My late mentor/friend Roger Ebert hated, hated, hated what he usually called “the Idiot Plot”, and here is his own definition: “A story in which every problem and conflict would be resolved in five minutes, if not for the fact that every character is a complete idiot.” There are several glaring moments of the Idiot Plot in Marc Turtletaub’s sappy SF fable movie “Jules”, and I am willing to bet my $100 that Ebert would roast these idiotic moments without any hesitation.

First, let me describe to you the most annoying example in the bunch. At one point, Milton (Ben Kingsley), the hero of the story, is suddenly visited by his concerned daughter who does not believe at all that he has an alien in his house. For avoiding more misunderstanding, all he should do is simply letting her inside the house and then showing his extraterrestrial guest, but, no, he simply lets her leave after arguing with her a bit, and that is all.

If the story and characters were more realistic and believable, that might not be much of a problem at all. Milton lives alone in a quite rural town of Pennsylvania which does not seem to have many residents besides him, and the town and its residents look like the stock characters from your average American sitcom. His big and comfortable house, which is located in a rather remote spot outside the town, also has a large backyard, and you may wonder how he has maintained this place fairly well even though it seems there is no housekeeper or gardener visiting this place.

I know, I know, I know. The movie does not intend to be very realistic from the beginning, and that is particularly evident when Milton’s another usual night is suddenly interrupted by the crashing of a UFO (Unidentified Flying Object) on his backyard. He naturally calls 911 at one, but, not so surprisingly, his call is promptly disregarded, and nobody pays much attention to him when he talks about that UFO at a routine town council meeting.

Meanwhile, an alien creature happens to crawl out of that UFO and then collapses in front of the backdoor of Milton’s house. While quite flabbergasted to say the least, Milton tries his best for taking care of this alien creature, and this alien creature, which is later named “Jules” (Jade Quon), looks like getting slowly accustomed to being his guest, though there is not much communication between them from the beginning.

What follows next is the cross between “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” (1982) and “Cocoon” (1985). Milton’s two old busybody neighbors, Joyce (Jane Curtin) and Sandy (Harriet Samsom Harris), later get involved in his tricky situation, and they all agree to keep their alien visitor in secret as much as possible, while also wondering how to help their alien visitor. While looking rather detached all the time, Jules looks mostly quiet and gentle, and Milton and his two neighbors are certainly brightened up by their unexpected friend.

Of course, things soon get more complicated for several reasons. Milton’s daughter begins to suspect that her father is hiding something serious, and that leads to the aforementioned moment of misunderstanding between them. Furthermore, Jules is also being pursued by those government agents, and we see lots of agents checking on millions of phone calls in the area surrounding Milton’s town (How the hell could possibly they overlook that 911 call from Milton, I wonder?).

All these and other things in the story are pretty familiar to say the least, but the movie does not bring anything particularly new to its conventional genre territory. While you may get some dark amusement from a little special power of Jules or what kind of fuel that flying saucer actually needs (You may be quite disgusted if you are an animal lover, by the way), the movie does not go further with these morbid details for avoiding any unpleasant moment, and it only becomes sappier instead while Milton later comes to confront the growing possibility of mental deterioration. 

The main performers of the film try their best with their rather thin roles. Ben Kingsley, an intelligent actor who has been usually dependable for more than 40 years since his Oscar-winning performance in “Gandhi” (1982), conveys well to us his aging character’s melancholic existence, and we can easily discern why his character accepts Jules into his house without much fear or hesitation. While Jane Curtin, whom I still fondly remember for her supporting turn in TV comedy series “The 3rd Rock from the Sun”, brings some humor to her functional supporting part, Harriet Sansom Harris, whom you may remember for her scene-stealing appearances in TV comedy series “Frasier”, also manages to acquit herself well, and Jade Quon, who has been mainly known for her stunt performances in a number of recent blockbuster films such as “The Hunger Games” (2012), holds her own small place well even though she is simply required to occupy the screen throughout the movie.       

In conclusion, “Jules” is disappointing in its big failure to engage us in terms of story and characters, and it only makes me want to revisit “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” as soon as possible. Just like “Jaws” (1975) did everything a shark movie can possibly do and then made many subsequent shark movies nearly pointless, “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” remains on the top of its genre even at present while also making its many imitators look inconsequential and forgettable, and I am sure that “Jules” will be also forgotten within a few years.