Christopher Walken gets an anal probe in this alien abduction movie. This movie (and the original book) is actually the origin of that bit of alien lore. The film is not that good. It kind of has the opposite problem of Fire in the Sky. There are a lot of scenes with the aliens, but they're quite poorly done. The aliens look like crap. The big skinny ones (the grays) look like balloons (like Fire in the Sky, it's suggested that these are actually aliens wearing space suits) and the short, stumpy ones look like rejected costumes from a Star Wars rip-off (one of them always has its lips pursed, because, you know, that's the way the animatronic mask was made). The alien scene at the end also gets pretty silly, with the aliens dancing with Walken and high fiving him. Walken himself is pretty good. Definitely Walken at his hammiest, but I think the film would have been unbearably boring if he hadn't gone that way.

Communion is a bizarre and conflicted treat. I believe a number of those involved with the making of the film had differing ideas as to what the film was about and what was fact. Walken plays Whitley Strieber, a man that investigates his supposed encounters with aliens. Strieber reportedly told Walken he was playing the role "too crazy" to which Walken replied "If the shoe fits...". This sums up the difficult story being told here. The film never gives a clear answer on what the truth is, nor which characters believe what. It's more an examination of reality, imagination, truth, and all out mental psychological weirdness. It begins as a rather terrifying film. The aliens (fake looking) appear bit by bit, and their simplicity adds an artificial and uncomfortable atmosphere. It becomes apparent that the aliens are meant to look fake, as they are later used as a tool for identity and realism. We see other aliens wearing alien masks and the lack of realism lures us into a bizarre, comical and unsettling world. Communion is a confusing film, but if you are willing to let a film punch your brain you should seek it out. Comes with a haunting main theme by Eric Clapton.

From the writer of "Wolfen" and "The Hunger", two somewhat awkward but nevertheless genuine horror tales, comes this truly outlandish and unclassifiable amalgam of Sci-Fi, thriller and family drama that I still haven't figured out how to properly rate even though I saw it several days ago and did a whole lot of contemplating since. Whitley Strieber, who turned his own novel into a screenplay and co-produced the film, unceasingly claims that "Communion" is based on his very own experiences as being the target of alien abduction and examination. Now this given could easily be dismissed as a cuckoo and sensational gimmick to promote the film, but simultaneously you can't deny that Strieber and director Philippe Mora ("The Beast Within", "The Howling II") attempted – and mainly succeeded – to insert a lot more psychological depth and feeling into this film than usually the case with alien movies. "Communion" is, above all, an extremely weird film and undeniably one that provokes thoughts and opinions that go far beyond the experiences you usually have when watching late 80's movies that deal with extraterrestrial encounters. The author Whitley Strieber is depicted by Christopher Walken – I'll get back to his unforgettable performance later – and the movie begins somewhere early October 1985. During a series of recesses at their country cabin, whether with friends or just with his family, Whitley has "meetings" with two types of alien visitors – the stereotypical large black-eyed ones and little blue monsters – that thoroughly subject him to painful and psychologically devastating examinations. Since Whitley doesn't recall these meeting but obviously alter his mental state of mind, he eventually agrees to relive them via hypnosis sessions. The revelations that come to the surface during these sessions are amazing and fantastic, to say the least… This film's greatest trump is inarguably how it forces you to identify with the supportive characters. Not the protagonist himself, as he's obviously a character you can't easily relate to, but his wife or his doctor. Personally, I'm not a "believer" in extraterrestrial life myself, but that doesn't matter because you are only supposed to accept that Whitley Strieber strongly believes all the ordeals that he's hallucinating about. It's quite remarkable how Strieber and Mora manage to put the emphasis on the impact that Whitley's behavior has on his social life, rather than on the actual alien encounters itself. I haven't read it myself, but a friend of mine assured me that the novel digs even deeper into the psychological aspects, so if you're into complex protagonist portrayals you might want to check out the book. If half of the film's power relies on atmosphere, than the other half definitely relies on Christopher Walken's performance! Walken is famous for his outrageous performances and eccentric characters, but he truly surpasses himself as Whitley Strieber. The stereotypical maniac and certifiable crazy person that you know as Christopher Walken – and how he's often imitated by fellow celebrities like Kevin Pollack and Kevin Spacey – fully came to life on the set of "Communion", I presume. He yells, stares creepily, pauses between words and pulls petrifying faces almost like he's spoofing his own personality. In an attempt to appeal to an as versatile as possible audience, "Communion" loses a lot of its credibility and ingenuity near the end, with sequences that are just exaggeratedly demented and special effects that ruin the surreal ambiance. The last fifteen minutes are overlong and sorely disappointing. Also, on a lesser important note, you better not have seen the pilot episode of "South Park" too many times, otherwise you can't help comparing Whitley Strieber's alien encounters with the anal probes that Eric Cartman had.

Whitley suddenly finds himself in an alien world, where once he tells his abduction story, he becomes subject of, strangely enough, his own ridicule, but also public skepticism. When his mind tells him something even his own, never mind outsiders, own logic rejects, he truly finds himself inside an alien nightmare of a reality. But this is the moment he has his "communion", when he changes as a person. The symbolism is powerful in this movie, suggesting that it's not what is obvious, but that there is a hidden meaning behind a life-altering experience.From a creative point of view, a story like this might be quite appealing, and regarded as extravagant, but how would we cope with somebody claiming to have lived such things? Or more, with our own minds telling us? And how are these things going to affect us? Are they going to derail us from our current paths, change our perception, or are we going to regard them as oddities beyond our grasp and understanding? There is a moment where Whitley says that they are all masks of God, perfectly underlining the fact that the strangest thing can actually be just a bit outside our roam of understanding, but still within some common frame of cosmic alignment. It's up to us weather we accept or reject it. Much of the movie is Walken's merit, because his performance compensates the lack of elaborate special effects and there are some occasions where his facial expression is enough to make your skin crawl.