Earth To Echo

Earth to Echo is the first full length feature film from director Dave Green. It's a solid debut in my opinion though I could have gone for less shaky camera pov. It's a mash-up of many of my favorite childhood movies like The Goonies, E.T., and The Explorers. The stereotypes are all in place which is fine. I was originally going to give this movie 2.5 out of 5 buckets of Killer Korn due to the overwhelming amount of shaky cam, but I'm going to give it 3 delicious buckets of Killer Korn because it earned it.










Earth To Echo is straight out of the milieu of E.T. and The Goonies and when you make a film using the templates of those two classics, you can't go wrong. There are other elements of other movies scattered about but those two comprise the heart and the soul of Echo. It's the story of three best friends in middle school and it takes place on the last night they may ever spend together thanks to a planned highway displacing the residents of the quiet suburb the kids live in. There is Tuck, played by newcomer Brian Bradley who is the leader of the trio, Alex played by Teo Halm, the charming but quiet foster kid who longs for stability, and lastly there's weird Munch played by Reese Hartwig. He's the skitterish, clueless brains of the operation. Together the three friends make quite a trio and hate the fact that they'll soon be separated. Tuck seemingly wants to be a Youtube sensation and records EVERYTHING (hence the shaky cam nonsense) and one day all three boys phones go haywire.

On their last day together they decide to lie to their parents and embark on a journey in the middle of the night a la The Goonies. They follow a map on those haywire phones that leads them to a barn where they find something that looks like a pod. They spend a few hours communicating with the it (a 1 beep for yes, 2 beeps for no kind of thing) and they find out that it's an alien that wants to get back to it's ship so he can go home. The alien named Echo, because it can repeat your ring tone back to you, is also being hunted by a mysterious organization that smacks of E.T. Echo guides the kids all over town finding parts that it can use to help get it stronger and back to it's ship. One of those pieces is in the bedroom of the prettiest girl in their school named Emma, played by Ella Wahlestedt. The threesome becomes a foursome and Echo leads them right back to a very familiar spot.

The plot holes are massive and are hard to miss, but you don't really care because the movie is enjoyable. Besides it's a kids movie and kids could care less about plot holes. The true beauty of this film in my opinion is the diversity of the cast. In a role where it could have gone to someone white and no one would have batted an eye, Tuck is African American. That made me smile and hopefully other directors and casting directors will follow suit and cast more African Americans in the future. There is a cinematographer though I think he got paid for not doing much. Maybe there is a serious technique to shaky cam that I just don't know about but if there isn't then Maxime Alexandre got paid for nothing. Scored by Joseph Trapanese, the music sounded like something the group Explosions From The Sky did for the film Friday Night Lights. Trapanese is a talented composer but if this score seems familiar to you it's because it sounds entirely like someone else's music. That being said, I enjoyed Earth To Echo, it was a trip down movie memory lane for me and I really enjoyed the ride.

MarkEricEntertainment