Movies
[BD Review] ‘Prometheus’ Has Epic Scope, Muddled & Uneven
With my review posted here, and Evan’s spoiler-fueled discussion coming after release, below are David Harley’s thoughts on Ridley Scott’s Prometheus, the quasi-Alien prequel in theaters Friday.
In the latest film, “Scott creates a groundbreaking mythology, in which a team of explorers discover a clue to the origins of mankind on Earth, leading them on a thrilling journey to the darkest corners of the universe. There, they must fight a terrifying battle to save the future of the human race.”
Get the review inside and then check back here to write your own this coming weekend.
If there’s one thing that Prometheus isn’t, it’s a film that is strictly mindless popcorn entertainment. Ridley Scott’s return to the legendary franchise he created, which follows a group of scientists who travel across the universe to meet our makers, attempts to explore some of life’s big questions by way of ideas found in numerous religions and conspiracy theories, making it a tad esoteric in comparison to its big-budgeted summer brethren and series counterparts. Scott successfully recreates the atmosphere and look of his 1979 sci-fi milestone while crafting it into a stand-alone story that has more than its fair share of “strands of DNA,” but Prometheus is no interstellar haunted house movie. Thematically, it has more in common with Blade Runner than anything.
After discovering cave drawings in Ireland, among other locales, scientist couple Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace) and Charlie Halloway (Logan Marshall-Green) convince wealthy businessman Peter Weyland (Guy Pearce) that our creators, alien gods referred to as ‘Engineers,’ have left us a map to their doorstep, inviting mankind to visit. With the same kind of blind faith they exhibit – because they “choose to believe in it” – the trillionaire sets up an expedition across the stars for them to meet our makers and learn anything and everything about the birth of our race. The crew of the Prometheus, including David (Michael Fassbender), captain Meredith Vickers (Charlize Theron) and pilot Janek (Idris Elba), are skeptical of what they’ll find, if anything, and are shocked to see primitive structures on the unexplored planet’s surface.
Of course, what they actually find is even more surprising.
Prometheus’ epic scope takes a lot of big ideas and distills them down into a two hour narrative. Religion, the meaning of life, what it means to be human, and mimicry of higher life forms are all dissected in Jon Spaihts and Damon Lindelof‘s script, but Hampton Fancher they aren’t. In trying to get all these nuances and ideas out on the table, the writers completely forget about almost half the characters, let alone give the crew time to develop comradery or have some already evident during the outset – one of the reasons why Alien worked so well. The characters are fleshed out in the sense that it’s easy to understand what makes them tick and where they come from, despite many of their presences being entirely arbitrary (especially Theron’s Vickers), but the dialogue is clunky enough to seep into their development and make them seem like flimsy, paper-thin characterizations. Most of the heavy lifting is given to Rapace and Fassbender, the latter of which steals the show as the inquisitive android with shades of Roy Batty. Shaw’s need to understand our creators is juxtaposed with David’s desire to be as human as possible despite the fact that he has no soul, and as artificial life tries its hardest to mimic natural life, humans are determined to understand gods in order to become more like them.
The mythology of the Alien franchise has a few unanswered questions and Prometheus answers some of them, but never in a straightforward manner. The audience really has to take some leaps of faith to put the pieces together; there are hints to answers throughout, but some are hazier than others – Scott promises the next film will offer answers and pose new questions, which feels like a cheap way to get people to come back. Keeping things interesting on a deeper level by not handing the audience everything is great for discussion and analysis, which the film will no doubt give way to for certain ideas, but not when it leads to the frustration of having to narrow down scene-specific motivations from a list of five possibilities. This kind of vagueness also leads to a ridiculous action scene three quarters into the film that brings the second act to a screeching halt, completely breaking the mood and tension.
Prometheus is a gorgeous looking film that fits into the Alien universe aesthetically and dips its toes into the mythos in such a way that it functions as a prequel and a stand-alone tale. Spaihts and Lindelof’s script has a lot going on in it, which sometimes leads to larger than life ideas and other times is muddled and uneven, a victim of trying to do too many things at once and collapsing under its own weight with so many non-answers. The type of various discussions it will undoubtedly spark for Alien and sci-fi fans, along with its epic scope, is something that isn’t often seen in studio films anymore, but it’s no Alien-level masterpiece.
Score: 3/5 Skulls
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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