Alien, released in 1979, delivered something awesome to the horror movie genre, with its chest bursting, airway crawling, head mushing, flame-throwing carnage that the film is known for. Plus, it's a tense bugger, too. Aliens followed in 1985, and had a change of pace, being more manic, with more gunplay, more plot (with a saboteur who wants to take the thing back), and a kick ass finale. Alien 3 went back to it's roots, with a more thoughtful film that undeservedly gets a lot of stick, because it a bit more slower paced. Then, along came the 4th installment. And it seems to have gone all pear-shaped.
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| You're one ugly moth...sorry, wrong film. |
Set some years after the events of Alien 3, the USS Auriga has found some DNA samples of Ripley (after she took a swan dive into molten metal. Don't ask.), and have cloned her, to get the alien Queen she was carrying (that also has been cloned). Eventually, a ragtag crew of mercenaries dock with the Auriga in their ship, the USS Betty, with a 'cargo': several humans in stasis who they kidnapped. Just afterwards, the aliens that burst forth from the victims, having some sense of intelligence, manage to escape, and now it's up to Ripley to get the mercs off the ship, and destroy the Auriga before it can get back to Earth.
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| Pastries are to your left, humans to your right. |
I'll admit, the plot does sound alright. But, and I'm probably being an idiot here, but how can a man who has a new found hole punched into the back of his head by an Alien really have enough time to reach around and pull out part of his mushed up brain before he dies? I can't be sure, but all I know is the film sucked. It took everything the last 3 had, and stamped on it like a bully at school. Some of the special effects were rubbish, some of the acting wasn't up to scratch, the dialogue is more stupid than an idiot, and it's just too woeful to watch. It even makes me cringe when Winona Ryder interfaces with the computer and says "All aliens, please go to level XX". It's stupid, just.....just stupid. One of the good parts of the film comes when Ripley comes face to face with all the other clones that have gone wrong, and she burns them all like toast. Another is when they are swimming through the cafeteria (through coolant, I suppose) and are being chased by Aliens (who can swim as well), it's a tense moment, but it's a shame the rest of the film isn't like it. The biggest mistake is, when it's revealed that the new alien queen has, over time, developed a womb like a human (!) and can give birth (!!), which she does to some sort of alien/human hybrid (!!!), it's a sort of what the fu** moment, and you're left scratching your head when the infant decides that the queens jaw looks better on the floor, and looks at Ripley that SHE is it's mother. It's very disjointed, it doesn't sit right, and doesn't feel right in an Alien film. The whole film is a letdown. And the film had such a promising start as well, and the Directors Cut on dvd is even worse, with even more woeful CGI and scenes that add f**k all, it was a kick in the teeth for Alien fans who wanted to see the film in a better light, and give it another go.
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| Probably one of the worst things I've ever seen in a film. Weird. And wrong. On so many levels. |
There's naff all to recommend this film to anyone. If you buy the boxset on Blu Ray or DVD, treat it as a special feature. Other than that, avoid like Herpes.
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