Sam Phillips (Philip Sayer) and his son Tony (Simon Nash) are playing in the yard at their cottage when a bright light appears, and Sam is abducted by aliens. Three years later the alien ship returns and crash lands in a wooded area. The organism in the ship develops into a creature that kills a couple in a car. It then goes to a nearby house and rapes the woman inside. The impregnated woman gives birth to an adult humanoid that looks like Sam. The newly formed Sam creature then goes looking for his son.
While Sam was gone his wife Rachel (Bernice Stegers), believing that Sam abandoned her and Tony, has moved in with another man, Joe Daniels (Danny Brainin) and has hired an au pair, Analise Mercier (Maryam d’Abo) to help take care of Tony. Even though Rachel has moved on, Tony has been having strange nightmares and has continually insisted that his father was taken by aliens.
When Sam shows up, Tony is happy but Rachel, not so much. Rachel’s new boyfriend Joe is pissed. Sam claims that he can’t remember anything from the day he went missing up until today. Joe doesn’t believe him and thinks he’s up to something. Tony’s pet snake, Harry, has laid eggs. Tony catches Sam eating the eggs and runs away. When Sam catches up to Tony, he explains that when he was taken by the aliens, they made changes to him so he could live with them. Tony has formed an affinity with the alien Sam and when Sam drinks his blood, Tony begins to develop strange powers. Powers that he uses to evil ends.
“Xtro” was released in 1982 and was directed by Harry Bromley Davenport. It is a British science fiction horror film. There are two sequels to the film, “Xtro II: The Second Encounter” 1990, and "Xtro 3: Watch the Skies" 1995. Neither film had anything to do with the original film. Supposedly there is an Xtro 4 in the works but so far it hasn’t materialized.
Director Davenport said that the strange atmosphere of the film was unintentional. He also said that there is no deep symbolic meaning to the weird and random events shown in the film because he and his co-writers were actually high on drugs while writing the script. They would often throw in whatever random ideas popped into their heads.
I firmly believe him. The movie started out strange. As it went on it got totally weird and random. Most of what went on didn’t make any sense. There are also dozens of plot holes that don’t really seem to matter since nothing is ever really explained anyway. “Xtro” is a combination of “Alien” 1979 and “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” 1977 on crack and quite depressing. It is a Salvador Dali nightmare manifested in a little boy’s dreams. Most of the film appears to be conjured up by Tony’s mind. Or was it just the childish mind of Harry Bromley Davenport?
The alien creature in the beginning of the film that kills the young couple and impregnates the woman in the cottage was played by mime artist Tim Dry who had the ability to crawl upside down. There is a popular meme all over the internet of a photograph that is supposed to be a real alien by the side of a road. The meme is actually a still shot from this movie and is Tim doing his thing.
There is an alternate ending to the film.
Movie
Alternate ending