Landscape with Invisible Hand
Based on the novel by M. T. Anderson, the story is set in a near future where the planet has been taken over by the Vuvv, a race of dog-sized creatures that look like slimy shoeboxes with lobster eyes and four flappy appendages. This is no Independence Day action story, however -- the Vuvv are basically an alien private equity firm that partners with Earth's more-than-welcoming elites in an "exciting business opportunity," moving the upper class to live with them on giant floating cities in the sky while the rest of humanity slum it out on the surface, struggling for jobs and trying to survive as an afterthought of the new dominant species. The have's have taken all their toys and left, while the have-nots are left (quite literally) picking through their garbage. The best hope anyone can have for stability is to make a desperate play to get the aliens to notice them and hire them on as servants.
For those on the ground, it's a pretty bleak existence that shares a lot of parallels with our current, real-world environment of late-stage capitalism. Things like education, art, and even relationships are either rendered obsolete or treated as commodities, and there is no limit to how low people will stoop to get their new alien leaders to notice them. The social media commentary pretty much writes itself.
Adam (Asante Blackk) is an aspiring artist who falls for new student Chloe (Kylie Rogers), and with an alarming casualness, almost immediately invites Chloe and her less-fortunate family to live in their basement. Adam, his younger sister and mother (Tiffany Haddish) are considered incredibly fortunate to even have a home, even though they still struggle to make ends meet. In a scheme to make a little bit of cash, Adam and Chloe start live-streaming their relationship to the increasing interest of the aliens, who don't understand many basic human emotions or feelings. Their relationship quickly fizzles out on camera, and the couple find themselves sued by the aliens for fraud, putting both families in uncomfortable situations as they try to avoid complete bankruptcy.
It's a clever premise that allows a lot of opportunity for satire; maybe too much opportunity in fact, as there are bits that take aim at corporations run amok, gentrification, social media, dating culture, class and race inequality, commodification of the arts, and general jabs at the slow collapse of humanity. It's not exactly biting material, but to be fair, it's hard to satirize an era where the issues and their causes are so well-known and widely discussed; other modern satires like "Don't Look Up" (2021) have had the same problem.
The movie's tone is one of almost casual indifference, as even coming face to face with a crazy-looking alien hardly garners any kind of response from anyone. It's the end of society, met with a sigh. The dry tone works well for the material and manages a few good laughs, even if it does slightly undercut the attempts at more serious moments in the movie's latter half. The aliens themselves are quite comical; their design alone provided some good physical comedy (I laughed every time they shifted their eye stalks around) and their appendage-rubbing language is a fairly unique creation.
The movie flies by from one episode to the next, managing to entertain but never really exploring anything beyond surface level. The lessons learned (selfishness of the elites and the exploitation of artists and educators) aren't anything new at this point, even if they are repackaged into a science fiction allegory. The cast is mostly fine, even if Haddish seems a little miscast as a weary single mother. Finley does a lot right visually, as the alien effects and CGI find a good balance between realistic and completely silly.
It's hard not to feel a little let down after such a promising start (and considering the quality of Finley's previous efforts), but ultimately the movie tries to take on too many things at once, resulting in a pretty uneven experience. The quirky concept is interesting enough to keep things moving, but the entire project falls well short of providing any real insight, a big no-no for any effective satire.
