Illegal Aliens Review

By Rob Rector

I no longer fear the icy grip of death, for I have endured and lived to review, the magnum opus known as “Illegal Aliens” a.k.a “How to Draw Blood from Anna Nicole’s Corpse.”

If you thought that there was no way the weight battling train-wreck of a fringe celebrity known as Anna Nicole Smith could embarrass herself any more than she had on her infamous “Anna Nicole” reality show on E!, well… you’re right.

That abysmal exercise in excess was about the lowest common denominator that documents the steep decline and a lifestyle that served as a preview to her early death. But that does not mean the makers of “Illegal Aliens” can’t try to dance around on the gravesite a little.

Smith shares the screen with two co-stars - her right and left breast. And while they both prove more animated than their master, they occasionally get pushed aside for two other actresses - Lenise Soren and Gladyn Jiminez (neither whom have found film work since, it may be added).

The three are shape-shifting aliens (Actually, Anna’s the only one who displays this ability, and it’s usually into a vehicle from some stock footage chase scene so the director can further pad the film) named Lucy, Cameron and Drew (wink, wink). They take the form of three tarted-up bimbos when they land on our planet because if Julie Brown taught us nothing, it’s that Earth girls are easy.

The film is set in 1990 - you know, that time when cell phones, the internet and Justin Timberlake were all so popular! At least they were with the lazy writers. The three take jobs as, what else, Hollywood stunt doubles (though the only stunts shown are Anna tripping over various things in what seems to be a drunken stupor). They are attempting to stop an evil E.T. Who had the misfortune of morphing into Joanie Laurer a.k.a. Chyna, the former WWE superstar. Apparently, the alien was not sure whether to morph into a man or a woman, so it chose a little of both.

Laurer spends the entire time screaming each and every line. It is almost like an audition tape for her current role on “Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew” on VH1. As an actress, she succeeds only by deflecting concern viewers may have of Smith’s deteriorating psychological state during the proceedings.

Smith, meanwhile, decided to make her character an even more brainless version of her televised “alter-ego.” It might have been considered a shrewd move, calculated by the actress to parody her own image. Yet a closer inspection of how director David Giancola (from “Timechasers,” the beloved chestnut featured on MST3K) stages the shots that were not cut from previous films, reveals that the three actresses were seldom shot together. It was usually Soren and Jiminez in one frame, with Smith filming her lines in another take altogether. Both Soren and Jiminez gamely deliver their lines, then we cut to Smith baby talking her part, eyes half closed, until she’s required to either fall down, break wind, play with sex toys, giggle or pretend to have explosive diarrhea.

And that makes a perfect segue into the overall quality of the film. Shot on the (very) cheap, crammed with bits from other films (the helicopter chase scene is actually featured in a trailer on the DVD for another film released by the studio!), and a script seemingly written in crayon, “Illegal Aliens” is painful and excruciating even on a mindless, B-movie level.

And yet, the image of Smith shoving a dildo in her ear here still manages to a less-damning legacy than her televised Anna antics on her E! sur-reality show.
I suppose that musical sage Phil Collins was spot on when he predicted in 1983 that “it’s no fun, being an ‘Illegal Alien.’”

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