It's been a while since an Alien movie has left me feeling anything other than slightly disappointed. I did enjoy the trailer for this, but trailers have been known to mislead us movie fans before. And the fact that Cailee Spaeny had a main role in this made me even more nervous. I have REALLY enjoyed the performances from Spaeny in everything I have seen her in so far, but I have rarely enjoyed any movie that she's starred in. And yet . . . it was time to do the dance that we always do.
Spaeny plays Rain, a young woman hoping to find a way out of her hard life of health-afflicting indentured servitude that feels like a daily batting with a big stick while the carrot of life on a new planet continues to be dangled in front of her. An opportunity arises when a group of like-minded youngsters figure out that there’s a seemingly-abandoned Weyland Yutani vehicle floating in orbit above them. They have a plan to get to a much better place, but they need Rain and her half-brother (full android) Andy (David Jonsson). The obvious problem is that the vehicle isn’t as abandoned as it first appears to be.
Taking place in between the events of Alien and Aliens, apparently, this is a love letter to the whole franchise from director Fede Alvarez. Having co-written the script with Rodo Sayagues, Alvarez does well to use the main creatures in a premise that is once again a pure and unabashed horror movie experience. It moves away from, but doesn’t ignore, the aspects of the backstory that Ridley Scott seemed to become more and more obsessed with, and makes good use of the xenomorph lore while adding some nice details throughout.
Things go wrong when Alvarez feels the need to lift some things from the last movies that didn’t need to be here, whether it is a line of dialogue or a disappointingly lazy “cameo” from someone recreated in the usual painful CGI style that we’re all supposed to pretend is life-like and realistic. And one of the set-pieces feeling a bit too much in line with Don’t Breathe (despite an apparent plot hole at the start of the sequence) is both a positive and negative, depending on how much you enjoy Alvarez and Sayagues revisiting some of their own past glories.
Although I have seen others strongly disagree, I think the cast and characters are a fantastic group, more of less, to start worrying about when faces look ready for hugs. Spaeny is a superb lead, and it’s always toughest for anyone playing a female lead in these movies after the series spent so much time on the shoulders of Sigourney Weaver’s iconic performance. She is strong, smart, but also as vulnerable as anyone else when it comes to facing off against a monster that has acid for blood. Jonsson is equally good, and benefits from being able to deliver more than one persona (thanks to a mod to upgrade him as everyone prepares to get into the thick of any action). Archie Renaux, Isabela Merced, and Aileen Wu are appealing enough, and given just enough moments to stand out as individuals from the group, and Spike Fearn is saddled with being the annoying dickhead, which he plays so well that I spent some time hoping for his demise. Let’s not evaluate the performance of the computer-generated cast member, because the film would have been much better without their presence.
It’s imperfect, and I know some will be more annoyed than I was by the multitude of memberberries, but it’s also worth considering just how well this manages to deal with the weight of every other main movie that preceded it while also appealing to those who might be relative newcomers to this universe. The score, cinematography, production design, costuming, etc. are ALL pretty top notch. It’s only the script being a bit too precious about the legacy that drags things down, but it never comes close to other low points in some of the more recent entries in the series. Okay, Jonsson being made to utter a very famous line is bad, but I will put up with it to move a step away from another story of Michael Fassbender creating deadly black liquid while playing some jazz flute.
7/10
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