Alien

Alien is an absolutely brilliant piece of science fiction horror. It is able to take many of the tropes of the slasher film and transport them into space in a way that elevates them to new heights. On top of that, it lays a layer of subtle yet rich science fiction world building that has you absolutely immersed in the world of the Nostromo and its crew by the end of the movie. This film is sublime and absolutely deserving of the reputation it has built up over the years. If you are at all worried about watching it because of the negative buzz it’s resulting franchise has generated with its more recent installments, don’t be.

One of the most notable things about Alien is that it veers wildly away from the grand narratives and heroes journeys that are common in science fiction. The crew of the Nostromo are blue collar folk and their ship isn’t part of some governmentally supported exploration of the galaxy, a la Star Trek, or on a fated mission to save the galaxy from tyranny, a la The Last Starfighter or Star Wars, they are just glorified space truckers, beholden to the far away company that pays their bills, who stumble on something way outside their pay grade. This is reflected not just in the visuals of the movie, which I will get to later, but also in the story itself. This is about people who very quickly find themselves very far out of their depth.

A keen observer will be able to pick up on the ways that the movie functions like a slasher film, like the presence of a largely unseen killer slowly picking people off, but this movie is so much more than that. For starters, the setting of a spaceship adds an entirely new component to the inherent terror of the situation: claustraphobia. While circumstances can keep a killer’s victims from getting very far in a classic slasher story, in Alien the victims are trapped on all sides by the vacuum of space. Another is the origins of the killer, the titular Alien. In many slasher films the killer is something supernatural, a la Freddy Krueger, something ghostly, a la Jason Voorhees, or something stumbled upon unluckily, a la Leatherface. Here, the alien is both aboard the ship and allowed to become a threat due to a combination of hubris, malfeasance, negligence, and a dash of greed. This adds a new component. Our crew are still victims, this isn’t quite Frankenstein where they are being tortured by a problem of their own making. However, there is something so human about each of the mistakes they make throughout the movie that anchors a potentially out-there concept to rock solid reality.

The visuals of Alien are also exceptional. There are so many different elements to the look of the film that it is hard to know where to begin. The vast majority of the film takes place on one ship. Keeping with the blue collar idea, everything about the ship feels lived in and worn down. The crew onboard dress in jumpsuits and plain outfits, such as white cotton tees. Haircuts short and practical. Lighting in common spaces is bright, but flat, and feels like an office building. Lighting outside common spaces is minimal, as one would expect from a company trying to save money and/or energy.

Everything alien in the movie also has a very distinct look. Both the design of the creature itself and the world in which its egg is discovered were designed by H.R.Giger and that otherworldliness comes through in spades. It is hard to describe exactly what is so particularly special and unique about it all, other than to say you’ll know it when you see it. It is highly possible that the look of the alien has been ruined for you, due to its prominence as an image in the collective unconsciousness of pop culture all these years, but the silhouette of the fully grown alien is only one piece of the mind-warping weirdness of Giger’s designs.

The final element of the visuals of Alien is the cinematography. If I had to sum it up in one word it would be atmospheric. The way everything looks and the way it is lit and shot just creates this aura of dark foreboding. The movie does an excellent job of not showing the monster any more than it has to, despite the monster looking pretty good, which adds to the tension in so many scenes. In the narrower halls, the tight angles have you questioning what a character will find around each turn. In the more wide open spaces, dark, expressionistic lighting obscures corners of the room so you never know what might be lurking out of sight. Light, in general, is very masterfully used, and not used, throughout to heighten the overall sense of terror. This movie is an absolute masterclass in creating ambiance with the lens of the camera.

Ridley Scott is, for my money at least, a hit or miss director. He has an absolutely world class understanding of how to take the visual language of film and milk every emotional drop out of it for the benefit of the audience. His movies are visually stunning. Sometimes they can be stunning in the traditional sense: strikingly beautiful, as in much of Blade Runner. Sometimes they are stunning in a different sense: in that I am stunned by visual storytelling that good. However, he doesn’t always show the same proficiency at the other aspects of filmmaking, like massaging a so-so script into something better or getting the best performance of someone’s career out of his actors. So, his movies live or die on how little that other stuff matters. In Alien, a rock solid script and a simple but highly effective story allow Scott to do what he does best. In this case, it is to use his keen sense for visual storytelling to deliver a seat of your pants, tension filled, science fiction horror classic… maybe the best one ever.

Would Recommend: If the words “scifi” and “horror” don’t immediately put you off.

Would Not Recommend: If the words “scifi” and “horror” immediately put you off.