rating:
(out of
4 stars)United Kingdom, United States; 1979
Directed by Ridley Scott; produced by Gordon Carroll, David Giler, Walter Hill; screenplay Dan O'Bannon
Starring Tom Skerritt, Sigourney Weaver, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, John Hurt, Ian Holm
Below you will find a temporary review for this film. The real (better, more complete) review will be online very soon.
'Alien' is one of those films that shows why most of today's sci-fi horror
films are not scary. This film knows that things are a lot scarier when you
do not show exactly what we are dealing with, it knows that it is scary up
until we see the creature (or killer), not during and after. In the last
couple of years only 'Signs' has taken this approach as well, also very
successful.
On board of a space ship a couple of men and women wake up too early to
investigate a strange signal that comes from a nearby planet. On the planet
they find a strange species and one of the creatures attaches itself to Kane
(John Hurt). After a while it lets go and the man seems fine before his
stomach explodes and a baby creatures jumps out of the dead man.
Other members of the team named Dallas (Tom Skerritt), Ripley (Sigourney
Weaver), Lambert (Veronica Cartwright), Brett (Harry Dean Stanton) and Ash
(Ian Holm), who seems to have his own priorities, now want to catch the
thing before it will do more harm. Slowly they learn more about the alien.
It has grown a lot faster than expected, it has blood that burns through
anything and it seems to be a predator that only wants to wipe out those who
threaten it, to give some examples.
Director Ridley Scott handles the material perfectly. He uses the usual
tricks to create suspense but he knows how to make it work. He starts of
slowly, introducing the characters and let us learn more about the ship they
are on. Before the creature attaches itself to Kane we already have seen a
lot of 'Alien' and we more or less understand how everything works and who
is who and why. When the alien is out of Kane's body it is interesting to
see how especially Ripley simply wants to kill the thing, instead of
investigating what it really is and can, as Ash suggests.
'Alien' is an intelligent film and on the same time it is the sci-fi
thriller where something scary can jump in front of the camera at any
moment. Scott knows how to combine something intelligent with the simple
kind of entertainment and the result is pretty impressive.