Alien (1979)

User Review

• 

  Barneyonmovies

  6 / 10

  WHAT I LIKED: 'Alien,' is, without a doubt, one of the most inventive and atmospheric sci-fi films ever made. That extends from the simple concept of a bunch of astronauts trapped in a ship with some murderous aliens, to the design of the aliens themselves which look like nothing you've ever seen before.
  
  Then of course there's Ridley Scott's direction which creates a sense of disorientation from the off, with the geography of scenes made completely unclear, characters shown half out of shot and lit dimly so you can't quite make out what's going on, and strange sound effects where it's hard to tell if they're part of the score or something in the scenes.
  
  Plus, the underlying notion that these people are all here under the discretion of a corporation which issues its demands through a computer called "mother," is pretty interesting.
  
  WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE: It does rely almost entirely on the classic horror movie trope of characters making stupid decisions. Some of those can be explained by the infamous plot twist, but from the moment they let a guy in the ship with a face hugger alien down his throat, to the constant trips on their own to hunt its offspring down, their idiocy does somewhat undermine the tensions of their situations. That doesn't help with the fact the narrative gets pretty repetitive pretty quickly either.
  
  VERDICT: 'Alien,' is brilliantly inventive both in its concept and execution, but the stupidity of its characters and the repetitiveness of its narrative undermines most of the tension.

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