There's no direct way to pitch you on watching Manifest Destiny, a short film by first timer filmmakers Darrel and Doug Walters, other than to say it's a clever, resourceful example of the kind of sci-fi two brothers can cook up in their garage with a $500 camera and some medical supplies bought off of eBay. If I say too much beforehand, I'll risk robbing all the fun in discovering what it's really about. Don't worry about the vague details though, when I say short film, I mean a short film. In 3 minutes and 40 seconds you'll share the same job-well-done smile I've still got on my face.

Watch below the jump and then read on for my own little dissection of why this brand of invasive surgery is so charming.

MANIFEST DESTINY from Darrell and Doug Waters on Vimeo.

No, it's not that the twist is who is actually being operated on. I'm not even sure I'd call that a twist considering it's easy to call almost right off the bat. More interesting than that is what the Walters brother decide not to show at all. Bits and pieces of the little guy are being removed, implying that this is a simple autopsy. That is until the Grey sheds a tear after the doctors remove a sizeable 'organ' from its gaping chest. A snip of some familiar looking connective tissue later, and the distressed mommy Grey has an instantaneous postpartum seizure.

It wasn't an autopsy at all, it was an extra terrestrial Caesarean section. And with that simple revelation we're snapped into a retrospective 180, suddenly feeling empathetic for the doomed traveler and his exploited child. Ta-da, it's movie magic!

Plus, ya know, the whole thing was made for less money than most of us probably spend on DVDs in a year and yet it looks better than 90% of the films Syfy puts their 'original' stamp on. Le sigh.

Thanks to io9 for the pick up.