'Alpha Gang' Michael Gioulakis Watching Alpha Gang, the new sci-fi comedy from Sasquatch Sunset filmmakers David and Nathan Zellner, it is very easy to imagine what a thrill it must have been to cook up the look of the thing.
The leads — a small squadron of aliens who’ve infiltrated our planet — are decked out in the studded leather jackets of a 1950s motorcycle gang. Their home base, nestled deep into some war-torn European countryside, looks simultaneously like the ruins of an ancient castle, an opulent cave lair suitable for Dracula, a retro-futuristic spaceship with gleaming chrome surfaces.
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Alpha Gang
The Bottom Line An aesthetic in search of a story. Venue: Telluride Film Festival Cast: Léa Seydoux, Dave Bautista, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Lily-Rose Depp, Doona Bae, Riley Keough, Chris Pine, Cate Blanchett Directors: Nathan Zellner, David Zellner Screenwriter: David Zellner 1 hour 49 minutesIt’s a striking hodgepodge of visual influences, and certainly an unusual one; I can’t think of another movie that climaxes with, essentially, medieval knights making their way through a Cold War nuclear bunker. But I also couldn’t quite tell you why this one does — or in fact why anything that happens in it happens at all. Premiering at Telluride, Alpha Gang is a mood board in search of a story.
It is at least possible to see that the script (written by both Zellners; only David is credited as director) intends to Say Something about what it means to be human in a time of great strife. The titular Alpha Gang are a star-studded sextet comprised of Léa Seydoux, Dave Bautista, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Lily-Rose Depp, Doona Bae and Riley Keough, their ID numbers (Alpha One, Alpha Two, etc.) going in that order. Like aliens from all over cinema, their mission here is to conquer, though they appear downright incurious about to what precise purpose.
Alpha Gang, however, is not quite headed for a war for the fate of the world. (Not that it stops this movie from indulging in several long, dull fights whose staging begins and ends with machine guns shooting out lots of bullets.) Instead, it’s mostly the team versus their own newfound humanity. The bodies they’ve taken on are awfully inconvenient, what with the constant need to eat, drink, shit and piss. Worse, they’re evidently highly susceptible to a contagious condition known as “having emotions.” So dangerous do the Alpha Gang consider this disease that anyone found to have it must be quarantined immediately.
They, of course, all have it. True, the crew are unmoved by whatever human war is popping off in the horizon, between unnamed combatants for unclear ends. But they’re fascinated by new-to-them Earthly concepts like ants and hard candies — and especially intrigued by this crazy little thing called “love,” which seems to be the central concern of all the midcentury jukebox hits they have dance parties to several times a day. (The music of Alpha Gang, a mix of Octopus Project’s score and music supervisor Jillian Ennis’ collection of tunes by Elvis, The Crystals and the like, is another surface-level highlight of this hollow film.)
As for why they love dancing so much, how they’ve developed a taste for this specific kind of Earth music, what their home planet’s culture might be like, how it is these extraterrestrials came to Earth with the rockabilly look down pat (including the toothpicks sticking out of their mouths), yet apparently never bothered to find out if Earth has a single leader for them to capture … the lack of effort to address such basic questions would be more bothersome if not for the fact that Alpha Gang feels so thin I couldn’t muster the curiosity to ask in the first place.
All you really need to know is that this is a species very advanced in some regards (science, etc.) but hopelessly naïve in others. This does lead to some rather funny, or funny-sad, moments. In one, Harrison’s Alpha Three, the most innocent of the bunch, gets a visit from a messenger hawk and earnestly asks it to go steady, assuming that any creature this majestic must be very high-ranking in the hierarchy of Earthly creatures. In another, Alpha Four (Depp) decides she wants to try being known by a name instead of a number, leading to a comic shouting match in which everyone bickers over who gets to be what name.
There’s also a sweet bit of longing between Alphas One (Seydoux) and Two (Bautista) that ought to be the emotional crux of the film, but instead only made me wish once again for Bautista to play a proper romantic lead in a better movie.
But having assembled all these colorful elements, in a riotous collage of contrasting aesthetics, Alpha Gang seems not to know what to do with any of them. Even later additions to the cast, including Chris Pine and Cate Blanchett, bring plenty more flash — Pine revels in playing a weirdo who’s only just learning about things like “water” and “drinks even stronger than water,” while Blanchett chews up Brutalist scenery as a cartoonish, eye-patched villain — but not more depth or intrigue.
What we’re left with feels less like a movie than the outline of one, with character development or plot to be shaded in later. If this stylish but otherwise substance-free semblance of an existence is what it means to be human, I wouldn’t blame any alien for taking one look and turning right back around for whatever planet they’ve just come from.
Full credits
Venue: Telluride Film Festival Production companies: Felix Culpa, Dirty Films, Fat City, Gramercy Park Media, Peachtree Group, Aloe Entertainment, Sweetheart Entertainment, ZBi Cast: Léa Seydoux, Dave Bautista, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Lily-Rose Depp, Doona Bae, Riley Keough, Chris Pine, Cate Blanchett Directors: Nathan Zellner, David Zellner Screenwriter: David Zellner Producers: Nathan Zellner, David Zellner, Coco Francini, Cate Blanchett, Ryan Zacarias, Gina Gammell, Mary Aloe, Joshua Harris, Andrea Bucko Executive producers: Riley Keough, Jesse Ozeri, Ross Boucher, Thomas Ogden, Gillian Hormel, Nathan Mardis, Jeff Rice, Matt Hartley, Jordan Claire Robbins, Benjamin Michel, Paul Trillo, Greg Friedman, Jatin Desai, Justin Reardon, Barbara Reardon, Mark Cheatwood, Chilling Lin, Phillip Neumann, Faisal S Al Saud, Charles Paret Director of photography: Michael Gioulakis Production designer: Scott Kuzio Costume designer: Susie Coulthard Editors: Daniel Tarr, Nathan Zellner, David Zellner Original score: The Octopus Project Sales: CAA 1 hour 49 minutesTHR Newsletters
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