So Alien is fucking great. I think we’re mostly in agreement on this. It’s essentially a slasher movie in space and that sounds terrible like Jason X or something but man does Ridley Scott make it work (and the only film I think he has made work fully up to this point in my opinion but I haven’t seen G.I. Jane yet).
Then there’s Aliens. Where do I even begin? I don’t think there has ever been a sequel that is just as good as the original but is also a whole different genre. Many sequels will switch focus regarding character, situation or setting but not genre. To go to an all out action movie makes a lot of sense because it’s the natural progression from the first film. You want to know more about these things and you want to see more than one of them so why not wage war? I think Sigourney Weaver did a great job in Alien and she is just as good in this. It’s perfect from idea to execution. Aliens is definitely a movie that I thank Jesus for letting me exist with.
But then we move on to Alien 3 or is it Alien cubed? Whatever, this one isn’t as good.
The thing about the Alien series is that they seemed to be willing to try something new with every film which I’m totally for. The problem is that an alien dog is not as threatening or cool looking as an alien that comes from a human. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
We start by seeing that there was an alien aboard the ship that Ripley escaped on from the last installment. This causes an emergency evacuation and Ripley crash lands on some planet. So I guess to start things over again, like in Aliens, Ripley is the only one that survives the landing. That’s right, they kill off Michael Biehn (The Terminator, The Rock) and Carrie Henn (Aliens, duh) for convenience. This movie is already starting off on the wrong foot. Next we find out that Ripley is on a steel refinery prison planet with only men. Then the alien from the ship gets into a dog and becomes an alien dog which wreaks havoc killing off the inmates one by one.
Really the biggest problem that I have with this movie isn’t the not so great characters or the CGI alien shots, it’s that not much happens. The movie moves pretty slow. My man David Fincher (Seven, Fight Club) shot this thing very well like he always does. He does his best to make what’s happening seem interesting but it takes it’s time with some of the characters too much. I’m not against character, but I would like some excitement in my alien movie.
Another thing is that Ripley doesn’t really develop or evolve. She’s pretty much the same person she was in Aliens except you don’t see her motherly side because they killed it during the opening credits. She does finally learn to not trust “the company” though so that’s something.
The climax is kind of hilarious because (spoiler) the alien dog gets tons of molten lead poured on it. But that’s not how it dies. The thing then jumps out of the liquid lead and starts to go after Ripley. So she pours water on it causing the alien to explode. For some reason, and I know it sounded awesome as you were reading it, the whole sequence comes off as funny and not kick ass. Too much early bad CGI? I’m not sure.
Now I don’t know how much of this movie I can really blame on Fincher because apparently he shot it but walked off before editing started. So it’s a little hard to tell how different the movie would have been if he had stayed the whole way through. But I want to say that it probably wouldn’t have been that different. I mean, I like the way it looks and I like that it takes itself seriously. But the problem is that it’s not great for a David Fincher movie (but hey it was his first feature) and also looks kinda bad after Alien and Aliens. But how cool is that one overhead shot of the alien running into the fog killing a guy? That was some badass shit.
From here we jump into Alien: Resurrection which has to be the coolest title in the entire series. This one is a sequel’s sequel. It took three movies but Alien finally got a movie that felt like a straight up sequel. It always seemed to me that action sequels in particular don’t take themselves as seriously the second or third time around. I guess Die Hard 2, Under Siege 2, Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 and Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey set that rule in my mind long ago.
Alright, so we have an Alien movie here and that means we need Sigourney Weaver. Oh wait, she died in the last movie (spoiler). Well I know that won’t stop her. And it didn’t. But I have to admit I do think they came up with a cool way to bring her back. And that the only reason these people brought her back is so they could get the alien from her. Also it was an interesting move to have Ripley be a different character in this movie. Her clone acts like Ripley’s evil twin or something.
So the action is pretty good and the characters get into one ridiculous situation after another trying to get off the ship alive. And in this movie the new addition (cause remember they like to do something different with each film) is an alien that is even more human-like than the other aliens that you’ve seen before. This one is a little scary but not terribly in my opinion. It’s no alien queen that’s for sure. I also think it’s funny how they gave it little sagging alien tits. I thought I had imagined this the first time I saw the movie but when I saw it the second time my suspicions were confirmed.
The movie’s kinda jokey and I wish that it would take itself a little more seriously but really it’s a pretty good film, especially for a fourth. It was also nice to get back to some action after all the downtime in Alien 3. I really like that the whole thing feels pretty disgusting. The textures in this movie are very slimy and moist. The ship, the characters, the aliens, everything is soaked with sweat or slime or grease or some sort of thing that looks fucking filthy.
Also did you ever notice that the Alien movies were all directed by people that went on to be big guns? Ridley Scott went on to do Blade Runner and Gladiator. James Cameron made the highest grossing movie of all time and then made the highest grossing movie of all time. David Fincher did Seven and The Social Network after Alien 3. And Jean-Pierre Jeunet did fucking Amelie after Resurrection. I dunno man. I can’t wait to direct the next Alien movie.
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