Post by uforn on Oct 29, 2010 20:07:49 GMT 1
Anatomy of an ‘Autopsy’
The big-screen dramatization of the 1995 hoax satirizes the triumph of entertainment over sound judgement
by Billy Cox
We got a look at the flip side of corporate-media indifference toward UFOs two weeks ago with its overheated response to the balloon incident over Manhattan. The same machinery that couldn’t be bothered to pick up the bleepin’ telephone and ask Carswell Naval Air Base in Fort Worth, Tex., why its radar records disappeared on the night a UFO without a transponder beelined towards President Bush’s “western White House” in 2008 practically wet its pants over the New York balloons. That’s because the October surprise was easy, reactive, visual and required few resources. And, oh yeah, lazy.
And that’s why De Void is glad to see the British comedy “Alien Autopsy” finally getting released on DVD in the States. This overlooked parody opened at the Sarasota Film Festival in 2007 and vanished without a ripple immediately thereafter.
Those of you unlucky enough to have followed the UFO subculture for the last 15 years will remember the original alien-autopsy controversy, in which Fox Broadcasting — among others — shelled out six figures to air what was marketed in 1995 as original autopsy footage of a Roswell alien cadaver. De Void came thisclose to getting sucked into the five-star disgrace by an American huckster, but that’s another story.
Bottom line: Using a dummy and pig blood, hoaxmongers led by British video pirate Ray Santilli drained nearly a million bucks from willfully guillible networks spanning Asia to North America, which didn’t care because their ratings shot through the roof.
The cinematic version of “Alien Autopsy” is a loosely based, behind-the-scenes dramatization of that travesty, conducted with a large assist from — once again — Santilli. It’s not a great movie, but it is clever. And glib. And very smug. And actor Declan Donnelly, who portrays Santilli as a mischievous charismatic narcissist, no doubt flatters his subject.
Director Jonny Campbell does get terrific cameo performances from Bill Pullman, Harry Dean Stanton, and Orson Bean (remember him?). But that’s not why you might wanna give it a spin. Its caricature of the Manhattan balloon/UFO version of American media — amid a worldwide scramble to air the footage first — is instructive and spot on.
To be fair, entertainment executives and their checkbooks, not news division editors, made the call on Santilli’s hoax. But two weeks ago we saw the same raw competitive impulses disgorged in newsrooms, which brewed fevered speculation with a disregard for reality (panic in the streets) more commonly associated with entertainment. And what made it all so galling was the episode’s disproportionality to any sort of investigative commitment journos might apply to the larger riddle of UFOs which, as we all know, is zero.
It’s easy to dismiss the New York incident as harmless fun because nobody got hurt. But “Alien Autopsy” offers a make-believe scenario that may not be terribly far off base. “In the end,” declares an intelligence spook, “they know Ray’s gonna be found out as a faker, which will bury the truth even longer.”
We are reminded that even Time magazine took the bait and speculated the Santilli rubbish might be “the most important home movie since the Zapruder film.” That was back in 1995. Correct me if I’m wrong, but Time hasn’t touched UFOs ever since.
Source:
devoid.blogs.heraldtribune.com/11331/anatomy-of-an-autopsy/?pa=all&tc=pgall