I loved this for the first third or so, but wasn't a big fan of the creature design. Basically, the more the kids found out, the less involved I felt.

I did like the idea of having an E.T.-style emotional connection between kid and alien when it's an alien that eats people, though. There's a lot of unused comedy potential there.

If I had seen this when I was eleven or twelve, it would have been my favorite movie ever. And nice description -- the parts of this movie that worked realy did bring back the feeling of seeing a big summer movie as a kid.