Voyage of the Rock Aliens (1984)

The story-telling is good with flashbacks.The film is both funny and heartbreaking. You smile in a scene and get a soulcrushing revelation in the next.

The acting in this movie is really good.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

When Pia Zadora was rising to fame in the early 1980s she was always sold as a coquettish sexpot, from posing nude for Oui magazine to starring as Stacy Keach's teen temptress daughter in "Butterfly." Even her first album, "Pia," had the former Broadway performer heavy-breathing her way through soft pop songs, as if whispering into a lover's ear (until a chorus of back-up singers barges in, drowning her out). It was the career her then-husband Meshulam Riklis wanted for her, not the one that best suited her abilities, the multi- millionaire seemingly over-estimating her acting skill while underestimating her singing chops. That's not to say Pia wasn't complicit in this career plan; I just always got the impression she didn't want to be an international sex symbol as badly as her husband wanted to be married to one. As a result, Pia Zadora was a Hollywood joke before the '80s hit their midway point, with 1983's release of "The Lonely Lady" the punchline.Things started to turn around by 1985, but before they did there was 1984's barely released musical comedy "Voyage of the Rock Aliens," a last ditch effort to establish Pia as a movie star. It's a step in the right direction for Pia, playing to her strengths — singing and light comedy — rather than trying to present her as a barely-legal seductress. Unfortunately, even though she's stepping in the right direction, the movie she's in stumbles."Voyage" is the story of a rock n' roll obsessed aliens (portrayed by the band Rhema) who, after a screening of the video for Pia's duet with Jermaine Jackson, "When the Rain Begins to Fall," beam down from their guitar-shaped spaceship to the town of Speelburgh (insert eye roll here). Speelburgh is known for its toxic beaches, horrible fashion and camera-mugging. Also, there's some sort of beast with rubber- tentacles living in its waters that no one seems to notice. Pia plays Dee Dee, a cherubic high school hottie dating Frankie (Craig Sheffer). Frankie is a leader of the rockabilly band The Pack, though he never once performs with it. And he doesn't want Dee Dee to perform with the band, either. The aliens, dressed like they hail from the planet Chess King, have a hard time fitting in until they introduce the teens of Speelburgh to their synth-heavy, New Wave-ish sound and before you know it they're being invited to play at the Heidi High cotillion. Then the aliens' blond commander ABCD (pronounced "Absid") gets one look at Dee Dee and literally explodes with desire. Once re- assembled, he decides the quickest way to win Dee Dee's heart is to allow her to perform with the aliens.Also: Michael Berryman escapes from the local Hospital for the Criminally Insane, going on a chainsaw murdering rampage while the late Ruth Gordon pops up from time to time as a clueless sheriff, because why not? Though "Voyage" is a comedy, it's seldom funny in the way its makers intended (only Alison La Placa, as Dee Dee's best friend, gets any genuine laughs), and not nearly as funny as the drama "The Lonely Lady." There is some fun to be had at Craig Sheffer's expense as he lip-syncs "Nature of the Beast" while slinking around the woods and jabbing his cheekbones at the camera, and Pia's otherworldly fashions (complete with an unflattering side ponytail held in place with a spool) will inspire some embarrassed titters. Still, "Voyage" will produce more groans than guffaws.And then there's the music. To be fair, there are a few listenable tunes. I liked Rhema's song "21st Century" well enough, and Pia does all right with "When the Rain Begins to Fall" and "Little Bit of Heaven" (both songs hits in Europe), but otherwise the music ranges from forgettable to out-and-out terrible. Though more in her element, the quality of Pia's vocals is often inconsistent. Not helping is "Let's Dance Tonight," a retread of one of Zadora's cheesiest efforts, "Rock it Out," down to pushing the star aside so back-up singers can shout the chorus over and over again (which amounts to shouting the song's title, over and over again). No wonder people were so astonished when she belted out pop standards on the 1985 album "Pia & Phil". As for the dancing, well, it's energetic! "Voyage" isn't the worst movie in Pia's filmography. It is, however, the worst in many of her co-stars': La Placa, Berryman, Gordon, the band Rhema. Even Sheffer, whose credits include such gems as "Killer Virus" and "Merlin: The Return," probably winces when reminded of his lead role as Pia's bubble-butted boyfriend. Yet "Voyage" retains some charm as harmless, extra-cheesy fun, even if it ultimately fails to live up to its potential as an ahead-of-its-time "Earth Girls Are Easy" and is instead a forerunner to 1989's "Dr. Alien." Then again, "Voyage," "Earth Girls Are Easy" and "Dr. Alien" would make a helluva Bluray triple feature, so feel free to run with that idea, Shout Factory.

"Voyage of the Rock Aliens" is certainly an oddity. Conceived as a spoof of various genres of b-movies, Curb Records got involved and turned it into a vehicle for many of their musicians. A production team was assembled that included people who'd worked on films such as "Dr. Strangelove," "A Hard Days Night," "Star Wars," "Deadly Blessing," "Staying Alive," and "Swamp Thing," amongst others. Not a shabby crew. The result is a completely off-the-wall low budget movie populated with actors who weren't really actors and featuring beautiful visuals, an offbeat production design, catchy songs... and a completely random music video with Jermaine Jackson that was synthetically (and confusingly) inserted into the film as an afterthought.The story concerns a group of aliens who come to Earth and find themselves strangers in the even stranger land of Speelburgh, which is filled with greasers, kooky cops, psycho serial killers, and a slimy sea monster. It's there that one of the aliens (Tom Nolan) falls in love with an aspiring singer (Pia Zadora). But will these starcrossed lovers sing and dance their way across the universe? Or will her jealous greaser boyfriend (Craig Sheffer) stand in their way?!There's something so endearingly tacky about the whole thing that it's downright charming in the way so many similar cult movies are ("Rocky Horror," "Beach Party," "Xanadu," "The Apple," "Earth Girls Are Easy," etc). The characters are quirky and unique (Spyder Mittleman and Patrick Byrnes are both particularly noteworthy for their campy performances), the songs and dances are as '80s as it gets, there's more seemingly random WTF moments than you can shake a stick at, and it seemed like everyone was having a lot of fun screwing around and devouring the scenery.The problem is the film is not very well known. It barely saw any theatrical distribution in the USA before being unceremoniously dumped on video five years later, and I can't find any evidence that it ever played on cable (though it did in Canada). In Europe it had a slightly more substantial release since Pia Zadora's music was popular.If any American DVD distributors are reading, this one's crying out for a widescreen special edition release. And if any theatre managers are reading, midnight screenings would be sublime!

Even though the special effects rarely rise above amateurish, even though the acting, at places, can best be described as 'cardboard', and even though the final production lacks the polish of a comparable film, say 'Grease', this film is definitely worth the time.This film has several things going for it, definitely. First of all, there are some pretty decent actors in the film and some talented singers as well.There are few who are both decent actors and talented singers, but this in itself doesn't ruin the movie.Musically, watch for the sequence 'nature of the beast'. It is a bit overplayed, and stylistically overdone, yet still quite entertaining.Much of the comedy in the movie falls rather flat, but there a few shining moments mixed in. At the point the female victim helps the homicidal maniac repair his chainsaw is really where the movie begins to hit its stride and the various elements come together.Throughout the film, Pia Zadora is a joy to watch. She really doesn't deserve the bad press she's gotten. In this film, she comes across as a wonderful singer, as well as a passable actress who seems completely to buy into her character. This is definitely not a trivial task, as the plot as a whole is rather hokey and the monster in the film looks really cheap and rubbery. I personally cannot imagine myself having to pretend to be frightened of it, but the cast really does a pretty good job with it and overall. In short: Watch it, enjoy it. Don't expect 'Grease' going in, and you won't be disappointed coming out. And BTW, look for Pia's duet with Jermaine Jackson on 'When the rain begins to fall' at the beginning of the movie. I don't think it has anything to do with the rest of the movie, but it is a cute little rock video.

Plotless, goofy, lighthearted, audacious, uplifting, spirited - in short, the most fun movie I've watched in months! I don't even like musicals, but this one had me constantly tapping my feet on the floor. Pia Zadora's acting won't win any awards, but she's appropriately bright and perky here, plus a terrific singer. In its own terms, this film is damn close to perfect. If you have any nostalgic feelings about 80s music, this is a gift sent from heaven. (***1/2)