READERS FORUM ficult is it to copy methods used by psy- Viewers Find Flaws with 'Alien chic healers to fake blood? (Take a small hidden balloon or a hypodermic full of Autopsy' Film colored corn syrup and squirt it down the blade of a scalpel and you will get the I do most of the public Yerkes The film looks entirely too full of very "realistic" appearance of real bleed- Observatory tours, as well as private scratches and light leaks. It is as if some- ing cuts.) I do not believe the special programs, and so consider myself will- one were told to make a modern film effects people when they say they can't ing and able to answer questions about appear old and went a bit too far. imagine how such a thing could be faked. astronomy. During the question-and- The special effects people may be At least one of the advertisements answer period someone inevitably asks, experts, but not in exobiology or sci- was for the "alien autopsy video," which "What about Roswell?" The SKEPTICAL ence. They too were probably told they suggests we are watching an "infomer- INQUIRER has provided me both the were watching the real autopsy of the cial" designed to sell us the product. methods and information necessary to real alien. Extraordinary claims require extraor- answer the question. The Sharper Image catalog sells for dinary proof. Not once are we given People have been asking me about more than $1,000 an "authentic" fake anything real, no knowledge we could the so-called alien autopsy video. "alien" made from the same mold that only have gotten from an authentic None of die people interviewed could produced die "alien" in the movie Roswell. extraterrestrial, no real artifacts. possibly be said to be experts in exobiol- I find it fascinating that the Sharper In brief, the "alien autopsy film" was ogy! Where were die real biologists? The Image "alien" looks quite different from about the least likely candidate for proof astrophysicists? The pathologists? that shown in the alien autopsy film. that aliens exist that I have ever seen. It Many of those interviewed assume The entire movie was filmed with the is not scary, not realistic, and it is poorly the "film" was made in 1947 because camera person moving continuously, made (despite what we are told). For the dial's what they were told, over and much in die style of "N.Y.P.D. Blue" and same price of the video you can buy The over. If, however, the film was made indeed many modern commercials. I Day the Earth Stood Still and be more recently, all of their subsequent com- believe such motion is intended to con- thoroughly entertained. ments are worthless. vince viewers that they are watching a One of die nonexperts marvelled home movie. I think this is a dead give- Richard Dreiser that the organs came out "like chunks of away. T h e anonymous camera person was Lake Geneva, Wise. meat," and that ihcrc was no connecting filming in a modern style. Real autopsy tissue. Now that's a correct assessment. films would not be made this way. If the organs aren't connected, they What's a telephone doing inside an I had an opportunity to view "Alien would slide around every time the operating theater? Autopsy: Fact or Fiction?" on its "alien" moved! I propose they were There are almost too many "props," November 25, 1995, rebroadcast. To me indeed "chunks" of something. The more than necessary. Most are inexpensive the most blatant Hollywood effect was the more I diink about it, the more the props one could find at a scientific or army scalpel cut along the side of the neck from "alien" resembles something that could surplus store (I have half in my dark- the ear to the shoulder/chest region. It was have been half-baked in an oven. room). Where are the more sophisticated typical of a contemporary knife-cut effect, There did not appear to be any sign instruments one might expect to see? exhibiting the following characteristics: of ribs or the equivalent. The poor crea- No X rays appear to have been taken! (1) As the blade was drawn along the ture's organs must have sloshed around How does the "surgeon" know how deep neck, the "blood" appeared immedi- every time it moved! to cut into the cranium? ately, adjacent to the blade. (2) The We are told over and over that no No bones were removed from the blood appeared in a uniformly wide one in 1947 would have had the tech- "alien." The insides of the "mouth" were line. (3) The blood appeared entirely to nology to make such a realistic film. We never checked. No teeth were shown. A one side of the blade ("uphill" from the are told such an elaborate hoax could tracheotomy was not performed! All of blade, at that). (4) The blood appeared not be made today. Over and over we these would be routine, especially if the only on the side of the blade away from are told how well made the film is, as if "alien" were real. The lack of such exam- the camera. (5) Once the blood by repetition we will come to believe it. inations is consistent with the idea that appeared, it didn't drip or run, but Through sheer repetition, many watch- the "alien" is not much more than a stayed where it had first appeared, in a ing may come to believe that the stuffed mask. line of uniform width for the duration of the cut. Only in later shots did we see autopsy was real. However, it is really a We are led to believe the blood drip a couple runs of blood from this cut. rather shoddy piece of filming. ping from the scalpel incisions is signifi- Even then, the two drips had ceased Since there are so many obvious cant. Why is there no sign of blood com- flaws, the question about when the film ing from the right damaged leg? (Would was made is moot. a dead alien continue to bleed?) How dif- Readers continued on page 59 SKEPTICAL INQUIRER March/Apnl 1996 57 Readers continued from page 57 the worst possible design of an I beam. I ported alien wreckage and two purported beams were invented as a more efficient alien "typewriters" designed for six-fin- running by the time they were seen. way to carry a load. This is done by gered hands. T h e program enthusiastically These characteristics are the result of a putting as much material as possible compared them to our most advanced tube hidden behind die blade that deliv- away from the center axis of the beam. ergonomic hand-shaped keyboard. ers stage blood from a syringe operated The best design uses thick top and bot- Only one problem. The alien "key- off-camera. Remember the times you've tom cross sections and a thin vertical board" has two closely set "hands" cut yourself with a sharp hobby knife or section. The middle section of an 1 beam angled inward toward the user, complete razor? Rather than appearing instandy, does little to contribute to the load-car- with depressions for the wrists. The the blood seems to take a couple of sec- rying capacity of the structure. In fact, aliens would have to glue their elbows many times holes will be drilled through onds before it gushes up. For a corpse together in front of their navels to use it! the middle section of an I beam to with no circulation, the blood appeared The remainder of the wreckage in no reduce its weight even more with little at the cut without delay, yet only in quan- way resembles the Roswell foil-and-balsa effect on its load-carrying capacity. The tity sufficient to form a line without run- described by (for want of a better term) beam shown on this broadcast appears ning. This would indicate tls.it the source "witnesses." of blood had moved on with the blade, as though someone tried to make an I I recently mailed to Barry Karr [pub- rather than originating from inside the beam that "looked alien." But no matter lisher's representative, SI] a tape contain- body. At no time during this cut did the what planet you're from, the laws of ing a mid-1950s episode of "Science camera move around for position as it did physics are the same. Only beings with Fiction Theater," titled "Bulletproof." in the rest of the film. This would be nec- subhuman knowledge of structural The program concerned the discovery of essary to conceal the blood delivery tube design would have designed an I beam bulletproof alien "foil" left in the desert on the far side of the scalpel. like the one shown on this broadcast. by a damaged saucer. I wonder just People trying to launch careeis in the Since the first time I heard about the when the Roswell story developed the motion picture industry must demon- incident near Roswell, I had hoped that "super-foil" detail. I suspect a check of strate their skills to the establishment. someday the truth would come out the records will prove the television This often is accomplished dirough one about what really happened, but this show came first. or more demonstration films done as stu- film is an obvious hoax. dent film projects. George Lucas's THX R. D. Horton 1138 was one such student film project.