The Day The Earth Stood Still

The film begins in the early 1920's, when an arctic explorer (played by Keanu Reeves) encounters a strange sphere while climbing a mountain. After chiseling away at the ice, a flare of white light engulfs him. He awakens unharmed, but with a mysterious scar on his right palm. Jump forward in time to modern day America. Jennifer Connolly is an American scientist specializing in exobiology who is very nearly kidnapped by the government. Their reason is, of course, related to 'national security'. She ends up in a Chinook helicopter with a 'who's who' roster of top scientists from every major discipline. It seems that an object moving at high velocity is headed towards Earth, threatening to hit it.

The epicenter of the impact will be New York City. When the object changes course and slows, and then descends into Central Park we see that it is not an asteroid or comet, it's a glowing sphere. Just as in the original film (considered to be the most iconic, if not seminal 'science fiction' film) the military behaves badly, shooting the humanoid shape that emerges.
From there we're treated to some very well-done special effects. The plot differs from the original film, but the themes are essentially the same:

• "Humanity is driven by fear and violence."
• "Advanced alien civilizations are watching Earth with great concern."

Keanu Reeves is Klatu, a representative of a group of alien civilizations come to 'save the Earth'. Kathy Bates plays a vaguely familiar version of Hillary Clinton as the Secretary of State, who cattily denies Klatu the chance to speak to the world's assembled leaders. Klatu asks her, "Do you represent the entire Earth?" She responds: "I represent the United States of America."
She asks him again if he intends them any harm and he replies again that he is here to 'save the Earth'. If it sounds like the story is heading towards a 'It's a Cookbook!' moment, you're right. As the ultimate 'Earth First' activist, Klatu initiates an apocalyptic cloud of nano-insects, who devour everything, growing with each attempt to destroy them. Klatu has determined that humans are too destructive to the Earth to be allowed to live.
First the good -- Reeves' performance was excellent. I had all sorts of adjectives at the ready: 'somnambulistic', 'robotic' and 'Al Gore-esque'. I was wrong - Keanu Reeves gives a very credible performance as an alien mind put into the body of a human, acting primarily with his eyes. Jennifer Connolly puts in her usual performance as a sensitive female scientist-type, shades of 'The Incredible Hulk'. Also, the robotic assistant to Klatu, 'Gort' has been redone. Instead of an 8' tall robot from the original film, Gort is a towering, single-eyed colossus - truly scary.
Now the bad. The film's message about the future of mankind is exceptionally bleak and stupid. A lot of the film makes no real sense. After Klatu sets the nano-insects into motion they wreak all sorts of havok; we see a cloud of them eat a trailer truck (and its driver) in a few moments. Moments before sentencing humanity to ultimate destruction, Klatu sends out alien spheres to collect the Earth's myriad life forms. We see snakes, parrots and seals scurrying, flapping and slithering into the spheres, which then whisk them away into space. No humans are seen being rescued. I couldn't help but imagine that this is a secret dream of animal rights activists and environmental extremists -- humans really should die for the sake of the blue-crested lesser snail darter.
Also, the military is portrayed alternatively as fearful idiots (firing on the cosmic traveler in film's first major plot point) or as bloodthirsty morons. In one scene the military launches predator drones (unmanned aerial vehicles) against Gort. The commander of the soldiers declares, "Fire! Fire! FIRE!!!" like a maniac. This is how Hollywood envisions the military -- as idiots.
There's a heavy dose of hypocrisy here, as the American leaders (including Kathy Bates' impersonation of Hillary Clinton as an imperious Secretary of State) are obliquely criticized for thinking they represent the world, but how much better could the alien collective that Klatu represents be? They've concluded humans should be destroyed before we 'destroy' the Earth. How's that for pre-emptive action? Of course, the Earth is saved (thanks to cute scientists like Jennifer Connolly) but the film doesn't even bother to deliver an iconic moment when a message is sent out at the end. Disaster is simply averted and then the film ends.
Overall, 'The Day The Earth Stood Still' was entertaining. The visuals were superb, the acting was generally very good, but the message was (in this reviewer's opinion) very topical, but ridiculous. The plot summary is: an alien environmental activist arrives to 'save the planet' (which entails nano-insects eating away humans and their civilization) but he suddenly comes to his senses and decides humans are worthy of life.
The moral of the story then is: "Beware people who want to 'save the world.'"
As a corollary, don't let Hillary Clinton become Secretary of State.
(considers)
I declare this movie suddenly great!