The Alien Factor (1978)

The Alien Factor is a 1978 science fiction horror film written, edited, produced, and directed by Don Dohler. The film centers on a small town that is besieged by three aliens that have crash-landed in the nearby forest.

Plot
A spaceship crashes in a sparsely populated area of Earth and three horrific aliens survive the accident. These grotesque extraterrestrials soon begin to terrorize and kill the local residents, until one intrepid soul chooses to fight back.

Cast
Larry Schlechter and John Cosentino starred as the Inferbyce and Zagatile aliens respectively.
 * Don Leifert as Ben Zachary
 * Tom Griffith as Sheriff Cinder
 * Richard Dyszel as Mayor Wicker
 * Mary Mertens as Edie Martin
 * Richard Geiwitz as Pete
 * George Stover as Steven
 * Eleanor Herman as Mary Jane Carter
 * Anne Frith as Dr. Ruth Sherman

Production
The Alien Factor was filmed in 1972 in Maryland, USA. However, it was shelved for six years before it was finally released theatrically on May 1, 1978.

Release
The film was released on DVD by Retromedia Entertainment on February 26, 2002. Later Image Entertainment released the film on November 15, 2005 as a part of its Don Dohler Collection. Finally it was last released by Mill Creek Entertainment on July 19, 2011.

Reception
TV Guide awarded the film a negative two out of five stars calling it "silly", also writing, "Only the undiscriminating will be able to sit through this one". Dave Sindelar on his film review website Fantastic Movie Musings and Ramblings criticized the film's acting as "non-existent when it isn’t bad" and direction, which Sindelar equated to being "inspired by Larry Buchanan" and concluded that the film would only be of interest for bad movie fanatics. Critical Outcast gave the film a negative review writing, "The Alien Factor is undeniably bad, but it does have a certain energy to it, credit for a guy who went out and just did it. I would not really recommend you go out of your way for it. It is not a good movie, just admirable for the conditions under which it was made." VideoHound's Golden Movie Retriever awarded the film one and a half out of four bones, noting that the film had "decent special effects".

Sequels
The film titled The Alien Factor 2: Alien Rampage was not actually a sequel. The sequel-sounding title was chosen by Retromedia distributor Fred Olen Ray to market the film on DVD in 2002. The original title for The Alien Factor 2 was Alien Rampage. Alien Rampage was filmed in 1999 and was Don Dohler's comeback movie after an 11-year hiatus from filmmaking.