The new sci-fi kids flick Earth to Echo is a found footage film that is basically one part Goonies and one part ET only with YouTube, iPhones, and Google Maps thrown into the mix. It’s about three friends who set off one night to track down the signal that’s mysteriously caused their iPhones to turn into maps… and the alien creature they find who needs their help to iPhone home. It’s clearly trying to be like those “kids are smarter than everyone else” movies Spielberg and others made in the 80s (and was reproduced by the similar Super 8 a few years ago). It’s a fairly cute, fairly innocuous movie that might come off as a revelation to kids who can maybe more groove on the heroics of the kids… I, being a curmudgeon, have seen all this done before and better. Yet, it’s a workable movie. It works. I can’t say the kid actors were amazing or the found footage angle was always believable and I miss the humanity of ET and the more adventurous escapism of Goonies and the more honest emotions of Stand By Me (which is shares some DNA as well). Goodish, well-intentioned flick.