Fantastic Fest Review: Alpha Gang

A classic trope of alien invasion films is the interstellar interloper arriving on Earth and finding that they like it. In that way, and that way alone, Alpha Gang is a classic alien invasion film.

After that, it’s a textbook example of the quizzical, quixotic, and charming filmmaking stylings of the Zellner brothers, doing for sci-fi what they did for Westerns with Damsel or cryptid flicks in Sasquatch Sunrise.

The newly arrived Alpha Six (Riley Keough) is the latest member of the Alpha Gang, under the command of Alpha One (Léa Seydoux), who is leading the attack on Earth with her trusty lieutenant ,Alpha Two (Dave Bautista), as well as Alpha Three (Kelvin Harrison Jr.), Alpha Four (Lily-Rose Depp), and Alpha Five (Bae Doona). Their mission? To conquer Earth. Maybe. Or maybe devastate it. A lot of information was lost as these magnificent alien creatures were transmogrified and squeezed into these paltry human disguises. Can you imagine? Only five senses?

The invasion is going slowly. As a multipartite civil war rages across an unnamed Middle European nation, the Alpha Gang sit in their castle, await instructions, and dress like a 1950s biker gang. It’s as if their species had learned everything about Earth from a garbled late-night transmission of a biker B-movie, but not a good one like The Wild One. Some second half of a double bill headlined by Motorcycle Gang or The Hot Angel. There’s something quaint about them, a lost postwar dream as Bautista, leather cap pulled down over his eyes, chews on a toothpick and Seydoux frantically shimmies in a poodle skirt – yes, the kind with a literal poodle embroidered on it.

Their befuddled and befuddling idyll is ultimately one running on borrowed time, as the discovery of a biker jacket with the mysterious words “Beta Gang” spelled out in medal studs indicates. But they keep dancing, and eating soup, and occasionally mowing down pesky Earthlings with chrome-plated weapons and wondering if they should have come as ants instead because at least ants seem to know how to work together.

There’s a certain cadence to their performances that embodies the idiosyncrasies of the Zellners, and everybody here understands that balance. It’s in the juxtaposition of Keogh’s perma-shocked eyebrows under those razor-sharp bangs, and Bautista’s perfect lean over the jukebox, and Harrison Jr.’s budding relationship with an unexpected messenger. The arrival of Chris Pine as an interloper adds a surprisingly bawdy edge to what had previously been oddly chaste – the Zellners’ commentary, seemingly, on how innocent that supposedly dangerous biker culture looks in hindsight.

In its earnest stylizations, Alpha Gang has already drawn comparisons to Wes Anderson, but that juxtaposition misses a pivotal difference in orientation. Anderson’s characters have an emotional detachment that keeps them at arm’s length – a cinematic Alienation effect. By contrast, the Zellners portray aliens who are wrestling with their inner lives. While they muse in confusion about parts of their identity and mission that have been lost in translation, they are also contending with these new urges. To them, it’s a disease, but that doesn’t explain why they’re all so eager to be infected.

Anderson’s clinical eye also doesn’t have the Zellners’ sense of warmth. The Alpha Gang are absurd but treated with a certain tenderness. If there’s been a recurrent theme in the brothers’ more recent films, it’s that there’s no place for the eccentric and innocent in this world. There’s also that signature sense of mournfulness that starts to envelope the Alpha Gang’s increasingly ludicrous actions.

Handcrafted and ridiculous, Alpha Gang secures the Zellners’ position as America’s most delightfully unconventional filmmakers. Under all its quirks and calm silliness, it’s a poignant reinforcement of their ongoing thesis about the flimsiness of the American dream.

Fantastic Fest runs Sept. 17-24 at the Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar. Badges and info at fantasticfest.com. Follow our coverage at austinchronicle.com/fantastic-fest.

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