“Look out for the legs on the roof” they said, as I searched for the charming Duke of York picture house in Brighton. This month the cinema held a unique screening of Ridley Scott’s Alien to commemorate the 30th anniversary since it burst onto our screens. To round off the evening’s entertainment the lucky 300 audience members were also treated to a special Q&A session with Oscar award winning costume designer John Mollo, and Bafta nominated editor Terry Rawlings.
The pair, who had never met in the thirty years since the inception of Alien, were on hand to provide us mere mortals with an exclusive look into how the film came together and coupled with priceless anecdotes. For example did you know that Jones, the ships cat, was auditioned and hand selected by Scott himself? And that in order to induce fear in Jones when filming certain scenes a large Alsatian dog was brought in to quite literally scare the bejesus out of him? Nope, neither did I, but it sounds amazing. Now on with the show!
With the venue packed from front to back and an animated crowd ready to sink their teeth into the film (ohh these puns just keep on coming), our host for the evening made her way to the stage to greet us with some terrific news. “Tonight we will be showing a 70mm print of Alien, which has been sitting in storage since 1979” cue a typical fan boy ‘Oooooeeeeee’. Yes that’s right panto crowd, an original print complete with all its imperfections and scratches, making this screening all the more extraordinary, like a time capsule into the past which I’m far too young to have experienced first hand.
The lights dimmed and the pre-roll began, but with the unfamiliar sight of a ‘Rated X’ censorship warning, not that it mattered, as the whole audience already knew of the horror that was coming, and we couldn’t wait. The grainy film shot to life and a wash of tension spread across the audience. Within three minutes the Mining ship Nostromo was towering over us, unofficially the most bad ass haunted house on the hill to ever be imagined. Move over Bates motel, did you have a self-destruct button?
As expected the film was incredible and bar one scene, where the crew’s heads were flipped from the top of the screen to the bottom, the thirty year old print held up well and added a welcome element of nostalgia to the event. The most enjoyable aspect however was the level of interactivity that I found myself experiencing with the rest of the audience. Nowadays it’s very rare that I watch a film in a fully packed cinema and the impact of doing so certainly lifted the film from enjoyable to exceptional. Having watched Alien numerous times before, I was fully aware of each jolt, crash and scare waiting to jump out at me. Yet despite this the constant gasps, screams and seat jumping audience members that surrounded me only unnerved me further. Eventually I too, like the two women next to me, was jumping out of my seat as Jones the cat bolted across screen with a loud cry.
When I wasn’t being frightened by an assortment of cats, falling crates, renegade xenomorphs and missing facehuggers, two very important realisations became apparent to me. First was the incredible level of detail that has gone into making Alien, right down to the smallest features. One example of this is littered all over the canteen scenes, which feature ‘Weyland-Yutani’ branded beer cans and cigarettes, specifically designed for use in the film and a level of detail you simply don’t see today. Instead corporate branded product placement would bombard the screen as subtly as a brick to the face and if you don’t believe that just watch I, Robot or Casino Royale.
The second factor that stood out was the perfect use of tortuously slow editing to keep the audience constantly on edge. From the very first shot of the film, the tension mounts just a little bit at a time, slowly tying your stomach in knots. Even unthreatening scenes of Ripley searching for Jones in the cockpit are made to be extremely stressful with long panning movements which serve only to increase the mounting tension. Although the chest buster is highly regarded as the definitive scene from the film, in my eyes it really takes a back burner compared to the rest of the movie, which is put together so well that it has you in gut wrenching tension throughout.
When the curtain finally fell, the auditorium erupted in resounding applause. Of the numerous conversations that followed the most interesting came from behind me with one fellow religiously explaining to his friend exactly why it is, “far better with the naff suits than the new films with all those poxy special effects”. Despite the man’s ineloquent explanation, he had made a very good point. Barring James Cameron’s Aliens back in 1986, what contribution has the rest of the series made, other than tarnishing the good work done by Ridley Scott?
Alien3 was a crash and burn, rush job by the studio which offered nothing original that hadn’t already been done by its predecessors. While Alien: Resurrection, despite having the opportunity to start a fresh, moronically went backwards by hamfisting Ripley back to life in a bland and lacklustre script. As for the pair of Aliens Vs Predator films well, the less said about them the better. Never before has a film had me wishing for one of the aliens to jump out the screen and lovingly scoop out my eyeballs out with its double jawed mouth just to make it stop.
So with such undoubted failures since 1986, what hope is there and what direction should the series take? Although news is continuously circling that Ridley Scott is going to ride in like some white knight in shining armour and rescue the series, I’m not fully convinced. The initial buzz has been that Scott will take a producers role and that the film will be set as a prequel to the original movie, showing exactly how the aliens came to be on LV-426. But surely there must be something more interesting than a prequel returning to the same planet we’ve seen twice before? Perhaps Scott could be the man to finally bring together where so many others had failed: the infamous wooden planet idea proposed by Vincent Ward, which has always remained a firm fans favourite.
Another option which is creating quite a buzz on the Internet is screenwriter Anil Kunnel’s website Alien Planet. His unofficial 105-page treatment for a fifth Alien film, titled Alien Planet, which has been dubbed, “the best ‘Alien’ script in twenty years” by PlanetAvP.com is definitely an interesting and original premise (see screenshots). The script itself is decent enough, and with a little reworking an a few touches here and there it could be a very interesting option to see come to life and definitely better than the dross we’ve endured recently.
So let us know what other ideas you think could work and what direction the series should take? Anyone who suggests another Alien Vs Predator film best come prepared with a Marine issue M41 Pulse rifle to back up their argument though.
