EARTH TO ECHO
Director: Dave Green
Cast: Teo Halm, Astro, Reese Hartwig, Ella Wahlestedt, Jason Gray- Stanford, Alga Smith, Cassius Willis, Sonya Leslie, Kerry O’Malley, Virginia Louise Smith, Peter Mackenzie, Valerie Wildman
Rating: C
Earth to Echo is director Dave Green’s attempt at creating a modern updated version of the classic 1982 film directed by Steven Spielberg, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial. Stealing themes audiences have seen in movies like The Goonies, Stand by Me, The Blair Witch Project, Cloverfield, and Super 8 (just to name a few), Earth to Echo is strung together by jittery camera work as the storyline follows three misfit friends on a crazy unbelievable one night adventure. Will Earth to Echo skyrocket as the next heartwarming sci-fi kids adventure or just get grounded on the tarmac along with other failed sci-fi films?
Alex (Teo Halm), Tuck (Brian “Astros” Bradely), and Munch (Reese Hartwig) are best buds that are heartbroken at the thought of having to move away from each other due to a highway construction project that requires the demolition of their entire neighborhood. The boys are fascinated by an odd occurrence. There is a mass cel phone malfunction taking place and as the boys study and experiment with their cel phones they figure out that there is actually a map being displayed on the phone screens. With the help of Google Maps, the trio decided to spend their last night together on a treasure hunt so see where the map leads them. They wind up in the Nevada dessert and discover a metal cylinder and then figure out what or who is inside. A shiny, blue, cuddly bird-like robot that looks like an updated version of the owl from Clash of the Titans is what emerges from the container. Hours go by as the misfit friends try to communicate with the little tin creature. Finally, a line of communication is established between the boys and their new-found friend. The lighted up robot alien beeps once for yes, twice for no, creates echoes with sonic sound, and uses Google to communicate. So of course it is only fitting that Alex, Tuck, and Munch name their new pet “Echo.”
The threesome set out on a mission that takes them into the far corners of the city where no kid should go in an effort to figure out how to aid Echo in his quest to go home. First the kids breeze into a pawn shop and then amazingly enough they land up in the house of “mannequin girl” aka Emma (Ella Wahlestedt), the prettiest girl in school that the pre-teen boys are terrified to approach. Emma gets wind of what the boys are up to and won’t be left behind. She is the brains of the team that actually figures out what it is Echo is trying to do. Now the foursome manage to find themselves breaking into an arcade, strolling into a biker bar, congregating in a late night coffee shop, and ultimately ending up at the so called construction site with a nasty foreman that is not all that he appears to be.
Earth to Echo falls completely flat and often makes no sense at all. There is no explanation of why Echo leads the children on a journey to some unlikely places to retrieve parts for his ship when all the robot had to do was get them to a hardware store. Then there is the annoying narration done through the jiggling camera work that is enough to give anyone whiplash and a migraine headache.
Shaky video narration has been done so many times in other films and just holds nothing new for moviegoers. It is also hard to imagine that anyone, let alone a child, would have enough gumption to keep a camera rolling when faced with danger. Then there are loud noises and earthquake-like sounds hitting the city that no one seems to hear except four kids riding around in the middle of the night on bikes. It seems very unrealistic that only children would take notice of paranormal-like activity hitting the streets and no adults are to be seen during most of the film.
There are a few moments in the production that will get a chuckle out of the audiences, but for the most part none of the child stars really shine the way Drew Barrymore and Henry Thomas did in the classic E.T. from the 80s. There is no real connection between Echo and the four kids because everything happens in roughly 90 minutes over one night, versus the character development that happened in the original phone home movie that made those viewing fall in love the little alien just trying to get home.
Earth to Echo is to E.T. what Cubic Zirconia is to Diamonds – a cheap imitation of a classic. With too many stolen themes from other films to even count, this movie is just a collection of duplication that barely resembles sci-fi kid adventures of days gone by that left audiences with a sense of wonder and joy.
