Alien (1979) Re-Release

For much of August, we will be taking a break to get our proverbial batteries recharged - we'll be back to releasing new episodes before the end of the month.

Forty-five years ago, one of The Greatest and Most Influential Science Fiction and Horror films was first released.   And now to celebrate the release of the latest entry in the long-running Alien saga - Alien: Romulus - here is a newly remastered review of the original with a few extra features.

This was only the second feature to be directed by Sir Ridley Scott near the beginning of what would eventually become an illustrious career including Gladiator, Blade Runner, Thelma & Louise, and The Martian.  

The story follows the crew of the Nostromo, a mining ship in outer space in the future which is called to answer a distress call on a nearby planet (LV-426) and once on that planet, they of course get more than they bargained for….eventually meeting the eponymous Alien. :o It stars Tom Skerritt as Dallas, the Captain of this crew along with Sigourney Weaver in her first major role and the one which made her a star…..as Lieutenant Ellen Ripley.  

Host: Geoff Gershon
Edited By Ella Gershon
Producer: Marlene Gershon

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Transcript

ALIEN - 1979

Directed by Ridley Scott (Audio clip)

Starring Tom Skerritt, Sigourney Weaver, Yaphet Kotto, John Hurt, Ian Holm, Veronica Cartwright, Bolaji Badejo, and Harry Dean Stanton

Genre: Sci-Fi Horror Thriller

Ten minutes into this, I suddenly had a realization regarding another genre film I had rewatched a couple of nights prior, "Wow this is within the SAME universe as Predator 2, crazy!" :/ Indeed it is....

And gratefully it's so much more because this film was just METICULOUSLY crafted by Sir Ridley (and sci fi screenwriter extraordinaire Dan O'Bannon) into a just under two hour tension machine featuring relatable characters dealing with an almost indescribable threat which starts to pick them off one-by-one!

 And by threat, I'm referring to several different things combined: a creepy derelict spacecraft filled with giant leathery eggs, the nimble face-hugger who manages to plant one on John Hurt's shamelessly curious Cane (Audio clip), the ruthless company who diverts the crew of the ship Nostromo from heading home instead sending them to a desolate planet housing said spacecraft, the milk-spewing Android who manipulates them into danger, and of course....the titular Alien who manages to make QUITE the violent entrance into this world via Cane's chest cavity and then inexplicably grows about 100x larger to become a slimy 8-foot tall walking, black dildo which is ribbed for nobody's pleasure. :o

This giant phallic monster not only has super-strength (just watch the deleted scene with Harry Dean Stanton) but is freakishly nimble, has a retractable mouth of sharp teeth, has a savagely sharp tail which it can whip around.....oh and it also spews acid for blood, good luck! ;) This creature was designed by the late Swiss artist H.R. Giger and it's a testament to just how effectively this "Tempest in Space" (as some described it upon release) builds its tension for the 65 minutes it takes before we even get a glimpse of the full monster that Mr. Alien's appearance feels more like a CULMINATION of the horror which preceded it….as opposed to a payoff.

Because everything I just described leading up to it is damn scary - Ridley Scott is just a visual master and he certainly didn't do it alone with help from cinematographer Derek Vanlint and Michael Seymour who lead production design. And Jerry Goldsmith providing a perfectly moody score. Everything just feels creepy yet sufficiently lived in from the ribbed walls of the alien space craft to those scratchy-sounding spiral doors to the ventilation shafts on the Nostromo. (Audio clip) 

 And thanks to this top-flight cast, we buy all of it - each character comes off like a '70's-Futuristic version of a space trucker. Sigourney Weaver was literally the youngest of the main cast at 29 while most of the rest of the cast were in their '40's and '50's which would just be UNHEARD of today for any sort of horror film. Every one just looks sleep-deprived and grizzled from the get-go which makes it feel all the more realistic.

It goes without saying that Sigourney is great as Ripley in what was her breakout role….playing suspicious, concerned, freaked, and unflappable all very convincingly (Audio clip) ....but she's really not THE star as this is a true ensemble. Everyone shines from Yaphet Kotto as the jovial but tough Parker (whose death STILL pisses me off after so many rewatches - DAMN YOU Veronica Cartwright….even though she's pretty great herself)….to Ian Holm adroitly playing it all cold and creepy as Ash, the secret android....you could even make a case that he's the most unnerving villain in this whole deal! :/(Audio clip) 

And I realize that compared to the amazing sequel – Aliens great film, check out my review – that this film gets a bum rap from some viewers as the "slower" one as the story takes its time, feeling more deliberately paced. But IS it actually?? 🤔 We're touching down on LV-426 within 20 minutes and we encounter the face-hugger before minute 45....seriously this thing moves faster than I remember. Yes Scott carefully takes us though the corridors of the Nostromo for several minutes but it all works towards setting up this environment pretty efficiently - literally everything shown to us serves a purpose introducing us to this world and building tension. I didn't feel a wasted moment rewatching it this time around....

It all climaxes with a final 20 minutes that just doesn't let up and is a masterclass in sustaining fear through performance, sound design, (Audio clip)  and...some visuals which just catch you off guard, I mean WOW did this alien find the RIGHT ship to stowaway on. :) Just the perfect mixture of oblong pipes and gray-coated wires to hide amongst….all within what might be one of THE most perfect horror movies ever directed. 

Best Needledrop (best song cue or score used throughout runtime of film): 

The late, great Jerry Goldsmith composed the score and it’s an effective mix of tension-building orchestral strings and almost indescribably non-melodic background sound to convey something otherworldly and scary.  For the latter part, he utilizes different instruments from all over the world including Shankars and didgeridoos, playing them in ways which sound almost unrecognizable resulting in a perfectly creepy table-setter for the movie, the “Main Titles” introducing the movie over the slowly developing word…..ALIEN. (Audio clip) 

Of course, there’s a more conventional theme introduced early on as our main characters are being awoken from hyper-sleep – it involves flutes, horns and the canny use of a device which Goldsmith was one of the composing pioneers for….known as the “Echoplex.”  Yes it does with musical notes EXACTLY what you would expect from the name….it creates echoes.   This theme is eventually repeated throughout the film– the track is called “Hyper Sleep.” (Audio clip)  

And because this film came out in 1979, imagine my delight to learn that there was actually a DISCO version of the main Alien theme released as a single, produced by a side project of a few DJ’s known at the time as Nostromo (named after the ship in the movie) – I mean as far as I’M concerned, there should be a disco version developed of EVERY major theme.  Sorry I’m just a sucker for this stuff! (Audio clip) 

Wasted Talent (most under-utilized talent involved with film):

There is honestly no one I can think of in front of nor behind the camera whose talent is wasted but…I would like to give a shout-out to one of the unsung master contributors to this movie and that would be the man who actually PLAYS the full grown eponymous Alien.  His name was Bolaji Badejo and he was a Nigerian design student who was discovered by the casting director at a local London bar one night – before production they were on the lookout for some one to fill out that alien suit who was freakishly tall and thin.  Needless to say, Bolaji standing at around seven feet tall and quite lanky MORE than fit the bill.  

From all accounts, he was a fantastic collaborator on-set and was a very good sport often having to wear this giant latex suit under less than friendly conditions most of the time.  And it should go without saying that his physical performance is just SPOT-ON – despite having a large humanoid frame, this alien doesn’t move like a human on two legs.  His movements are very slow and deliberate, along with being acrobatic at times which we see during his introductory scene when he’s literally dangling above Stanton’s Brett hanging from chains no less.  It remains one of the GREAT horror monster performances, right alongside the near-silent work done for Jason Voorhees or Michael Myers right around the same time.  Sadly this would be Badejo’s only on-screen acting appearance – he was diagnosed at a young age with sickle cell anema and passed away in 1992 at the age of 39 due to complications from the disease.  RIP to a true otherworldly legend.

Trailer Moment (scene or moment that best describes this movie):

There can ONLY be one right??  Yeah it HAS to be the show-stopping sequence which occurs about halfway through the movie – Cane (who is played by the late, great John Hurt) has woken up from a coma induced by having the mysterious face-hugger alien wrapped around his neck.  He SEEMS ok and they’re just having one last meal before returning to cryo-sleep to then return home.  Every one’s just shooting the shit, laughing, enjoying their meal when suddenly…..well you know what happens, our eponymous Alien is birthed and says hello 

Can I just say that 43 years later after it first hit screens, this sequence STILL holds up!  Hurt is terrifying as we watch him convulse in pain in the lead-up to it….the blood effects look genuinely convincing as we see them burst out in a mini-geyser from his chest cavity…. that creepy sound effect of the baby alien’s first scream is still quite unnerving…..the way every one else is framed around him at the table conveys the scale of how shocking this is…. Ian Holm does some sly foreshadowing the way he’s staring at this almost stone-faced (apparently knowing what’s going to happen) and….I gotta say, what REALLY sells this the most is the completely UNNERVING cry that Veronica Cartwright lets out as she’s watching this, “Oh…Go-od!!!!” . (Audio clip)  Honestly…..when it comes to game-changing movie moments that I WISH I could have seen live in theaters as part of an unsuspecting audience, it’s probably comes down to the twist ending of Planet of the Apes in 1968….and THIS. 

MVP (person or people most responsible for the success of this film): 

Last year, I reviewed Aliens and for me, selecting Sigourney Weaver as the MVP was almost a no-brainer – her performance in this movie is arguably as strong as it was in that film but as she has a smaller role and this is more of an ensemble, I don’t think she’s the clearcut choice.  It’s also tempting to choose HR Geiger for his design of the titular Alien – just SUCH a unique design for a creature it’s a mix of phallic and insect-like imagery, you could make a strong case that this film would not have had NEARLY the impact it did without presenting us for the first time with such an iconic creature villain.  

At the end of the day, this film is the whole package – perfectly structured and paced, both awe-inspiring and terrifying to look at throughout, well cast with several seasoned actors giving pitch-perfect natural performances, and a sound design and score which never fails to keep you on your toes and unnerve you at times.  One man pulled all of that together in what might arguably be the best horror film of all time – it’s certainly in the conversation, likely Top Five if nothing else – and that man is Sir Ridley Scott.  

This was only his second feature film at the time though he was already 42 and had been directing short films and commercials for more than a decade before that – there’s a confidence here from those lingering opening shots taking us through the empty hallways of the Nostromo which just never lets up throughout.  Every decision he makes from what’s shown and what’s not shown, from what’s said and what’s not said…..all of it serves a purpose.  I mean, we never even get a full-on discussion of the implications of what this crew has discovered but we just don’t need to…..and we BARELY see the full design of the alien through the first ¾ of this movie.  If I’m being honest, I have always been a bit mixed on the overall filmography of Ridley – I find some of his most acclaimed films like Gladiator and Blade Runner to be somewhat overrated….examples of style overwhelming substance.  And personally, I’m NOT a fan of his now two recent attempts to reboot this franchise with Prometheus and Alien Covenant, both films which have some AMAZING moments but overall, are somewhat confused and shapeless.  But when he’s matched up with the right screenwriter and a strong, game cast – The Martian, Thelma & Louise, and hell the VERY self-aware trashiness of both Black Rain and Hannibal – he just puts together moving images on the screen which are awe-inspiring!  And he does that here – Ridley Scott is the MVP. (Audio clip) 

Final Rating: 5 stars out of 5

Alien remains a masterpiece, one of the greatest genre mixtures of science fiction and horror ever made – as I just said, I truly love some of Ridley Scott's filmography but I don't think he's ever directed something better. Few have.

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