Hal Kitchen
As I intimated in my Trailer of the Week article for the forthcoming Alien: Romulus, few other franchises can rightfully claim to run a wider spectrum of quality than the Alien movies. That article may contain spoilers for this list. Yet, the gist is the Alien series is extremely broad and even the worst entries still have vociferous defenders and I can at least see where they’re coming from for the most part.
The eponymous Xenomorph is just such an incredible design, not just one of the most iconic movie monsters ever created, but one of the most purely and legitimately terrifying in its very being. It walks a perfect line between being so completely…alien and hostile, at yet uncannily familiar. On some level it is part of humanity, they are after all, incubated by human hosts and take on some human-like attributes. The teeth are metallic, razor sharp, and human-like. The round elongated skull is missing those windows into the soul that imply the existence of one. It’s just here to take its natural place as an apex predator, we’re its prey, and we’re trapped alone with it. That’s the essence of the terror that the Xenomorph instills, and from the way I’m describing it, you may already be able to guess at this ranking.
So, before we see the release of Romulus, let’s take stock of the franchise so far, from its lowest lows to its highest highs.
8. Alien Vs. Predator: Requiem
No prizes for predicting the bottom spot. I’ll admit that I hadn’t even seen this film until I committed to making this list, literally no one had ever recommended it to me and I had considered cutting out the “Vs Predator” crossovers entirely just to avoid having to see it. Completionism won out and I did go in somewhat fearful; what if I end up liking this movie and have to justify putting it above Prometheus or Covenant? I needn’t have feared. Credit where its due, those movies have some intensity to them that this just doesn’t, despite trying very hard to achieve it.
On paper, there’s some things to commend Requiem, it’s basically The Blob but with Xenomorphs and Predators instead of the blob. It’s quite shockingly dark in places—both literally and figuratively, a common complaint is you can hardly see what’s going on—taking particular relish in the shock value of violence enacted towards babies and pregnant women. Is there some redemptive value to be found in that subversiveness? No, it’s purely done for shock value and there’s absolutely no thematic justification for it. Shock value isn’t necessarily no value, yet every single death in Requiem (and there’s a lot of them) leaves you feeling the exact same way, regardless of whether it’s an unnamed extra butchered off-screen or the hero’s love interest. Oh no. This character is dead now. If that hadn’t happened they would not be. That is bad for them. I had grown so accustomed to having them be in this movie I am watching. By the time we get down to our handful of survivors, you look at them and think this really could’ve been any four random side characters, and the feeling would be the same. I’d honestly have been fine with none of them surviving, just embrace the nihilistic tone fully.
Occasionally, there’ll be a moment gruesome enough to cut through the mindless noise. The problem is there’s so little gas left in the tank at this point. They’re stretching themselves so far trying to make squishy red and/or green goo exciting and apparently appending it to an interesting set of characters or a scenario that had seen multiple drafts wasn’t among the things they thought of trying. Bringing the Aliens to Earth at last isn’t a terrible prospect (I mean, obviously in reality it’d be horrifying). Alien vs. Predator: Requiem presents nothing except the blandest, most paint-by-numbers version of that scenario.
The attempts to add something fresh just amount to a “what if” scenario of if there was one alien that was bigger than the others. Aliens, Alien vs. Predator, and Resurrections already did that and none of them were ever scarier than the classic Xenomorph design. It’s basically just a random ’00s slasher movie with a higher budget for green slime. There’s a bit of nostalgic revisionism for this era of horror at the moment, only I’ve yet to see anyone leap to this film’s defense. The effects are pretty great, only it’s hard to appreciate them when everything is so dark and visually noisy, and there’s nothing else I can particularly find redeeming about Requiem. It’s the shortest film in either franchise and yet somehow it’s also the most boring. That’s almost impressive.
7. Alien: Covenant
Michael Fassbender starred in three movies in 2017, and this was the best one. No wonder he’s been in actor’s jail ever since.
You can find revisionist for almost any movie online nowadays. I will tolerate no quarter for this film, this sucks in every way imaginable. The only thing it does right is kill James Franco in the first scene. Alien: Covenant is the end result of condensing two movies into one, flattening out the resolution of all the setup of Prometheus, which gets a cursory flashback explanation which basically answers none of the potential Prometheus left it with and betrays what little emotional connection we could’ve had to its story.
Alien: Covenant genuinely feels like they wrote out a dos and don’ts list for what people did and didn’t like about the other sequels, and then mislabeled the columns and made a film entirely out of the “don’ts”. “Don’t kill off the most likable characters from the previous film in between films”, “don’t needlessly exposit about the Alien’s origins”, “don’t rewrite the established rulebook at your own convenience to accelerate the pace”, “don’t have an endless series of anonymous red-shirts die like its some teen slasher movie”, “don’t shoehorn in nonsense religious symbolism as a feeble attempt at thematic depth”, “don’t make the aliens squishier than jelly and remove all semblance of threat from them”, “don’t make all your characters complete imbeciles”, “don’t shoot and edit your action scenes so that they’re completely visually incoherent, I thought you were supposed to be a good director, Ridley?!”
Most bad movies are like Requiem, just boring and never invest you. The ones that really make you angry are the ones where you start off predisposed to liking them and then feel your patience tested past breaking point over the course of two hours. Films where you feel yourself getting wound up like a rubber band until finally your patience breaks and once it has, it’s never coming back. I held onto my patience throughout almost all of Alien: Covenant, but then finally, we got to the big “twist” and David revealed that the whole time, he was in fact… David, what a shock! Then, he tells Siri to play his villain music as he saunters through the cargo hold listening to Wagner and I look desperately around me for something I can throw at the screen. Seriously? Is this what this franchise has become? Is your opinion of your audience really this low, Ridley?
I hate this film so much. I have nothing good to say about it. Fassbender’s a total ham. Everything about it is phoned in, and it doubles down on everything that doesn’t work about Prometheus and jettisons everything that did, it’s just dreadful both technically and creatively. It’s not last simply because this has the “you blow, I’ll do the fingering” scene and Requiem doesn’t.
6. Alien: Resurrection
As much as there is wrong with the Ripley saga, it does actually have a relatively pleasing shape to it when you stand back from it. There’s no denying that Ripley’s character development is the one consistently compelling thing about these movies, even after the titular Xenomorphs have lost their sticky luster. Her descent from a grounded every-woman to an action-ready hero, to grief stricken suicidal to jaded and hard boiled cynic, is always entertaining and Sigourney Weaver kills it every time. This is the campiest movie in the series, and she matches that energy while still feeling like the only part of the movie I still find myself taking seriously, if only to the point where I start to get mad at how little sense it makes.
Alien: Resurrection takes place two hundred or so years after the events of the previous movie, with both Ripley and the Alien queen inside her being brought back through the miracle of cloning – which certainly is a miracle cause that’s not how cloning works – so that the military can harness the Aliens as biological weapons, yet again. However, the cloning has had some unintended side effects on both Ripley and the Alien queen, and she must team up with a crew of space pirates to escape the ship and ensure the aliens never reach Earth. With the possible exceptions of Ripley and Call (Winona Ryder), a sympathetic terrorist intent on foiling the military’s plans, every part in the film is overacted to hilarity by the likes of Dan Hedaya, J.E. Freeman, Brad Dourif, Michael Wincott, Ron Perlman and Dominique Pinon.
With a cast like that, it’s clear director Jean-Pierre Jeunet and writer Joss Whedon are going for a somewhat sillier, more cartoony tone than previous ventures. I’m not convinced this was a direction the movies needed to go in by this point, and even less so by the execution. Whedon’s adolescent dialogue and Jeunet’s quirky surrealism are the most ill-matched of mixtures and the whole movie feels very, very stupid. There are a few moments that hint that more could have been done here— scenes that throw in some ideas with potential— but often too late in the game to really see them play out. The best scenes here feel alienated from the actual plot, which is all very by the numbers at this point, and is played just as a sillier, semi-parodic version of what we already saw in the earlier movies. Scenes like Ripley and Call discussing their respective inhuman natures or Ripley discovering and destroying her failed clones—effectively destroying her past self—work well individually. When you look at them in context, they don’t really add up to a story or much of a character arc, nor can you really take them seriously in the context of the surrounding movie.
With the tonally mismatched approach, the puerile and base attitude towards sex and violence, the underdeveloped ideas and hasty exposition, it all feels more like a work of fan fiction than a mainline sequel. It’s an assortment of silly ideas with even sillier execution, and I don’t think it’d even have worked that well even without the Alien brand attached to it.
5. Alien vs. Predator
I struggled with this one for a couple of reasons. First, whether to count it at all, as it’s a spin-off and moreover, really more of a Predator movie than it is an Alien one. Tonally and conceptually, it fits better in their universe of dumb, two-fisted action than it does the creeping, nail-biting terror and cynical social commentary that characterizes the Alien saga. As we’ve already seen on this list, the Alien franchise abandoned cerebral sci-fi horror a long time ago, and some time before it abandoned being good at that. And that’s just it, as I would consider Alien vs. Predator to be a more successful film than a couple of those I’ve rated higher than it and so I struggled with that decision. Yes, I almost put this at number three.
Does a film that aimed low and hit its target carry more value than one that shot for the moon and missed? I go back and forth. At the present moment, I just find the films later on this list more memorable and I appreciate that they took more risks. Plus, some would argue that Alien vs. Predator only barely hits its mark anyway.
No, I don’t think of Alien vs. Predator as the disaster it’s oft reputed to be. Yes, a PG-13 team-up between two such R-rated icons isn’t anyone’s first choice, unless you’re the fourteen year old who could finally watch one of these in theaters. That said, it isn’t that noticeably hurt by the lack of onscreen violence, there’s still some tense scenes and gory moments and Terminator 2 and Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome are both more all-ages friendly compared to their predecessor and they’re both better than the originals! And I just love anything that reminds me of At the Mountains of Madness: the Antarctic whaling station setting looks great and I wish it was utilized more, honestly.
Some might consider it sacrilege. I actually find this a more succinct and less obtrusive prequel than Prometheus, and it’s a fun, goofy ride that doesn’t hang around nor outstay its welcome. I wish the aliens remained more of a serious threat, and a more mature direction overall wouldn’t have gone amiss, but Sanaa Lathan’s veteran climber teaming up with the Predator is just a cool, effective and focused story. It’s well paced, not riven with glaring plot-holes. The effects hold up better than a lot of the other entrants in this saga and, although the action is not very well shot, the acting is often pretty bad. The film does condense the time-frame of the Alien gestation in a frankly comical way at the plot’s convenience (as do most of the movies after the first two). Alien vs. Predator is still one of the more successful outings for the Xenomorph. It just knows what it is: an adolescent B-movie and, if you remember that too, you should be able to be equally as forgiving of it as one of the more enjoyable and less frustrating watches in the saga. If it had been given a bigger budget, a couple rewrites and a more seasoned and tasteful action director then this could have been a dark horse for the podium.
4. Prometheus
Ah Prometheus, the black sheep of the Alien franchise. You tried. I’ll give you that, you tried. Still, oof! This is a bad movie, and I’m sorry Prometheus defenders. I understand the fascination, I’ve seen this film multiple times and although it really did get worse and worse each time for a while, recently I’ve begun to swing back the other way and appreciate the positives in it.
For one, the medi-pod sequence is the best scene in any Alien movie since Bishop said, “not bad… for a human”. It’s an inspired and organic addition to the lore, the execution is faultless (except for the slightly lame new face-hugger design), Rapace sells it phenomenally, and the pay-off when we return to the medi-pod at the end is delicious. I also like Fassbender’s performance as the inscrutable, soft-spoken David a lot more in this one and the score is astounding, that opening sequence casts such a spell. Yet, there’s so much wrong here, starting with the whole concept of digging into the Xenomorph’s origins. The idea of something like this just evolving out there in the universe is much scarier than the idea someone made it for a purpose. That in itself is a well worn trope as well. Since the days of HP Lovecraft, sci-fi horror has been full of ancient alien species reawoken in the midst of a desperate battle for survival against an ancient enemy of their own creation. It’s a very cool concept and yes, it’s often tied to questions of humanity’s own origin and violent nature a la Quatermass and the Pit.
So, neither do I think what Prometheus is doing is wise. Nor do I think it’s doing it in a remotely novel or original way, frankly, but that needn’t be damning, I do love these tropes when they’re done well. The issues with Prometheus‘s story are admittedly mostly nitpicks and plot-holes. They do stack up over two hours of very leaky storytelling, the sum of which is a scenario I just don’t buy in the least. Nor are the characters credible or interesting enough to divert attention. I said I like Shaw and David, but the rest of the crew are laughably one-dimensional, at times absurdly out of place, and dependent upon the charisma of the actor interpreting them. This might be the first truly awful Charlize Theron performance as the imperious 1990s businesswoman Meredith Vickers. I don’t know what possessed the filmmakers to cast a heavily made-up Guy Pierce as a nonagenarian, easily one of the most stupidly distracting casting choices I’ve ever seen. I think I could make a reasonable case that Theron dropping the twist that he’s her father and then dramatically walking out is the silliest moment in any Alien movie.
It’s a common talking point and it really does merit addressing: Why are the characters all so, so dumb? What would horror movies be without terrible decision-making right? These are supposed to be scientists, recruited by a multi-billionaire for his interstellar mission to discover the very root of human existence, why do they talk and act like freshman science majors who’ve never been in the field before? Holloway takes off his helmet the very second he discovers the air is breathable, is he a moron?! Has this scientist not heard of bacteria? Extra-terrestrial bacteria the human body has no immunity against? I’d overlook that if that’s how he got infected, however it’s uneven. It’s an exposition device for the audience, but why weren’t they briefed until the last minute?
Even in Alien vs. Predator, that made sense, they were rushing to be the first to lay hands on propitiatory knowledge and haste and secrecy were acknowledged as top priorities. Unfortunately, that doesn’t apply here. They’ve just flown a dozen scientists across the galaxy without giving them the slightest hint as to why. I guess it makes sense. Vickers was in charge and she was a nepotism hire who wants the mission to fail anyway, so maybe it’s intentional that she’s a complete screw up who didn’t screen or brief any of her candidates. Sadly, that’s a reach that it took me five viewings to arrive at. As I hinted in that film’s entry, these problems wouldn’t bother me in a film of Alien vs. Predator‘s level. By contrast, Prometheus has clear “thinking person’s blockbuster” aspirations and thinking about it is as lethal to it as those alien sperm are to Holloway.
Ridley Scott is a still good director for the most part (or at least he still was in 2012). The film does have some interesting themes and ideas and obvious as it is. I do like the layers of subtext the film puts in place about religion, faith, parenthood and scientific curiosity. It gives you something to chew on even if the film never does more than skim the surface itself. The world it builds makes no logical sense. However, it does make some emotive sense and part of me wishes the film had steered harder in that direction.
The biggest issue with the film really is it doesn’t know what it wants to be, with a grand and epic tone that clashes with the clichéd characters and shallow story. We have an actual zombie turn up all of a sudden for no other reason than to provide an action beat near the end of the second act and kill off a bunch of red shirts who never received an introduction anyway. That sequence could have safely been written out. Rather than build from genre thrills to probing questions about humankind’s place in the universe or vice versa, Prometheus switches back and forth constantly. It’s deceptively shallow and does a very good job of seeming to be profound without actually pushing past a few vague what-ifs. For all its faults, what happens in Prometheus is certainly memorablem, and I can respect it’s lofty aims, even if they were ultimately defeated by commercial concerns.
3. Alien3
At the time a huge step down in quality from everything that came before it, the studio hack job Alien3 still stands as the third best Alien movie. The film suffered an infamously troubled production, details of which are outlined in a documentary that’s significantly longer than the longest cut of the film itself. Several radically different drafts of the script by several different screenwriters were proposed and rejected, before settling on a reworked version of an earlier script, moving the action from a monastery to a prison. Each of those earlier drafts left its own thumbprint that made it through the production. The controversial idea of killing off or writing out some of the surviving characters from Aliens was there from the start, with some earlier drafts having Ripley killed in between films and Hicks becoming the lead. Given how much Sigourney Weaver does to carry the film, I feel justified in feeling relieved that the producers at least had the sense to reject that idea.
This strange production cycle did at least result in perhaps an admirably strange film, and echoes of the earlier—and probably best—pitch of “The Name of the Rose in space” do survive, albeit stripped of much of their intended depth, commentary and resonance. The end product is an undeniably bleak, grimy and often striking film. Alien3 is generally one note, slightly repetitive and ultimately rather unfulfilling.
This movie marks a decisive shift in plot that set the tone for future entries in a very bad way. Unlike in the first two movies, this Xenomorph is apparently uninterested in finding hosts for more embryos, despite how later revelations suggest it would have every reason to do so. Instead this alien’s only goal is crunching its way through every live body in the place, leading to the film’s most uncomplicated pleasure, shot after shot of heads being ripped off, chewed through or exploding like pumpkins blasted with a shotgun while the hapless victim’s limbs flail impotently. It’s as if the alien itself is just going through the motions, chopping up humans mechanically and this excision of internal logic and motive behind the monster’s actions set the tone for subsequent sequels, in each case leaving them feeling so uniformly lifeless and unrealistic in comparison to the first two.
The success of these scenes is hampered considerably in this movie though by how utterly, utterly rubbish the visual effects are. The full scale suit designed and worn by Tom Woodruff—shout out to the unsung hero of this franchise—still looks fantastic, but the blue-screened puppet used for the wide shots is dreadful. It looks nothing like its supposed physical reference, moves uncannily, never matches the lighting of its surroundings, changes in color from blue to green (the Woodruff costume is always black) and varies enormously in size from about eight feet on its hind legs to the size of a small greyhound. Some shots almost approach decent, others are the worst effects shots this series has ever had. The far more ambitious effects of Aliens haven’t aged a day and to follow that with this laughable embarrassment is inexcusable.
The slower first half of the film primarily establishes its grim atmosphere. A few interesting themes are raised, and explored only shallowly before being dropped and the same often happens to characters as well. The characterisation and backstory given to medical officer Clemens, and his chemistry with Ripley, are necessary to keep us interested until the alien shows up. Charles Dance plays the part admirably, only the film soon forgets them once this purpose is served. The further evolution of Ellen Ripley is one of the film’s definite highlights. I would have liked more character driven scenes with some better writing, but a few really good lines are snuck in. “You’ve been in my life so long, I can’t remember anything else”, is possibly the best single line in any of these movies, beautifully and simply articulating the trauma that has defined Ripley’s whole life, credibly aging her fifteen years in what was for her only a couple of months. I’m not as big a fan of some of her earlier scenes and I don’t think her near rape at the hands of the convicts was necessary or particularly tasteful though. Weaver as always gives a commanding central performance and the film completes her arc nicely, the fact it does so is probably what sways me in the film’s favor, this does feel like the same Ripley, and would have made for a fitting end to her story, if nothing else.
Though Alien3 does stand as somewhat of a betrayal of the creative visions of the team who tried to contribute to it, and more damningly, is just rather one note, I do rather enjoy that one note that it hits. There are some notably weak scenes, with the emotional weight the film is shooting for not really coming off. I do hold a strange affection for its scuzzy setting and cast of semi-reformed rapists and murderers. Endearing enough not to be too wearisome, not so lovable you’re sad to see them get gnawed on. As far as Alien movies go, this one is watchable and simultaneously disposable. At the time, a massive drop in quality and ambition, now though, still one of the best we’ve got. Alien‘s compelling template and iconography were now open for studios to make mediocre, unambitious retreads out of, and this was the film that broke the seal on that.
Also, if you can get your hands on it, definitely watch the Assembly Cut rather than the original. It’s not so different that I feel like giving it a separate entry. It works better tonally and my familiarity with that version helped pull this into third place. I might knock this down a couple spots if I were solely judging based on the theatrical cut.
2. Aliens
Finally, we start cooking with gas. From “watchable and disposable,” we leap over good and great to absolutely awesome. There’s perhaps little argument that this stands as one of the best sequels in Hollywood history. More controversially, I would also say this is likely director James Cameron’s finest hour (between this Terminator 2 and The Abyss, depending on my mood). Despite the almost complete change of creative crew and direction, the film manages to feel contiguous with the original masterpiece, staying true to its world and characters while escalating the scenario and broadening its scope. Where Alien was a movie for the pessimistic and unstable 1970s, Aliens is a movie for the decadent, commercial 1980s. Rather than replicate the slow and insidious tone of the original, Cameron’s film plays to what turned out to be his strength by moving in an action direction, upping the stakes and the spectacle accordingly. Thankfully, the more intimate scale of the original isn’t wholly lost.
The film boldly and rightly takes its time, waiting more than an hour to show its hand and deliver the first big action scene and this first act and a half is as much a masterclass in mounting tension as its predecessor’s – though this one does have more of a workmanlike approach. It only gets more gripping from there, as Ripley and her ragtag team regroup and prepare to hold out against their nightmarish aggressors. I love how efficient the opening segment of the film is, using its early fake-out dream sequence to deliver exposition and advance the time-frame. Right away we feel in safe hands. Part of why the film feels like such a natural evolution from the original is it builds upon concepts established in a deleted scene from the first film where during her flight from the Xenomorph, Ripley finds Dallas and Brett cocooned and puts them out of their misery with her flamethrower. That scene wasn’t needed in the first film and would’ve waylaid the pace at a crucial moment, but it provided material for this film to repurpose and reinstate into canon and for that we’re grateful to it.
There are some flaws. Although the supporting cast are a lot of fun, they and their dialogue do feel very cartoonish compared to the original film’s more naturalistic characterisation. It feels a little dumbed down in comparison, and I stand firm on some of Carrie Henn’s delivery being very bad indeed. The common flaw with this and Terminator 2 is Cameron’s just can’t convincingly write and direct children. I would also say that as with Alien3 the 1991 special edition is the superior version, with better pacing and more time devoted to atmosphere and characterization. That said there are some terrific performances here. Weaver is as always fantastic and her development from stable-headed survivor to fiercely protective warrior-mother figure is logical and effective character growth and Weaver plays it near-perfectly. It’s cheesy, 1980s family-values stuff that can tolerated when it’s done well, although I do think the deleted scene establishing Ripley had a daughter whose whole life she missed while in cryo-sleep is important, if not totally necessary connective tissue.
The supporting cast are a lot of fun, and I do love the miniature arcs lots of the supporting characters get. It’s another case where a little goes a long way as far as characterization, with Hicks’ rising to the occasion as leader or Gorman’s little redemption arc playing out unobtrusively, reinforcing the action the whole way. Paul Reiser is excellent as the underhandedly pragmatic company man, and I adore Lance Henriksen’s characterization as the humbly intrepid artificial person Bishop. Jenette Goldstein is also a favorite as salt of the corps marine Vasquez, another example of excellent casting and performing elevating a stock supporting role. There’s only a couple of effects— mostly the green screening in the flight sequences— that have aged poorly. The practical effects, puppetry, costuming and model work haven’t aged a day and still stand as some of the best effects cinema has ever produced, well into the era of computer generation and performance capture. The mech-suits—one of cinema’s greatest ever Chekov’s guns—still make my jaw drop in wonder more than anything in the Avatar movies.
As a near-perfect balance of character, action, story, world-building and tension, Aliens is about as good as big-budget Hollywood formula movies get, delivering energizing, uncomplicated thrills three and a half decades later, with the environments and world-building here managing to maintain enough of that atmosphere despite the more gung-ho tone of the action.
1. Alien
It’s a matter of personal preference which of the first two movies comes out on top. I think they work pretty perfectly as a part one and part two. Of the pair, I do much prefer the darker, more artistic, intense and mature original. I’ve heard it said that Aliens is the work of a master craftsperson and Alien the work of an artist, and…yeah, that’s pretty much it. Alien is one of those rare movies where everything just came together: the perfect director, the perfect premise, the perfect lines, the perfect cast, it’s all just so exacting, mirroring the perfectly terrifying organism at its center. It could’ve gone so wrong (just look up the original ending to see how close we came to a very different, and much worse film). Nevertheless, the creatives found the right way through and made the best horror film ever and one of the best films of any genre.
The slow pace makes it feel so real and the world so lived-in and credible. The cast have such good chemistry with one another that you forget you’re seeing actors giving performances and not just human behavior. Everyone’s just so relaxed and comfortable onscreen, interacting with their environment in such a naturalistic and confident way. We are told so little about each character with absolutely no exposition about their lives back home.
The actors make them so real through their onscreen demeanor and interactions. I love Ian Holm’s chilling performance as Ash. On repeat viewing you pick up all his quiet, sinister, evasive little ticks, as if he’s rehearsing, trying to stay in character as part of the crew. Yaphet Kotto and Harry Dead Stanton are absolute legends, obviously, and I have to mention Veronica Cartwright who gives, in my opinion, one of the greatest performances in the history of horror. Lambert is up there with Wendy Torrance and Sally Hardesty as one of the most intense scream queens in cinema, she imparts every ounce of the exhausting mortal terror her character is experiencing. Her fear is what builds the alien up and makes it feel, so, so frightening, as does Ripley’s in the impeccable final movement.
And then of course there’s the woman of the hour: Sigourney Weaver, in her career-defining role as the sensible, clear-headed every-woman just trying to survive. In her own way, Weaver has to be just as frightened as anyone else, while staying resourceful and proactive, unlike Lambert, who just falls apart as most of us would. She does so much to endear the audience to her with her early screen time without ever jumping out as the obvious protagonist. It’s initially a complete ensemble film and Ripley just gradually steps up and naturally emerges as our hero.
In all seriousness, Alien is a strong contender for the best looking film ever and certainly my vote for the “best lighting in the history of cinema” award. The model-work, the backdrops, the sets, the costumes and makeup, the steam and condensation, the water dripping off everything including the characters, it all makes the film feel so real. There’s a spontaneity and realism to it that nothing CGI based could ever hope to capture. The designs of the creature and every other environmental element look so credible, vivid and evocative. It’s no wonder the world created by this film has been so influential. Every single frame of this movie is absolutely stunning. It’s a cliche to say you could take any still from a movie and hang it on a wall. Moreover, I challenge you to find even a single mundane or uninteresting composition anywhere in the whole movie. Every single shot is framed and lit so dynamically. The setting isn’t some space-age cathedral of light and color. It’s a damp, oily, sweaty old cargo freighter, and it’s somehow one of the most visually captivating films ever shot.
As a setup, it’s really simple. The detail and maturity with which its handled make it feel so rich and investing. There’s a subtextual richness beneath the surface. However, the world and scenario are so intently gripping and viscerally terrifying that analysis feels more like pedantry. The story of the crew of an interstellar cargo freighter who find their ship infiltrated by a hostile life form is just told so well, with so much atmosphere and visual intrigue that it requires little to no character development or additional intrigue.
It’s really hard to praise Alien both because everything positive one could say about it has been said countless times already, and because everything positive one could say about a horror movie is true of this! Taken as a piece of storytelling, a technical feat, a milestone in the genre or as a transcendent work of art, Alien is simply perfect. There is no other film like it despite it being one of the most influential and imitated films ever made. It captivates me now as much as it did the first time and each viewing reveals new facets of it that impress me in new ways. It’s the absolute definition of a masterpiece and will not ever be topped. It’s just not possible to make a better horror film than this.
Good luck, Fede Alvares.
