Rechargeable Aliens

The found footage “movie” The Phoenix Tapes ’97 is YET ANOTHER attempt to cash in on the REAL EVENT of UFOs buzzing the Arizona night skies back March 13, 1997. It was on the news, so it had to be real.

Four smelly guys pile into an RV and go on a man date in the Arizona desert, filming every tedious dialogue interchange along the way. During the night, loud explosion-y booms are heard and meteors are seen crashing into the desert mountains. [Spoiler: this was the ONLY cool thing about the movie.]

Daylight brings more questions, like how to air out the RV and where is one of the dudes. And what the heck was shaking the RV at night and making stomping noises on the roof? I’m thinkin’ pranking frat brothers, but likely it was extraterrestrials. Kinda the same thing when you think about it.

As they argue like whiny b*tches and abandon the stalled RV and wander back towards civilization (they weren’t that far off; you can hear a dog barking in someone’s back yard), they see those famous patterned lights in the sky and go WTF?!?

One by one, each gets drug off into the night with the video camera still running. You sorta kinda maybe get a glimpse of the aliens, whose legs appear to be riddled with arthritis. But my issue is with the camera. That thing kept running (with night vision) long after they four guys were slipped a date rape drug and probed. Video cameras back in 1997 could barely hold a charge and were notorious slow to recharge, which was not done the entire time. (So an RV battery conks out overnight, and a video camera battery lasts all through the abductions?) And to think I was gonna buy an RV.

I believe in UFOs. I do not believe in 1997 video cameras. So there.