Planet 51

Imagine a world that is locked in the fifties; white picket fences and a dread fear of being overrun by monstrous aliens hell-bent on eating the brains of the inhabitants - but is not our own.

That's the premise for this excellent animated piece starring Dwayne Johnson (Escape to Witch Mountain, Doom, Scorpion King), Jessica Biel (Next, Elizabeth Town, Stealth, Blade - Trinity), Gary Oldman (Fifth Element, Harry Potter) and a whole host of others including John Cleese (Fish Called Wanda, Fawlty Towers, Monty Python etc, etc).

Captain Charles T. Baker (Johnson), lands on Planet 51, convinced he is the first person to have done so, with the intention of plonking a flag somewhere close to his space ship and getting out of there as quickly as possible.

However, things go slightly awry when he discovers he has just entered a world that looks eerily like Earth in the 1950's, with white picket fences typical of suburban America of that time, only this time, the inhabitants are green, speak English and if there's one thing they're afraid of, it's him.

On this planet, dogs - or their equivalent, pee strong acid that actually melts lamp posts and it rains rocks. Cars hover - just like we were hoping would have happened by now, which would save an absolute fortune in tyres, but lose the ability to do doughnuts and burnouts, not to mention remove half the fun of a Grand Prix. The youth are just getting into protesting, although, they're not too sure of what to protest about, but they do travel around in campers that bear an uncanny resemblance to the very popular German jobs, typical of the surfing fraternity.

Charles is befriended by Lem (Justin Long - Live Free or Die Hard, Alvin and the Chipmunks) - well, reluctantly anyway, who has just secured himself a job at the planetarium. Here, they are convinced that there are no more than a handful of planets or stars in space and that aliens are brain-eating, zombie-creating, murderous... well, you get the picture.

It's Lem's job to get Charles back to his space ship before the evil General Grawl (Oldman) or the maniacal Professor Kipple (Cleese) get their hands on him and dissect him or worse - if there can be anything worse.

When I saw the previews for this, I knew it was going to be novel. I mean, the idea that somewhere could be just as ridiculous as us when it came to the concept of aliens?

Inconceivable, right?

Not here. The panic that ensues is hilarious as the town, the armed forces and government testing facilities (curiously, an equivalent of Area 51, which doesn't exist, does it - no. It doesn't there either) all come together, whilst at the same time, the latest blockbusting alien invasion movie is being screened at the local cinema and everyone is dressed as some form of alien.

The pace is fast, the dialogue rich with comical fun poking back at us and overall, this planet is well worth a visit.