Close Encounters, but Unkind

By Gerald Clarke

Dear TIME, I am writing you because I need some information, and according to your TV commercials, you know what's happening on your world. Before the little ones are old enough to slither away, I would like to visit earth, show them the sights of Disneyland, let my other half wander through Bloomingdale's, and do some shopping for myself at Radio Shack. But I have been watching your television for years, and if your movies are any indication, it seems that though earth may be a nice place to live, it is not a good place for aliens like me to visit. If true, it is a pity because we are almost neighbors, only 26 light-years away. Tell me, please, what sort of welcome might we expect? Sincerely yours, Mega from Vega (Planet IV)

Dear Mega from Vega (Planet IV), Thank you for your letter, which has caused a certain amount of comment in these corridors (not to mention a scramble for the postage stamp). As it happens, there are lots of aliens visiting onscreen this summer: the godlike creatures of Cocoon, who put youthful zip back into the geriatric set; the vampires of Life-force; and the adorable, if grotesque, brats of Explorers, who steal Dad's jalopy, zoom around the galaxy and help three young earthlings build their own backyard spaceship. And of course everybody's favorite extraterrestrial has come back in a re-release of 1982's zillion-dollar grosser, E. T. We can sympathize with your nervousness, however. Since receiving your letter, we have looked up many of those old films that have caused you so much anxiety up there on Vega (IV), and you are right. We don't treat aliens very well here on Sol (III), but then, for the most part, aliens don't treat us very well either.

Hollywood first became aware of alien visitors in the '50s, when the cold war was at its height, flying saucers were flitting over suburban barbecues, and Americans were feeling, perhaps justifiably, a little paranoid. Among the first of these science-fiction creature features was The Thing, a real scarer in which a huge and extremely unpleasant plant lands in the Arctic, the point man, so to speak, of an invasion by other vainglorious veggies. "You mean we're dealing with a walking carrot?" asks an indignant reporter.

Later came callers from the Red Planet. In Invaders from Mars, they manipulate humans by implanting devices in their heads (such a good idea that a remake started filming a few weeks ago). In The Day Mars Invaded the Earth, they incinerate an entire family and flush their ashes down the swimming-pool drain. In The War of the Worlds, the aliens turn their deadly rays on everything in sight. "Welcome to California!" say three friendly Chamber of Commerce types as they walk toward the Martian craft. Zap! More ashes. A minister tries to soothe them with the 23rd Psalm. Zap again! Luckily (or unluckily, as Vegaites might view it), they had not got their flu shots before they left home, and they succumb to our microbe-rich air.

There were other galactic creepie-craw-lies in Invasion of the Body Snatchers, so much a classic that it has been filmed twice, and in thrillers such as It Conquered the World, This Island Earth, It Came from Outer Space, The Space Children, Invasion of the Saucer Men, Earth vs. the Flying Saucers and I Married a Monster from Outer Space--in which the monster assumes the body of a young man just before his wedding, leaving his poor bride biting her nails in confusion. You can perhaps understand, Mega, why so many earthlings are afraid of things that come from Out There.

Yet we must admit that as far as Hollywood is concerned, we are not always good hosts either. In The Day the Earth Stood Still, one of the earliest of the alien films, the suave, distinguished-looking Klaatu alights from a saucer to try to save us from atomic war. His reward is to be shot. Another Good Samaritan came calling in last year's Starman and received an equally rude greeting before he managed to reach a waiting spaceship. (Is it true, as seems apparent from our movies, that all flying saucers are designed by Steven Spielberg?) Even lovable E.T. is hounded, picked at and all but dissected before his phone call home is answered and, racing through hyperspace, the interstellar cavalry rescues him from the Indians, namely, the U.S. Government. With the exceptions of Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Cocoon, we could not find a single movie in which the earthlings and the aliens got along.

What sort of welcome would you receive? We can't say for sure, but our scenario is different from Hollywood's. 60 Minutes would demand to know who paid for your trip, Barbara Walters would delicately ask how you, ah, do it, and Joan Rivers would make off-color jokes about you and Heidi Abromowitz. Perhaps it would be better if you traveled incognito. In that case, our advice is to land, big and bold as you please, in Hollywood's own backyard, on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills When someone says "Are you new to California?" pretend not to hear and ask for directions to Spago. After that, no one will raise an eyebrow. --By Gerald Clarke