For whatever reason when I think of 1996's 'The Arrival' the first thing that comes to mind is a Letterman sketch from the time the film came out. Letterman critizes the films dialogue, we cut to a clip of one of the movies floppy headed aliens and hear dubbed over the scene the words "I've got a flop, flop, floppy head." Dave then claims that all the kids are gonna be quoting this line.
Ironically the scene they used for that gage contains one of two effects shots that hasn't dated horribly (the other being the collapse of a giant satellite dish). While the visuals often come across as goofy the story is played pretty straight, with Charlie Sheen improbably cast as a SETI type scientist who uncovers evidence that aliens might already be here on Earth.
Of course aliens are here and Sheen sets out to uncover what they're up to. This is one of those mysteries that's not reallty a mystery, because the audiance figures out what the plan is long before the lead pieces it together. The aliens are trying to terraform our planet to be more like their's, the time it takes Sheen to realize this is a little above par compared to the annoyance level of how long it takes Laurence Olivier to figure out that the escaped Nazi's are cloning Hitler's in 'The Boys from Brazil'. Still its nice to see science fiction ideas played resonably straight and reasonably smart in a 90's action thriller. While such a story would be underwhelming today; I'm going to graciously see it through 90's lenses and award ***
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