Weekly ‘Flix Fix: Dan Aykroyd Unplugged on UFOs

Weekly ‘Flix Fix takes the legwork out of wading through thousands of film choices on Netflix, bringing you the most truly bizarre, quirky and outright amazing gems instant streaming has to offer.

Somewhere underneath the amateur cinematography, cheesy title cards and fuzzy UFO footage of “Dan Aykroyd Unplugged on UFOs” lurks utter genius.

After more than 30 years of his comic antics, it’s tough to tell whether this one deserves a serious look or another round of laughs.

Over the course of the film, essentially a 100-minute interview with Aykroyd, the film’s host and the comedy veteran discuss every facet of UFOs from government cover-ups, to mass sightings, to the mechanics of interstellar travel. Their discussion is calm, collected, seemingly intelligent and entirely opposite the semi-coherent ranting of UFO-enthusiasts portrayed by most mainstream sources.

By the end, viewers must decide if the host and interviewee are either madmen or perfectly sane people in a mad, mad world. Neither choice is comforting.

The film is technically appalling. The title sequence looks like director David Sereda cobbled it together with Microsoft WordArt. Much of the source footage is barely discernible, yet oddly creepy. The lighting makes Akyroyd’s characteristic eyebrows look like swollen face-knuckles and the scene transitions are awkward at best. But every spoken word grows on you, festering in your mind like some psychotic brain fungus. Behind those eyebrows lies a complex man. So, if you’ve got a NetFlix account, it’s well worth it to at least experience such a character.

However, that suggestion is insidious. Be warned, the charming, chain-smoking visage of Aykroyd has an irresistible effect.

The cinematography is a clever ploy, its amateurism luring viewers into a false sense of security: “Look, someone learned to use Windows MovieMaker and believes in aliens. How quaint!” And that’s how they get you. Halfway through the film, as the abduction section begins, the eeriest of tones befall this once pleasant cult experience. Even though it sounds insane, it becomes difficult to ignore the possibility of alien abduction — impossible to ignore, in fact, the possibility that you have already been taken.

So take a look at “Dan Aykroyd Unplugged on UFOs.” At worst, it’s 100 minutes of Dan Aykroyd being genuinely awesome, and at best it’ll forever change the how you think about your place in the universe — if you’re gullible at least.