In a Goonies-meets-ET sort of way, the recent movie Earth To Echo crackles with the childish feeling of delving into the unknown.

The storyline follows three boys whose homes are threatened by the construction of a new freeway with the twist of a government secret. After a construction project begins in their neighborhood, best friends Tuck (Brian “Astro” Bradley), Alex (Teo Halm) and Munch (Reese C. Hartwig) begin receiving strange, encoded messages on their cell phones. They immediately inform their parents and the authorities, but when no one takes them seriously, the youths decide to crack the code themselves and trace the messages to their source.

After receiving pictures on their phones that turn out to be maps, they follow the lead and find themselves smack dab in the middle of a government conspiracy. Turns out, the unexpected freeway project has nothing to do with building a road and everything to do with excavating a spacecraft.

The boys stick together to solve the problem and keep the government’s intrusion into their lives from tearing them apart.