David Duchovny-Fox Mulder

Gillian Anderson-Dana Scully

William B. Davis-Cigarette Smoking Man/Cancer man

Mitch Pileggi-Walter Skinner

Martin Laundau-Alvin Kurtzweil

Armin Mueller Stahl-Conrad Strughold

The X-Files is the best show on television in my humble opinion. Explaining why in a rational way would require a whole different review. So I'll just give you a pretty simple description: Great cinematgrophy, great acting, original and inventive plots, eternally intriguing chemistry between the two leads, and no use of hammy fame-seeking guest stars. I had been waiting for this film for about two years. The extreme secrecy of the plot kept me in suspense. I even sat through Firestorm just so that I could see that super COOL!!! trailer. In other words: I was set up for dissapointment from day one

And I was dissapointed. It wasn't a horrible film. It wasn't even a bad experience. If this had been any other film then I would have given a pretty solid two and a half stars out of four and go on with my life. But the purpose of a film based on a movie is to top the television show. So whwen all the film delivers id just a pretty good three parter then I will naturaly be depressed.

Let's get the obligatory telling of the plot done real quick, alright. I promise it won't take longer than a paragraph. After Cancer Man burns down Mulder's office in the season finale, the two hapless agents were sent to work for the anti-terrosrism unit. While on assignment in dallas a building containing the bodies of three people killed by the mysterious black ooze, blows up. Mulder and Scully barely escape with theire lifes, and afterwards face charges of leaving the scene of a bomb threat. But with this being the X-Files, things aren't all that simple. After a funny scene in a bar, Mulder goes into an alley and pisses on an Independence Day poster (possible inside joke alert!). There he is confronted by a man named Alvin Kurtzweil. Alvin tells Mulder that the bombing was orchestrated by the goverment so that the American people don't find about the Goverment's plan to take over the world with the black ooze. Why exactly the goverment wants to take over the world, and it doesn't really matter. Any X-Phile (what an X-Files fanwill call himself while surrounded by fellow geeks) worth his salt will tell you that everything goes along a lot better if we just assume that everything the goverment does, it does just because it can.

Ah, damn! I've gone into two paragraphs! Must...wrap..up plot summary...quickly. After being told of all this by Kurtzweil, Mulder and Scully go on a quest to unamask the Goverment that brings them in the path of aliens. corn, and bees. Or something. Ah, hell! As if the plot really mattered anyway.

If you aren't a fan of the show, or if you've never seen the show you'll probaly enjoy more than I did. My brother lied it, and he's never seen the show in his life. Perhaps that's the only really great thing about this film. It might convince a couple of people that the show is more than just some nerd fixation (no there's anything wrong with a nerd fixation). As for all of us die-hard fans, this is worth a viewing at a dollar theater, or on video. Other than that, I'll just stay with being glued to my couch every saturday at 8.