Ok, I'm finally getting around to reviewing what might the most controversial geek-friendly film of the year, Ridley Scott's long-awaited Prometheus, as well as two of the films that begat Prometheus: Alien and Aliens.
Up until a month ago, I was a total Alien newb. I had never seen the original film or the sequels that followed. I also didn't know anything about Prometheus and why it was filling the fever dreams of fanboys and fangirls everywhere, until my boyfriend started salivating over the previews back in January and February. After getting the lowdown (about how Prometheus *seemed* to be a prequel to Alien, but Scott and the other filmmakers were being coy about it) and watching the preview myself, I started to get psyched about the movie.
To prepare, I watched Alien and Aliens with the BF and a couple other friends and learned about the whole Alien universe and lore: face-huggers, Weyland-Yutani, "Get away from her you bitch!"...the whole nine yards. Then, finally, I stayed up past midnight to see Prometheus.
A couple things that struck me: I would rate all three movies about the same. They are all entertaining and good in different ways, as well as imperfect in differing ways. I would say that Prometheus is the most imperfect, but I also enjoyed it the most. Where it fails spectacularly, it makes up for it in other ways.If I could assign one word to each film, I'd say that Alien is claustrophobic; Aliens is funny (thanks Bill Paxton!); and Prometheus is stylish.
The strength of Alien lies in its claustrophobia. The set is dark, dank, and crude. The workers on the ship, Nostromo, are blue-collar and thus work in blue-collar conditions. They are also expendable. And when Ellen Ripley discovers that her employers at Weyland-Yutani don't care if the passengers on Nostromo live or die, you can imagine how lonely and desperate she must feel--an emotional claustrophobia.
Ellen Ripley is the other strength of Alien and Aliens. A true feminist heroine (and "last girl", so common in horror movies), Ripley decidedly kicks ass. She is kind of the perfect woman: strong, smart, self-sufficient, and yet nurturing (taking Newt under her wing in Aliens), with a strong moral compass. But despite her seeming infallibility, Ripley never seems fake or one-dimensional. She's a phenomenal character and really carries the series on her shoulders.
By the time Aliens came out, the series (and James Cameron, who directed the film) seemed comfortable being such a well-known (and oft-quoted) part of pop culture. Aliens is funnier and feels more modern and blockbuster-y than Alien. I especially liked Bill Paxton's over the top goofy performance and outbursts, such as "Game over! Game over, man!"
So, what I'm getting at is that Alien and Aliens are both really good, but really different movies.
This brings us to Prometheus. After the film opened, the outrage began. Critics and fans alike had issues with the movie that can be distilled down to two main problems: 1) it didn't relate directly enough to the previous Alien movies, but related *just enough* to be a tease and 2) the pacing was wacky and there were too many stories crammed into one film.
The first problem is one I wasn't bothered by. Ridley Scott said that Prometheus wasn't a prequel to Alien and...he was telling the truth. It isn't. It takes place in the same universe as Alien and kind of shows a sort of origin story that runs parallel to the world of Alien, but it's not a direct prequel. This didn't bother me, but I can understand why it frustrated many diehard fans of Alien. Scott reneged on an unspoken promise he made to fans.What did bother me was the pacing. The last 30 minutes of Prometheus is nuts. The film begins very slowly and lingers on pretty scenes and pretty actors. It effectively builds up tension and excitement--you can see how things are going to reach a tipping a point and go terribly awry. But when the shit finally hits the fan, it's so much shit that it...uh...muddies your vision. All of a sudden, twists and turns (some good, some pointless) come out of nowhere. Some of those twists are immediately and prematurely resolved to make room for new events and twists. There was one particular plot line I found terrifying and fascinating (SPOILER: it involves a late-term abortion that had my jaw on the floor), but this plot line emerged and was resolved in about fifteen minutes. It could have easily been the biggest and most important event of the movie, but it was one of about 5 major plot lines thrown at the audience in the last third of the movie. Too much.
However, despite its major problems, Prometheus was highly entertaining. It was effectively gory and horrific in a satisfying (as opposed to simply gross) way. For the most part, the acting was excellent--particularly Michael Fassbender as the amoral android David, and Noomi Rapace as Dr. Elizabeth Shaw, the most Ripley-esque of the bunch.
Prometheus also brought up many good questions. In the film, Dr. Shaw is searching for the extraterrestrial beings she believe created humans. She is a woman of faith, and her faith informs her search. But at what price? Are we intended to question and confront our Maker(s)? Shaw finds out who made the human race, but it turns out they are not the benevolent gods she thought they were. The theology of the film is interesting, if flawed, and it brings up questions about our various theologies and their relationship with science and progress.
I could go on about other themes Prometheus delves into, but this post is long enough as it is. One thing is for sure: Prometheus is a very ambitious movie. In fact, its ambition may have been its downfall. If Scott had been a little more focused, Prometheus would have been a much better movie.
Alien: 4 out of 5 stars
Aliens: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Prometheus: 3.75 out of 5 stars
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