Also, I don’t have a 4K tv, so it wouldn’t have done me any good!
I recently picked up a 4K TV so I am tempted - but I assume I also need a blu-Ray player capable of processing the 4K images too? And I imagine my older model won’t cut it. Maybe my Xbox One would though?
Xbox One S and Xbox One X both have 4K Blu Ray drives. My original Xbox One does not. You have an X though, so you’re good to go.
Aliens is among my favorite movies ever, and like some of you I’ve seen it countless times and have memorized pretty much all of it.
One of my favorite parts about it that few films get is all the little details about the marine squad. If the Nostromo and Sulaco are characters in their own right(and they are), the marine squad itself is a lovingly crafted character too. My favorite parts of the film all involve the acting and emotions of the squad and there’s scarcely a bit that’s out of place. It’s small wonder that the actors in the squad actually did a boot camp together:
Over the course of a few weeks, the actors who played the Colonial Marines were put through the paces by military advisors. They went through drills and maneuvers, assaulted stairwells around the studio, learned to salute, wear their uniforms properly, and handle their weapons appropriately.
“We had a physical fitness routine for them from 8:30 in the morning until 5 o’clock at night, and they were running, weight lifting and doing calisthenics,” Paul Weston, the stunt coordinator on “Aliens” said in a behind the scenes documentary.
The scene where the audience first meets the Colonial Marines was filmed at the end of the shooting, well after the actors had already spent months training and getting to know each other, in order to make their relationships feel more authentic, like they were born out of hardship in the same manner as an actual military unit.
Due to other film projects, Sigourney Weaver, William Hope (Lt. Gorman) and Paul Reiser (Burke, the conniving corporate lackey), had little contact with the actors who played the Marines until after filming and training had started. The effect was that, when the new boot-tenant and two civilians show up in the film, they’re regarded by the Marines with genuine skepticism.
Oh, and apparently the 3 hr HD documentary on the making of aliens is on youtube
Ok, I finally got around to watching Alien3. I wanted to find time to sit and watch it all in one go, but unfortunately I ended up watching it in two sittings; not the best watching experience.
Also, I did watch the 2003 edition (which the Quadrology box calls the “Special Edition”, but which some folks upthread said is the “Assembly Cut”, or maybe that’s different). Everyone says it’s better, but it is also a full 30 minutes longer, so…
Anyway, I haven’t seen this movie in many years; probably not since it first came out (or maybe when it first appeared on home video, I don’t think I saw it in the theater; but I don’t remember). I sort of have a memory of liking it, or at least not hating it.
And there is some decent stuff in here. Charles Dance (yes, Tywin Lannister) is in it, and he’s pretty great. And his death is well done, he’s had this interesting relationship building up with Ripley, and he’s just confessed his sordid past, when BAM, he’s just suddenly dead. And the movie’s only half over.
I kinda liked what they did with Bishop, in terms of the practical effects. Definitely a callback to Ash in the first movie.
But after that it gets hard to find stuff to say good things about. There’s supposed to be 25 prisoners in the facility, but except for a couple I have no idea who they are. The location is drab. The action sequences are more confusing than exciting. And, oh man, when you guys said the CGI Alien was bad, you weren’t kidding. That thing is embarrassing.
There almost could have been a plot about the apocalyptic religious sect that had developed in the colony choosing to worship the Alien as a god, but what we get is just one nutcase who decides to let it out after they’d captured it. Just to make the movie longer, I guess?
In the end, my biggest problem with this movie is that it simultaneously takes the franchise in a weird direction that it didn’t need to go, and also does nothing new with it.
In the first movie, the Nostromo encounters the alien – and this is, apparently, no accident, because Ash has been sent by “the company” to capture the alien and bring it back. In the second movie, it’s Burke who gets sent to retrieve the alien; and Ripley is along for the ride due to her previous experience. Her journey is almost pre-ordained.
But… why is this movie happening? They happen to crash-land on a planet which happens to have a penal colony of religious nuts? They just happen to land on the one inhabited planet with no weapons whatsoever? It just seems so random. It doesn’t fit in her journey. It’s just a thing that happens for no reason.
At the same time, it’s another story about trying to keep the alien out of the hands of the company’s bioweapons division. Why is Ripley so sure they won’t be able to contain it? Maybe she’s just been driven a little nuts. Maybe it really isn’t that big a deal. Actually, there’s another interesting direction the movie might have gone. But no, Ripley is just right, we know that. Despite not really knowing anything about the company or what its capabilities are. Anyway, this time it’s the human version of Bishop which wants to take the Alien back for the company, and they are (seemingly) thwarted once again.
The final action sequence is particularly bad. It’s ten minutes of identical bald dudes running through identical looking corridors and doors and saying “Corridor A clear!” “Corridor F clear!” over and over. At no point is it clear what is going on. Then, the alien, Dillon (Charles Dutton) and Ripley end up in the lead casting mold. Ripley tells Dillon to get out, and he says he won’t because the alien has to die before he’ll kill her. Then, he says there’s no time for him to get out, he has to stay down there to keep the alien from escaping. What? Why didn’t he just leave her down there? Now they both die for no reason!
Also, I could have sworn I remembered the alien popping out of her before she fell into the molten lead, but that didn’t happen. It turns out, that was removed in the Special Edition. Why? I dunno.
Anyway, that’s the end of the Alien franchise, right? Everyone’s dead. The company still didn’t get an alien. So I guess we’re done!
Wait, they got the Delicatessen guy to make an Alien movie? I gotta see that…
Go into it with correct expectactions of weird action comedy instead of horror movie.
And written by Joss Whedon. It should’ve been a lot better than what we got.
There’s also Brad Dourif as a mad/evil scientist.
I was just messin’ with ya, I’ve actually seen it. More than once!
It’s interesting to go back and re-watch Alien Resurrection if you’re a Firefly fan. The movie features a band of wisecracking mercenaries, traveling to interesting destinations in a small ship… concepts Whedon would later use to create Firefly.
Not that I actually recommend going back to watch Resurrection.
And my dire feelings about Alien 4 are probably influenced to some degree by how I feel about Joss Whedon’s writing, to wit: can’t fucking stand it. The whole mismatched mercenary gang should have been fun, and I actually dug the whole idea of Ripley as a clone, even though it makes no sense. But then we get bizarre baby albino alien that only wants to be loved but just gets sucked out into space.
Mainly though, it blows my mind that they made an Alien movie with Brad Dourif, Dan Hedaya, Ron Perlman, Leland Orser and Michael Wincott - and did absolutely nothing with them.
This entire paragraph 100%.
I actually really liked the 4th Aliens film when I saw it in theaters, but it’s been ages since I re-watched it so I can’t really defend it or anything. I’m going to be watching it again here at some point with my daughter since she enjoyed the first three, so when I do I’ll probably have some updated thoughts.
Wow that looks fantastic!
That’s just damn impressive - good for them!
Ok, took me a while, but I finally finished watching Alien: Resurrection!
So, I mentioned before about how I was initially bothered by the transition from horror (Alien) to action (Aliens). But now, with the quadrology complete, I see that each movie is in it’s own genre, which is kind of neat: Alien is a horror movie, Aliens is an action movie, Alien3 is whatever the hell it is, and Alien: Resurrection… is a comedy.
You know what, I’m going to go to bat for Alien: Resurrection. A little bit. It’s not a great film, no. It has a lot of problems. The second act drags. The end is dumb. But damn, it is a funny movie.
The station has door locks that you breathe on to open. Which Call (Winona Ryder) defeats with a can of Binaca. Brad Dourif (whose character is apparently named “Gediman”) licks the glass between him and the alien. When they’re trying to teach Ripley to speak, they show her a fork and she says “fuck”. I mean, that’s comedy.
But does it end there? It does not! During the ladder sequence (which, fair dues, is a pretty cool sequence), Johner (Ron Perlman) hangs upside down on a ladder to shoot and kill an alien. Then, when he levers himself back upright, there’s a spider in front of his face, which scares him! Ripley asks why Call cares if the aliens kill the humans, she says “Because I’m programmed to”. To which Ripley replies, “You’re programmed to be an asshole? You’re the new asshole model they’re putting out?”. Screw you, I laughed. And Call teases Wren (J.E. Freeman) over the intercom, “Intruder on level one, all aliens to level one”.
The special edition adds some more hilarity: the opening shot is a close-up of alien jaws… which, on pulling back, turns out to be some kind of bug, which Vriess (Dominique Pinon) smashes on the ship’s windshield. And when Call asks Ryder if she dreams, she says, “I used to be afraid to dream, but not anymore. Because no matter how bad the dreams get, when I wake up, it’s always worse”. Also, in the special edition, at the end, they’re actually sitting on Earth, looking at a destroyed Paris. All that time and effort to get to Earth, and it’s a wasteland! Ha! Although possibly it is a wasteland because they just crashed a ship into it, which apparently created an explosion thousands of miles across.
Oh, did I mention how Wren dies? When Purvis (Leland Orser) knows his alien is about to burst through his ribcage, he holds Wren’s head in front of him, so it goes right through Wren’s skull. Awesome.
Ok, look, the whole thing with the white alien hybrid thing at the end is dumb. And the alien looks terrible. I dunno how anybody thought that was a good idea. It made so little sense that they had to have Brad Dourif cocooned up on a wall explaining it. I’m not defending that. But when it gets sucked out through the window, it is pretty disgusting – the alien’s guts fall out when its skin gets ruptured, then the guts get sucked back in as they go through the window. Nice touch. And that whole part of the movie is only a few minutes long, anyway.
One weird connection: Ripley has an “8” tattooed on her arm, because she is the 8th attempt to resurrect the alien. Much like 11’s tattoo in Stranger Things… both starring Winona Ryder. Coincidence? Yeah, probably.
Also, the production design (well, at least, the design of the space station) is pretty darn good. It looks lived-in and dirty, and I think actually carries on some of the design aesthetic from the first two movies (unlike certain other movies with the word “Alien” in the title I could name). Some of the special effects are a bit weak, but still miles better than Alien3.
And that’s it! I’m done! Luckily there are no more Alien movies to watch! Can you imagine if they ruined the franchise with some dumb prequels?
Thanks for reading!
There’s a special edition of Alien Resurrection? Jesus Christ.
I seem to recall it was made specifically for the Anthology boxed set since every other movie had one. Could be wrong, though.
Like Alien 3, it’s not a director’s cut because the director wasn’t involved in recutting it.
So how about a poll?
Best Film
- Alien
- Aliens
- Alien 3
- Alien Resurection
0 voters