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
It’s been 75 years since The Thing From Another World first warned us to “watch the skies”, and filmgoers have done just that by showing up to multiple instances of extraterrestrial contact on the big screen. This makes sense, as a recent CBS news poll estimated that 63% of Americans believe in intelligent life on other planets, and the ongoing disclosure movement aims to raise that number with each passing day.
With Steven Spielberg’s Disclosure Day leaving many genre fans hungry for more alien footage (preferably of the spooky variety), today I’d like to share a list recommending six underrated alien invasion thrillers for your viewing pleasure. After all, regardless of whether or not you believe that we’re alone in the universe, it can be fun to dream about the worst-case scenario if our cosmic neighbors ever decide to visit.
For the purposes of this list, we’ll be focusing on lesser-known invasion stories rather than the popular extraterrestrials of franchises like Alien and Close Encounters of the Third (or even Fourth) Kind. That being said, don’t forget to comment below with your own alien favorites if you think we missed a particularly thrilling movie.
While it won’t be featured in this article, I’d highly recommend checking out Dean Alioto’s UFO Abduction/The McPherson Tape if you’re up for some ufology-inspired found footage thrills.
With that out of the way, onto the list!
6. The Arrival (1996)
Not to be confused with Denis Villeneuve’s Academy Award-winning Amy Adams vehicle about learning to communicate peacefully with extraterrestrial life, David Twohy’s The Arrival is a much more straightforward (but no less entertaining) genre romp where Charlie Sheen faces a global conspiracy involving hostile alien invaders.
It’s not exactly up there with Close Encounters or even Independence Day, but Twohy’s conspiratorial thriller plays out like an exceptionally fun episode of The X-Files that I’d recommend to sci-fi/horror fans who don’t mind a little bit of wonky CGI and 90s excess alongside their alien thrills.
5. Extraterrestrial (2014)
The Vicious Brothers made a name for themselves with the success of 2011’s Grave Encounters, but that was far from the Canadian duo’s only collaboration. And while it’s not exactly a fan favorite, I always point out 2014’s Extraterrestrial as one of their most underrated projects simply because I agree with the filmmakers’ opinion that there aren’t enough ‘cool alien abduction movies’ out there.
Admittedly, the majority of the picture functions like a run-of-the-mill creature feature with paper-thin characters and familiar horror tropes, but I’d argue that the cosmically-terrifying final act elevates the experience to new and memorable heights. The movie also boasts great performances by both Michael Ironside and Emily Perkins – a combination that more than makes up for the occasionally janky CGI.
4. Alien Raiders (2008)
Director Ben Rock has gone on record lamenting how his John-Carpenter-inspired creature feature was forcefully renamed from Supermarket to the painfully obvious Alien Raiders (a change which likely resulted in many potential viewers skipping out on the experience), but the new title doesn’t change the fact that this single-location thriller is something of a hidden gem.
Taking place entirely within a supermarket, Alien Raiders tells the story of an ensemble of customers and employees who are taken hostage by a group of armed men looking for something far more dangerous than an easy payout. I won’t get into details in order to avoid spoiling the experience, but I’d highly recommend this criminally underseen flick to fans of John Carpenter and the Resident Evil games.
3. Phoenix Forgotten (2017)
You’d think that a Ridley-Scott-produced retelling of one of the most infamous real-life UFO sightings of all time would have a bigger following, but I rarely see Justin Barber’s Found Footage period piece brought up during discussions about extraterrestrial-focused horror movies.
This is a huge shame, as Phoenix Forgotten is just as spooky as it is convincing, with this well-researched dive into the Phoenix Lights incident benefiting from surprisingly believable special effects as well as an appropriately horrific finale.
2. Communion (1989)
I wouldn’t blame you for disregarding Whitley Strieber’s controversial book about his alleged close encounter as sensationalist slop, but I’d argue that Phillipe Mora’s 1989 adaptation of these events is much better than the source material. After all, the movie works as a standalone piece of speculative fiction while also benefiting from an incredible performance by the one and only Christopher Walken!
Mora’s take on Communion may not be particularly scary, but the film is still an unforgettable character study regardless of whether or not the abduction really happened. Not only that, but the flick also paved the way for plenty of future sci-fi stories where the extraterrestrial invaders aren’t as evil as they initially appear.
1. Altered (2006)
Originally envisioned as a Sam Raimi-style horror-comedy titled Probed, Eduardo Sánchez (of The Blair Witch Project fame) eventually realized that it would be much more interesting to turn the film into a serious exploration of the emotional aftermath of a traumatic abduction incident.
That’s how we got Altered, a clever inversion of the standard abduction narrative that follows a group of troubled friends as they capture and experiment on an alien in order to enact revenge for their own abduction years prior.
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