Read More @HJ Reviews: Men are from Mars Mike Furches Previews: Overview, Movie Clips, Trailer, Production Notes David Bruce, Webmaster Art Imitating Life CoachZ Spiritual Articles: ReelPeople Review (video) David Bruce, Webmaster

John Cusack has a reputation of choosing interesting roles. Instead of succumbing to conventional expectations, Cusack continues his career of experimentation by taking riskier and challenging parts. Chalk up Martian Child as another foray into quirkiness.

Cusack portrays science fiction writer David Gordon, a thirtysomething widower. Seeking to do something "meaningful" with his life, David considers adopting a child. While wrestling with the decision, he is drawn to a six-year-old boy named Dennis (Bobby Coleman) who just happens to think he is from Mars. Dennis spends his days secluded in a large cardboard box (he's fearful of the sun), wearing a weighted belt to keep him floating away and the victim of the cruel teasing of other children.

David, also an outcast as a child, sees a lot of himself in Dennis. It was this traumatic childhood that inspired David to write. As an author, he explains that he escapes reality "through stories" which allow him to look "at life from a distance." Much to the chagrin of his sister Liz (played by annoying real-life sis Joan Cusack), David agrees to take Dennis into his home. Acclimation to the home is painstaking as David valiantly, if not effectively, struggles to parent Dennis.

Throw in your proverbial bureaucracy as the "bad guys" who could remove Dennis from the home and you have the workings of a melodrama more likely to be found on the Lifetime network--if not for the earnest performance of Cusack. Given more sappy cliched one-liners than a Hallmark card, Cusack manages to keep a straight face and makes this strange film endearingly bearable. The rest of the cast, however, struggles to keep up with Cusack. Coleman is a strange hybrid of Macauley Culkin and Haley Joel Osment and barely speaks above a strained, low-key whisper.

For the most part, director Menno Meyjes manages to keep things moving briskly but nearly slips down the slippery slope of audience manipulation. Meyjes teases the idea that Dennis may really be an alien as he "predicts" the end of baseball games, causes traffic lights to change and reads peoples minds. Do you think he really COULD be an alien? Hmmmm, I wonder.

David soon realizes that, after many years in the foster care system, Dennis has become wary and suspicious of love, trust and family. (One wonders why the "experts" that have been working with Dennis for many years never figured this out.) Fear of abandonment causes him to retreat into an alternate world where he is safe—even if he has to act like an alien to do it. David recognizes this need for love, this need for a home, and knows that it is not unique to Dennis. In David's eyes, we are ALL aliens, strange creatures who cling to and need one another to survive--no one knows this more than David himself. In each other, they are kindred spirits made for one another, each one fulfilling a void in each other's lives. The internal quest and God-given desire of our heart is to belong to a loving and supportive family. By graciously accepting the eccentric Dennis into his home, David demonstrates the unconditional love of a true father reminiscent of the work of our Heavenly Father:

Ephesians 2:19
Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens , but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household.