The swell new sci-fi flick The Vast of Night will stream on Prime beginning this weekend but last week, it played at drive-in movie theaters across the country and it’s hard to think of a better way to watch this film. A love letter to small town life, star-filled night skies and to movie-making itself, director Andrew Patterson’s debut feature is set in late 1950s New Mexico. While most of the town is at the high-school basketball game, seniors Everett (Jake Horowitz) and Fay (Sierra McCormick) are the first to hear reports of “something in the sky”. A piercing sound comes in over the radio and phone lines, followed by reports of strange objects hovering over a house outside of town. Racing pell-mell into the night, Everett and Fay track every lead with Patterson and cinematographer M.I. Littin-Menz sending their camera zooming along behind them, and sometimes way out in front of them, as if to suggest that the filmmaker in charge is so jazzed to be telling this tale that he can’t get to the next story point fast enough. An oft-told alien invasion story that’s really a movie about being exuberantly young, and boundlessly curious — as alien trackers and first time directors alike must be — The Vast of Night is a nervy delight.