To date, the strongest argument against the multiverse concept as entertainment is Intermate, a witless waste of digital space. It posits a virtual dating game, also named Intermate, in which players visit actual “baby universes” and make a random hand gesture that triggers ultra-euphoric mindgasms.

The attractive Desa (Lauren York, Airplane Mode) serves as the game’s spokesperson, but she doesn’t play. Except when she does, joining equally attractive friends (Kidnap’s Malea Rose and Hunt Club’s Maya Stojan) in a round that sends them to Earth. They’re stuck on our strange world when a pink-necked space repairman (Jonathan Goldstein, Body of Influence 2) works to disrupt the game.

Or something like that. Written in part by director Richard Lerner (Revenge of the Cheerleaders), the story makes as much sense as the game’s convoluted rules: zilch. If only the repairman had disrupted his own movie!

Don’t just take my word for it; on the movie’s own website, Goldstein calls the script “really dense” on a “red carpet” interview: “We were all trying to figure it out.” Rose echoes that, admitting, “When you read the script, you’re like, ‘What is going on?’ … You’re thinking to yourself, ‘Oh, no, this is bad.'”

Boy, is it ever. The sci-fi tale plays like a comedy, but Lerner’s Q&A on the aforementioned site implies its campy vibe is accidental. That checks out because the movie is bereft of a single laugh, through no fault of the actors. Okay, there’s almost one good joke, however unintended: The ladies go to a rock club named, judging from the letter-sized piece of paper taped outside, Rock Club.

I imagine the real fun is the behind-the-scenes story, as Intermate originally came out as 2019’s slightly longer Flashout. Three years later, it sports a new opening and is “sexier.” I assume the former entails the exposition-packed title card that works against its purpose of adequately orienting viewers. As for the latter, Lerner depicts each male’s climax with quick cuts of bikini- and undie-clad torsos put through a tie-dyed filter, while a closing-credits disclaimer confirms as suspected, “Body and négligée shots in ‘flashouts’ not performed by Cast.”

None of this is sexy. In fact, running counter to the Lerner filmography, the whole thing is nudity-free — exceedingly odd since it resembles every Surrender Cinema release, down to the questionable computer animation. It’s as if whoever funded production found Jesus between shooting and editing, thereby threatening to pull out if the sex weren’t excised. That’s not to suggest any amount of added flesh could keep Intermate from being less interminable. —Rod Lott

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Based on a purported true story, The UFO Incident dramatizes the alien abduction of Barney and Betty Hill on Sept. 19, 1961, in New Hampshire — rural New Hampshire, of course.

After their close encounter of the made-for-TV kind, Barney (James Earl Jones, Exorcist II: The Heretic) and Betty (Estelle Parsons, Bonnie and Clyde) have amnesia, but also enough of a memory to not want to discuss it. Easier said than done since Betty experiences nightmares out the wazoo, while Barney sprouts warts on his groin.

Under hypnosis, however, they start to recall specific details of What Went Down on that silver saucer — no anal probe mentioned, but Betty shares taking a pregnancy test by way of a needle through the navel.

For the remainder of the telepic, director Richard A. Colla (Fuzz) cuts between Jones and Parsons’ separate sessions with the doctor (Barnard Hughes, The Lost Boys) and flashbacks to the night in question. While the visitors may look silly by today’s standards, youngsters watching live in ’75 were collectively traumatized. It’s hard to convey how much more powerful and terrifying a quick and partial glimpse could be when “pause” and “rewind” weren’t buttons on the remote control.

What’s most interesting are not these sequences aboard the ship, but the Hills’ recounting of such, thanks to Jones’ and Parsons’ skills as stage-trained actors. Jones in particular is able to go from sweat to full-on snot and tears on cue. Although I’m uncertain whether Betty is supposed to be as “special” as portrayed, there’s no denying Parsons sells her character’s unconditional love for Barney, a barrel of a man.

I’d even argue the movie works best before they undergo hypnosis, when Colla simply lets us into their normal life, including the everyday challenges they face from mankind. That the couple’s biracial aspect does not go without comment makes The UFO Incident more progressive than the tube offered at the time, outside of a Norman Lear sitcom. —Rod Lott

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When I read Michael Crichton’s 2002 killer-nanotech novel, Prey, I thought it would make a great movie. Now that I’ve seen Roland Emmerich’s Moonfall, featuring a similar villainous swarm, I second-guess my decision.

Ten years ago, while arguing over Toto lyrics, Space Shuttle astronaut Brian Harper (The Conjuring patriarch Patrick Wilson, born to look the part) lost a fellow crew member to an attacking cloud of sentient particles that put the “AI” in “hentai.” Now a disgraced former space cowboy and current deadbeat dad, Harper gets a shot at redemption when British and bearded conspiracy theorist KC Houseman (John Bradley, 2018’s Patient Zero) notices something NASA has not: The nanotech has forced the moon’s orbit outta whack!

Corralling Harper’s former partner (a wasted Halle Berry, Catwoman), they embark on a world-saving mission: Nuke the nanotech. All they need is a Space Shuttle; good thing a decommissioned one sits in an abandoned museum, if you don’t mind “FUCK THE MOON” graffitied on the fuselage. They don’t.

As stupid as all of this is, Moonfall is fairly watchable in its first hour, wringing a money shot out of the orbital shift triggering an L.A. flood. The second hour — the one in space — is where the movie becomes one big Moonfail. Emmerich sends our heroic trio into the moon’s craters, where what they find makes Mission to Mars’ much-derided “PowerPoint” climax look distinguished by comparison. Emmerich stretches his reveal into full-blown prequel potential with unneeded mythology that unspools like Stargate fanfic.

Meanwhile, back on Earth, family members in Colorado flee inbred rednecks in a chase sequence so overblown, it’s remarkable F9 hadn’t already laid claim.

Hoping to relive his box-office glory days of Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow, Emmerich recycles every page from his playbook: fractured family drama, meteorological porn, a melting-pot cast, regular-dude heroics, unspeakable dialogue (“I’m an astronaut, not a soldier!”) and, of course, upturned U.S. monuments. It’s all too much and yet not enough. —Rod Lott

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Vincenzo Natali’s minimalist sci-fi cult hit, 1997’s Cube, had such a killer concept — people wake in an apparently escape-free maze of cubes, many of which are booby-trapped — it didn’t need repeating. Proving lightning doesn’t strike twice, the Natali-less Cube 2: Hypercube simply tried to do the same thing again, leading to disappointment. Turns out, you can’t follow Cube.

So for Cube Zero, writer/director/prodcuer Ernie Barbarash (Stir of Echoes 2: The Homecoming) goes backward and behind the scenes. As a prequel, it’s only partly concerned with an all-new group of anonymous, amnesiac prisoners trying to navigate through the high-tech hell without being burned, chopped, melted or turned into ground beef. Instead, the focus is on the cube’s employees who carry out orders from management they know will cause harm to the maze dwellers without knowing the “why.”

One technician (Zachary Bennett, The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day) starts to question his job and the morals behind it — and hey, what took ya so long? After believing one attractive participant (Stephanie Moore, Urban Legends: Final Cut) is there entirely against her will, he takes an extreme measure that seems out of character, but action is action.

Even with a one-eyed supporting character who’s way over the top and a last-minute plot twist that veers toward the silly, Cube Zero emerges as a much better series entry than Cube 2 could ever dream of. It’s also notably gorier than either of its predecessors, and builds upon the mythology without getting caught in the abstraction of it all. Now, whether the original film needed further explanation … —Rod Lott

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When Okja premiered in 2017 on Netflix, many people maintained it’s about a girl and a “big pig”. However, I remembered a touching fable (foibles?) about a girl and a hippo-dog-elephant-pig. But I digress …

In an ideal farm in South Korea, young girl Mija (An Seo Hyun) cares for Okja, a wholesome hippo-dog-elephant-pig; he is taken to the big city, much like Babe: Pig in the City. But unlike Babe: Pig in the City, Okja is instead populated with pro-animal terrorists, pro-animal reality hosts and pro-animal factory farms.

Directed by the renowned Bong Joon Ho (Parasite), the film is notable for the extreme moments of scat jokes. But poop aside, it makes a children’s film in its own image. Also, the cast of Tilda Swinton, Paul Dano and Jake Gyllenhaal are playing to their characterized strengths — usually by stupid accents, but still.

What truly makes Okja a great film — which in turn makes Okja, a peaceful hippo-dog-elephant-pig, and how he is used — are the foot solders of this corporation, giving Okja a large boot to the head. It truly is unsettling about animal rights and how far we’d go.

Of course, it’s all undone by the time you crave a steak, but at least you know you tried. —Louis Fowler

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