Mars Attacks!

Comedy, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Action

Jack Nicholson	President James Dale/Art Land
Glenn Close	First Lady Marsha Dale
Annette Bening	Barbara Land
Pierce Brosnan	Professor Donald Kessler
Danny DeVito	Rude Gambler
Michael J. Fox	Jason Stone
Tom Jones	Himself
Martin Short	Press Secretary Jerry Ross
Sarah Jessica Parker	Nathalie Lake
Rod Steiger	General Decker

Director	Tim Burton
Producer	Tim Burton; Laurie Parker
Writer	Jonathan Gems; Len Brown
Cinematography	Peter Suschitzky
Musician	Danny Elfman

It's enlightening to view Tim Burton's Mars Attacks! as his twisted satire of the blockbuster film Independence Day, which was released earlier the same year, although the movies were in production simultaneously. Burton's eye-popping, schlock tribute to 1950s UFO movies actually plays better on video than it did in theaters. The idea of invading aliens ray gunning the big-name movie stars in the cast is a cleverly subversive one, and the bulb-headed, funny-sounding animated Martians are pretty nifty, but it all seemed to be spread thin on the big screen. On video, however, the movie's kooky humor seems a bit more concentrated. The Earth actors (most of whom get zapped or kidnapped for alien science experiments) include Jack Nicholson, Glenn Close, Annette Bening, Pierce Brosnan, Danny DeVito, Martin Short, Sarah Jessica Parker, Rod Steiger, Michael J. Fox, Lukas Haas, Jim Brown, Tom Jones, and Pam Grier. --Jim Emerson