Whatever you do, don’t confuse this with the Tom Cruise movie of the same name. This one is a pseudo-documentary/cinema verité/mondo movie/WTF flick about aliens directed by the legendary Ron (The Monster and the Stripper) Ormond. It tells the purported “true” tale of Reinhold O. Schmidt (who stars as himself) and his close encounters with UFOs. One day, Schmidt’s driving around Nebraska when he finds a spaceship in a field. He’s invited in by the aliens and makes lots of small talk with the friendly visitors before going on his merry way. Schmidt is then interviewed by a reporter to verify his tale.
Edge of Tomorrow is based on two books, but there’s barely enough story here to fill its fifty-minute running time. At least it gets off to a promising start. The scenes of Schmidt riding around endlessly have a real Manos vibe to them, and the Coleman Francis-esque narration contains some real howlers like, “We’re living in a new age with different things”. Sadly, once the movie cuts back to the interview segments, it gets bogged down awfully fast and quickly becomes rather tedious.
The big reason for this is that Schmidt just isn’t an actor. He flubs several lines, and his whiny voice gets irritating almost immediately. Whenever the film flashes back to his alien encounter, it flirts with showing a pulse, thanks to the cheesy UFO sets and awkward alien interactions. However, every time we switch back to Schmidt’s longwinded interview, the life gets sucked right out of the picture.
The funniest thing about the whole thing was that Schmidt was later proven to be a fraud! Not only did he lie about his alien encounters, but he also was caught trying to swindle old ladies by selling them “crystals” from his alleged UFO buddies. He even served jail time! Now there’s one part of his story I’d love to see made into a movie.
Schmidt also appeared In Ormond’s Please Don’t Touch Me.
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