(Ridley Scott, 1979)
(essay by Kevin)
There were a handful of films in this countdown that I dreaded getting assigned, and Ridley Scott’s Alien was one of them. Oh, not because it’s a bad movie (of course it isn’t!), but because what can someone like me say about the classic horror/sci-fi hybrid that hasn’t already been said by people much more adept than I?
I guess one place to start is how upon each subsequent viewing of Alien I’ve found something new to admire. I’ve seen the film at least 20 times, and I never tire of it (I even had the privilege of seeing it in the theater during its revival tour a few years back); mostly because it epitomizes classic filmmaking, and that’s something that never gets old. Like all of the great Hitchcock thrillers, Alien knows how to play the audience like a piano (to borrow Hitch’s line); it utilizes a slow burn mentality that uses the plot device of an alien life form evolving throughout the film to keep things fresh every time we “see” the alien (one of the brilliant things about the film is in the way Scott leaves much of the film in the dark, never tipping his hand as to how the alien may look, employing a kind of Val Lewton approach to the horror).
The pacing of the film is one of the primary factors in getting me to return to the film year after year. The pacing allows for the camera to really sweep through the ship and give us a sense of place. Yes, this is a science-fiction film, and Scott knows that (and its sets and exterior shots of the ship are great sci-fi moments), but at its heart Alien is a horror film; a thing-that-go-bump-in-dark slasher film – Halloween in space, essentially, and it’s one of the most brilliantly executed slasher films I’ve ever seen.
All of the elements are here for your basic slasher movie: dark corners, unknown killer on the loose, things jumping out of the dark to give you a good jolt, unrelenting terror, and a Final Girl. However, one element that isn’t the same is that Scott replaces the teenagers with adults, and it gives the film a more adult feel; a kind of slasher for the uninitiated (the prototype for the “dead teenager” movie, Friday the 13th, hadn’t been released yet, but you it existed without a title attached to it in films like Halloween and Black Christmas). By casting older actors (the youngest at the time being Veronica Cartwright at 29 and Sigourney Weaver at 30) like Tom Skerritt and Harry Dean Stanton, the film just feels different. I don’t know if more legitimate is the right way to say it, but it definitely took the slasher premise and made it more commercial (Scott is always good at taking genre films and making them commercial) by passing it off as a thriller (older characters in peril) instead of what it really was: a slasher movie in space.
Look, three paragraphs in and I haven’t even really said anything about the film. Again, I can’t think of much to add to the conversation in regards to Alien. It’s a brilliantly constructed horror film set in space, and it has some of the best sound effects I can remember. A lot of the film takes place in silence, or with Jerry Goldsmith’s ominous score just lurking beneath the action. I love the way Derek Vanlint’s camera pushes in on scenes at a slow clip, and how Scott keeps those scenes at the appropriately deliberate pace which allows the mise-en-scene to marinate, rather than jolting us around with schlock tactics in order to jar and scare the viewer – there truly is something more unsettling about waiting for something to happen (I still get tense when Kane looks into that pod, the calm right before the storm of a face-hugger attaching itself to its host); I love the way Dan O’Bannon’s script keeps a lot of the (pseudo)scientific wonderment about space and alien lifeforms of old science-fiction films (reminding me of Howard Hawks’ The Thing From Another Planet) before turning his script into a full-fledged slasher movie; and I especially love the performances, specifically Sigourney Weaver, as Ripley, who portrays one of the best and strongest female protagonists of any film in any genre (but especially the horror genre).
But perhaps the most memorable thing about the film, and the reason it still resonates years later, is the design of the alien itself by Swiss surrealist H.R. Giger. The amazing pencil artwork of Giger was shown to Scott by O’Bannon who thought that Giger’s work – specifically his famous Necronomicon IV – was perfect for the look they wanted. Giger is fascinated with phallic symbols and dark imagery (I have a lot of his art work, and I always hid it from my parents when I lived with them, hehe) and the design for the alien was perhaps his masterpiece. He won an Academy Award for his work (his greatest phallus, if you will, as the alien does look like a giant penis…and the symbolism isn’t lost on even the most novice viewer when the baby alien bursts from the chest of Kane) It’s one of the most memorable movie monsters of all time, and it’s certainly one of the creepiest. However it’s not just the alien design that is offsetting; one of the film’s strongest assets is its theme of isolation (the tagline for the film is also one of the most memorable of the genre: “In space no one can hear you scream”), of not being able to hide or run to safety because there’s nowhere to go…you’re in an alien world. The design of this alien world, specifically of the famous “cockpit alien” when Kane and his crew first come upon the strange terrain, is even more offsetting than the design of the alien itself.
Oh, I could go on and on (I’ll save it for the comments) about how the final moments are as tense as anything I’ve seen in a horror film; about how the scene of the crew guiding Skerritt as he chases the alien through the ship’s ducts is equally as intense and never fails to put me on edge; and I could go on and on about how Ridley Scott and Dan O’Bannon took a very basic slasher premise and created something that would become a franchise – making people believe along the way that science-fiction could be something different than 2001: A Space Odyssey and Star Wars.
I realize I probably haven’t shed any new light onto this well-known film, but I wasn’t expecting to offer any new insights. Alien is classic suspense/horror filmmaking at its purest; I can easily speak of it in the same manner I would speak of Hitchcock’s thrillers being timeless classics.
(this film appeared on Kevin’s list at #5, Troy’s at #17, Robert’s at #21, and Jamie’s at #35)
Excellent piece, very readable and still insightful even while noting that so much has already been said. This was my first rated-R movie, on VHS with my Dad watching it too (he had seen it in ’79, having no clue what to expect, and was so terrified that after having a nightmare about the facehugger he woke up and began vaccuuming around the house trying to pick it up – my mom came home and though he was on drugs. hmmm, maybe he was…)
What are your thoughts on Aliens? I like this one more, but I have friends who swear by the second being the best. Very different films, of course (action/war vs. horror/thriller).
Thanks, Movieman! I appreciate the kind words. I personally love ALIENS, and it’s one of those movies that I simply must watch whenever I stumble across it on TV. It was one of my favorite movies as a kid, and I still get visceral kick out of it. What’s amazing is how long the film is for an action picture, yet, Cameron is so good in that movie at ratcheting up the tension (after a mere 20 minutes or so of exposition) and keeping his foot on the gas for the entirety of the film that I never realize how long the movie is until the end…when I realize how exhausted I am.
I remember Ebert’s great review for the film claiming that is was as well crafted as an action film he had ever seen, but he felt depressed after seeing it because it was such an unrelenting picture. He was all wound up and tense during and after viewing it, and that wasn’t necessarily a good thing for him. However, that’s one of the film’s attributes that makes me admire it more than any other action film: it refuses to release you from its grip.
ALIEN and ALIENS are two totally different movies, and if there is a distinction one can make between “best” and “favorite” than I would make it with these two films: ALIEN is the best film of the series, but ALIENS is my favorite of the series.
Great answer Kevin! I’ll say this for the Alien series – no other franchise which comes to mind has had such an advantage in garnering a totally distinct and distincitive auteur for each of its entries (at least if you discount Alien vs. Predator – though I’m not sure who directed that & I haven’t seen it…)
Cool — this was my first R-Rated movie as well!
As Kevin states, ALIENS is great, but it’s a whole different beast than this — a balls to the wall adrenaline action flick and one of best ones ever. I love that movie as well (Kevin and I use quotes from it all the time).
This movie is so good, I saw it for the first and only time on TV and I can’t wait to see it again. I loved all the characters, the slow burning build up, the scares, the absolute gorgeous and tremble producing design of the alien, whose biology is so good.
I was just reading a post on the movie, and specifically the Giger work on the movie on a blog here:
http://unflinchingeye.blogspot.com/2010/10/you-are-my-lucky-star.html
The picture featured there scared the hell out of me! Is that was behind the costume? DAMN!
Wow. That picture is awesome…and creepy as hell! Hehe. Thanks for sharing that link. I agree with your comment you left on that site as well: the alien is arguably the definitive movie monster.
This is a fantastic film, and a nice little essay to boot (damn the Olson’s can write no?).
The chief scare moment for me is when the two astronauts (I can consider them that for short hand no?) go to investigate the other ship and must communicate just via a futurist walkie-talkie basically. They are in a virtual no mans land for what seems like forever, then we all breath a sigh of relief when they return unharmed (but this is the greatest joke, as they are actually as harmed as they could be, the monsters are IN THEM). I have a book with an essay on this film and it describes this scene as one ‘that would make even Hitchcock cover his eyes in fear’, I’ve always loved the thought and visual to that idea.
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This movie virtually created the Body Horror/sci-fi hybrid (which is saying a lot) along with early Cronenberg… the fact that it’s also one of the greatest slasher films ever made (as Kevin wonderfully asserts) is just icing on the top. A wonderful film that does what all great art should do; define and defy categories.
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As for the sequels/rest of the series: I might be in the minority, but I find little use for ALIENS actually thinking the third and fourth ones are more interesting and enjoyable. I’ve always thought the fourth one is incredibly underrated as most people think it out and out blows. Rather it’s a decently interesting film and has the best production design of the series (save for maybe the original), and it features a short haired Winona Ryder at the peak of her considerable ‘spice’ powers.
Jamie:
Thanks for the kind words! This one was hard to write because so much has been written about the film already, but I knew I wanted to mention that this is essentially HALLOWEEN in space as I’m not quite sure people realize that this film is essentially working from the slasher template. I can’t say I agree with you assessment of the later ALIEN films, though. ALIEN 3 (especially the director’s cut) has grown on me over the years, but the I thought the fourth installment was complete bollocks. Granted I haven’t seen it since its initial release, but I remember thinking that the alien wasn’t scary at all, the action bland, and Weaver seemed to be sleepwalking through the role that made her a movie star. It was just sad to watch.
I completely feel about your trouble with writing about a film. I’ve finished all my pieces for this countdown that I was scheduled for, but my #1.
I plan on a saturday viewing, shutting off the phone, turning everything off and just watching it as close as I can and seeing what it strikes me to write. I love my #1 that much that I want to do something ‘special’ for it. Stretch the blog form, I have no idea.
After The Shining this is probably my favorite Horror film. I remember when I first saw this. I was about 8 years old and visiting my grandparents house. I have a pretty big family and there would always be multiple cousins to hang out and play with. For some reason though, that night, the only people who were there were my immediate family and my grandparents. While the details are fuzzy, I remember turning on the TV in an empty room and watching about 20 minutes of Alien. I distinctly remember the alien popping out of John Hurt’s chest and me shutting the TV and running out of the room terrified. It took me about 7 years before I properly watched the film again. It has been one of my favorites ever since. None of the sequels can match the original in my opinion. When someone praises Aliens over this Ridley Scott masterpiece, I automatically view them with suspicion and cinema contempt…….
“When someone praises Aliens over this Ridley Scott masterpiece, I automatically view them with suspicion and cinema contempt…….”
true dat
Maurizio:
What a great anecdote! Thanks for sharing that. I remember being lured by the imagery of Giger’s alien design…it must have been in a book of sci-fi movies I used to check out the public library. I sought out a lot of movies based on pictures I saw of them in film books I used to read. I have to say this about the sequel, though: It’s not a better film, but my reasons for labeling it my favorite of the bunch is (like most people who label certain films as their favorite) purely emotional and nostalgia based. It was a huge part of my adolescence.
Kevin, you are one modest guy. Who is more “adept” than you when it comes to the horror genre?
I completely agree that the design of the alien if the film’s central allure, and what transforms a menacing and atmospheric science-fiction/horror film into hell-raising terror. Using the basic premise of a low-budget B movie from the 50′s, IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE, ALIEN’s horror is the suspense in the enveloping terror that claims one spaceman after another. I also see the reference you make here with THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD. O’Bannon’s script is taut and economically written, and there’s an enveloping sense of foreboding throughout.
The horror master has spoken again with exceeding passion and insight.
YOU ALL ARE VIRGINS TO THIS FILM wITHOUT THE BENEFIT OF THE THEATRICAL EXPERIENCE. I agree totally on all of the films atytributes that Kevin has spoken of in his review… HOWEVER: Like 2001: A space odyssey, CLOSE ENCOUNTERS, ITS A MAD MAD MAD MAD WORLD, LAWRENCE OF ARABIA, the power of the film is heightened to palm sweating proportions, 1000 fold, when its viewed on an enormous theatre screen. ALIEN is a perfect example of film as a theatrical experience, beyond being a mere movie. Add to it that, in this experience, this film-maker and crew are meticulous to make everything about this world of distant planet and spaceship a completely viable and real setting. On top of its excellent pacing, editing, FX and performances, this syands as on of the most convincing works of make-believe in the pantheon of horror/sci-fi. Can’t really say that about too many other films since ALIEN was released. This is the best of the four and EASILY my favorite of the four. Well done, Kevin!!!!
Last year around Halloween I was able to enjoy a theatrical double-bill of this film (the Director’s Cut version) and James Cameron’s “Aliens”, and I’ll agree– you haven’t really experienced any Scott film ’till you’ve seen it on a big screen. The only other films of his I’ve seen theatrically are the final cut version of “Blade Runner” (an essential experience), “Black Hawk Down” (not quite as essential), “Hannibal” (actually better than people say) and “Robin Hood” (one of my top ten of the year– suck it, Errol Flynn!). I’d love to see full roadshow-style extended-cut screenings of “Gladiator” or “Kingdom of Heaven” (hell, even “The Duellists” would be awesome).
The last time I saw this it was on the big screen.
couldn’t you say every film ever made should be seen on the big screen if possible?
Let’s see…
“You absolutely MUST see 13 GOING ON 30 in the theaters!!”
Nope, doesn’t work
eh. (a technicality)
couldn’t you say every film ever made worth seeing should be seen on the big screen if possible?
/fixed.
I know I sure miss living in a city with a revival theater.
By the way… I saw thisa film the first night of its theatrical run with my father and my uncle at THE ZIEGFELD theatre in Manhattan (still on of the largest original screens in America) and I have never forgotten the experience. I remember ever person in the theatre was sweating by the time the ffilm let out… Boy, am I showing my age or what????
You are not showing your age at all. You are again showing your well-known penchant for the “tall tale.”
I can tell Kevin is an avid horror movie fan and he seems like a very nice guy but I must take exception to his continuous referral to the great sci-fi horror flick “Alien” as a “slasher movie”, in space or wherever. To me a slasher movie is a dopey excercise in cheap scares and gore for the sake of gore. Alien is a brilliant science fiction tale intelligently conceived and executed which just happens to feature a being who rips up mammals to preserve itself and it’s species. Speaking of slasher movies, Bruce Hidemi Sakow who wrote the script to “Friday The 13th The Final Chapter” took my brother-in-law and myself to see Alien when it first came out in 1979.
Interesting story about how Bruce’s screenplay for “Friday” was intially rejected and when he went to see the movie it was his work almost word for word. He got a lawyer and the film’s producers offered him either $15,000 or his name in the credits. He did the smart thing and chose the latter.
My problem with the slasher movie bit notwithstanding excellent work Kevin.
I can tell Andrei Scala is an avid horror movie fan and he seems like a very nice guy but I must take exception to his continuous referral to the slasher movie as dopey exercises in cheap scares and gore for the sake of gore.
There are plenty of examples of slasher films that are effective thrillers and very bloodless. If one wants to reduce a subgenre to it’s worst examples then I’ll say the thriller genre is crap because all I’ve seen are a few direct to video examples with Eric Roberts in the lead.
You said it better than I, Jamie.
Andrei:
I’ll respectfully disagree with you about the slasher genre. Yes, like any subgenre it lends itself to exploitation, but the slasher –despite the bad name its garnered over the years — is no better or worse than any other subgenre of horror. HALLOWEEN is the quintessential slasher film, and there isn’t a drop of blood in the movie…it’s as artfully executed a thriller as anything by Hitchcock. As much as you may despise the title, ALIEN is, by all accounts, a slasher film. And that shouldn’t be seen as a slight to Ridley Scott and the people that worked on the film.
Andrei: My father and my uncle took me to the premiere of the original Dracula in 1931. My father turns 278 this year and my uncle hails from the Carpathian Mountains.
Interesting too that the film Alien never played at the Ziegfeld during it’s release history.
“Interesting too that the film Alien never played at the Ziegfeld during it’s release history.”
Ouch.
Oh yeah, well a lot of people don’t know this but my great-grandfather Arminius Scala (1854-1923) who was the author’s friend and colleague gave Bram Stoker all the best plot devices and most exciting action sequences for the great novel and he even made him change the name from “The Undead” to “Dracula”. The chase scene at the end was all my great grand dad’s idea…he even wrote part of the narration and he convinced Stoker to put in the scene with the baby being devoured by the vampire women because he was angry at my infant grandfather for dirtying too many linen diapers in a single week when they fed him too much broccoli rabe, so it was his little way to get revenge for all those soiled Victorian “huggies”.
Well, reading this just makes me think I’m undervaluing the film by placing it ONLY at #17. Like Kevin I’ve seen this movie many, many times and never tire of it. Watching it in the theater with Kevin (and maybe 10 other people?) was one of my most memorable film experiences.
It was also my first truly horrific movie experience — the first movie I ever saw that scared the crap out of me. I was probably 10 and while at a friends house (no way my parents would have let me watch this) we watched with his dad and older brother. I had trouble sleeping that night, thinking that an alien was going to get me, especially traumatized by the ultra-tense scene where Skerrit treks through the catacombs of this ship. Oh, and there was also this odd sensation I had while seeing Sigourney Weaver in her underwear at the end
Anyways, love the pithy style of your review here Kevin.
Well, since people are looking in this thread for our current conversation, I was wondering if anyone has heard/seen this:
A History of Horror with Mark Gatiss
Sounds like he hits the Lewton films in the first episode (complete with John Carpenter dismissing the importance of CAT PEOPLE), looks at British and Italian horror from the 50′s/60′s in ep. 2, and then talks about 60′s/70′s horor, including MARTIN, among other things, in the third episode. Anyone know a way to trick the BBC iViewer into letting me watch or am I going to have to go in search of other means of watching?
you maybe able to rip this through safari. i’ll look into it later, i’d like to watch it.
Just spent 20 minutes trying to get a UK proxy to work to watch via the BBC iPlayer and failed…found it in 2 seconds elsewhere. I’ll be watching the first episode later tonight.
Troy,
I’ll display my ignorance again on this board…where’d you find it? Gatiss’ BBC series THE LEAGUE OF GENTLEMAN is the most bizarre television I’ve seen, the morbid aspects overwhelming the comedy to such an extent that it just gets funnier the more horrific it gets, and vice-versa. They reference the finale of DON’T LOOK NOW without parodying it in the least. A great show. Gatiss loves this stuff, no doubt.
I’m especially interested to hear Carpenter’s negative reaction to Lewton’s films. I remember interviews with the guy around the time of THE FOG’s release where he gave equal credit to Lewton and EC comics as the inspiration for that film…I’ve always loved it for the uneasy blend of pulp horror and shadowy suggestion it conveys, and can’t help think it’s commercial failure (compared to HALLOWEEN) affects his artistic judgement to this day.
Not sure if the site wants to have talk of torrents and such on it — email me and I’ll give you a link (troyolson1@gmail.com).
Great essay, Kevin.
I was only a little kid when this hit theaters, but I remember my parents and my aunt talking about this movie over a chinese food dinner. I’d never heard them–my father in particular–talk about any movie like they were talking about ALIEN. It was all hushed awe, head shakes, nervous giggles, and I wouldn’t see that movie for another ten years, but it already scared the piss out of me.
paul
To Jamie: You gave me a good laugh at myself and I appreciate it and thank you for it. Kevin, you are obviously a gentleman and you’ve certainly cleared up and put to rest (for me gratefully) what could have become a rather silly “slasher movie” controversey. Keep up the good work siblings.