I, however, do not quite like the "alien take" of the movie ...
Do you want to talk about that?

I haven't read the Scott Heim novel but since it's "acclaimed" and the "alien take" is its premise, even Gregg Araki couldn't slice it up. It seems to me the contrast of the cynical and the blocked out personalities is what the story has going for it; without them, what would there be? Hence I think Brady Corbet's performance is just as signnificant as Joseph Gordon-Levitt's, though Gordon-Levitt is a magnetic actor for sure.