HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: erik@askinc.ask.COM (Erik Johnson)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: ALIEN(S)(3)
Date: 13 Aug 92 00:51:48 GMT
Organization: Ask Computer Systems, Mountainview, Ca.

<text deleted due to space>

Two things.

1. There was a slight error in the original article. The alien was based on
   Giger's paintings in "Giger's Necronomicon" (specifically "Necronom IV")
   *not* in Biomechanics. "Biomechanics" came much later.

2. I agree whole heartedly with the rest of it. I'm glad to see someone else
   come up with explanations along what I have already thought. (Although the
   bio/electrical is a new one, and very interesting!).


-- 
(__)  +-------------------------------------------------------------------------
( oo  | Erik Johnson - erik@askinc.ask.com 
/\_|  | Death is, after all things considered, an important part of life.
 Moo! |
From: v075q5fr@ubvmsb.cc.buffalo.edu (Scott J Gorcey)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Natives Down the River (was re: ALIEN^3 Eggs on Sulaco)
Date: 20 Aug 92 23:42:00 GMT
Organization: University at Buffalo
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

In article <BtAyo5.Dp0@acsu.buffalo.edu>, v075q5fr@ubvmsb.cc.buffalo.edu (Scott J Gorcey) writes...
>>1) The Sulaco was a military transport. I can (just) by Weyland-Yutani tapping
>>into its telemetry in the third film, but I certainly don't buy them being
>>able to issue orders to the military hardware.
> 
>     Can I say something?
>     Who ever said that The Colonial Marines wasn't a DIVISION of The Company?
>     Not a separate entity, but a connected arm.  Not a national, but a 
>     corporate, defense mechanism.  

      Or the alternative: who do you think MANUFACTURES all the computers
      those Colonial Marines put top secret information in?

     Scott Gorcey
From: mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Aliens the Special Edition
Date: 13 Aug 92 19:22:52 GMT
Organization: DB and ES Subdivision, TU Vienna

From article <1992Aug13.160846.19207@engage.pko.dec.com>, by boyajian@ruby.enet.dec.com (The Man from Another Place):
> Since ALIEN (in the only form it was ever seen by the public since its
> initial release) did not establish any solid procreative process for the
> Aliens, Cameron was free to pursue his own ideas WITHOUT CONTRADICTING
> THE ORIGINAL FILM.

Not in letter, but in spirit.  I still think using insects as bogeymen
is a wimpout.
-- 
Markus Stumptner                                mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at
University of Technology Vienna                 vexpert!mst@relay.eu.net
Paniglg. 16, A-1040 Vienna, Austria             ...mcsun!vexpert!mst
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
From: cooper@cos.com (Gary Cooper)
Subject: Re: Premiere's Top Ten SF Movies
Organization: Corporation for Open Systems
Distribution: usa  
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 01:11:06 GMT

>	The same can apply to the book as well. I've tried to read it.
>I can't stomach it. It's one of the few books I couldn't get through
>even when it was assigned to me in a class.

Obviously you were never assigned "Tess of the D'Ubervilles"....

_Clockwork Orange_, though - DOES repulse me, make me want to
retch, and seems to justify my overall cynical view of humanity.

Those are some of the reasons that I think it such a fine film. 
(and some of the reasons I grabbed the LD the second it came out) 
-- 
Gary Cooper (not the dead one)    personal responses - cooper@cos.com
* * * * * * *  Standard Disclaimers Apply, Of Course * * * * * * * * *
      "The Vice-Presidency is not worth a pitcher of warm spit."
			- Vice-President John Nance Garner -
From: rmorgan@lumiere.pyramid.com (Rockie Morgan)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Naming Alien 4
Date: 18 Aug 92 16:45:53 GMT
Reply-To: rmorgan@pyramid.com
Distribution: world
Organization: Pyramid Technology Seattle R&D

|> 
|> 	Well, of course, there is also "Star Aliens", "The Alien Strikes Back",
|> "Return of the Alien", "Back to the Alien (1|2|3)", "The Hunt for Red Aliens",
|> "Basic Aliens", "Raiders of the Lost Aliens", "The Alien of Doom", "The Last
|> Alien", and, for thos good oldies, "Gone With the Alien"...
|> 
|> 	I guess we'll be seeing Alien movies for some time yet!
|> 

Don't forget "Lethal Alien", "Lethal Alien (2|3)", "Fatal Alien", "An Alien
in the Dark", "The Purple Alien of Cairo" (an alien with angst?).  Oh, yeah,
how about "The Pink Alien", "The Pink Alien Returns"?  Oh. Sorry.
From: rabjab@golem.ucsd.edu (Jeff Bytof)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Natives Down the River (was re: ALIEN^3 Eggs on Sulaco)
Date: 21 Aug 1992 20:17:43 GMT
Organization: sio
NNTP-Posting-Host: lutherlab.ucsd.edu

Bob Casey states for the record:

>        The bio-weapons division of Weyland could use the
>        aliens to attack colonies owned by other companies so that they
>        themselves can gain more power and wipe the other corporations out.

Great Idea!  Would the Company also be inclined to use aliens against
other intelligent civilizations if they should be found to be in
direct competition or interference with Weyland?

Jeff Bytof
rabjab@golem.ucsd.edu
From: ccoprdj@prism.gatech.EDU (Jorge Diaz)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Natives Down the River (was re: ALIEN^3 Eggs on Sulaco)
Date: 17 Aug 92 02:37:07 GMT
Organization: Georgia Institute of Technology

In article <4816@blue.cis.pitt.edu.UUCP> seawasp@vm2.cis.pitt.edu (Sea Wasp) writes:

*>>>	Nope. The nearly universal impression of those I know (that is, the
*>>>impression of 34 out of 35) who have seen the movie is:
*>>>	1) Alien^3 sucked the big one.

*>>This is bullshit (either that, or you have just started reading this
*>>newsgroup, or you have a very selective memory).  I've read opinions on
*>>this newsgroup and r.a.m about the film since the day the film opened,
*>>and they seemed to be split pretty evenly. 

*>	Please read carefully the lines quoted above:
*>	...THOSE I KNOW...
*>	I don't KNOW the people on these newsgroups. 
*>	I KNOW people that I talk with fairly often, face to face, or perhaps
*>that I have very long and varied EMail correspondences with.

Ah!  Mea culpa.  I thought by 'those I know' you were referring to the
impressions you know (ie, those opinions that you'd heard, even if you
didn't necessarily know the people personally).


-- 
Jorge Diaz                       | Sign in a restaurant:
Georgia Institute of Technology  | 
Office of Information Technology |   "We reserve the right to serve refuse to
ccoprdj@prism.gatech.edu         |        anyone."
From: mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Star Trek VI - What anachronisms!
Date: 19 Aug 92 16:29:19 GMT
Distribution: rec
Organization: DB and ES Subdivision, TU Vienna

From article <1992Aug19.150021.28921@ioe.ac.uk>, by teexijd@ioe.ac.uk (IAN DAVENPORT):
> Yeah, there was something very odd about the vast bank of VDUs behind Kirk's
> chair - I mean in 300 years we're still gonna have our computer output on
> CRTs?  Given that the film-makers needed dome form of output there, did they
> have to make it that obvious?

While I completely agree with the point, I don't see why Star Trek VI
is singled out for this fault - effectively every SF film that deals
with spaceships uses what amounts to complete low-tech when it comes
to interaction with computers and spaceships - unless, of course,
these happen to be flying saucers.  For example, look at the
teletype-like chattering terminals of Alien.  2001, of course, was an
exception, but 2010 was a major step back.

(Note that the designation "CRT" is itself already a kind of
anachronism - the Enterprise screens could have been fluorescent LCD
screens or whatever.)
-- 
Markus Stumptner                                mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at
University of Technology Vienna                 vexpert!mst@relay.eu.net
Paniglg. 16, A-1040 Vienna, Austria             ...mcsun!vexpert!mst
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
From: gre253@mis.csiro.au (Steven Green)
Subject: Re: Natives Down the River (was re: ALIEN^3 Eggs on Sulaco)
Organization: CSIRO ITS
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 92 01:59:49 GMT

In article <Bt8J41.I4E@immd4.informatik.uni-erlangen.de> uhschreg@cip.informatik.uni-erlangen.de (Ulrich Schreglmann) writes:
>jsbell@acs.ucalgary.ca (Joshua Bell) writes:
>
>>xenophobes
>
>Xenophobes are people afraid of aliens.

GONG!!!! Wrong

Xenophobia is a fear/dislike of foriegners. (like most Australians)

-- 
* Steve Green     *  "Hey Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit outa my hat!"    *
* Comms Group     *  "That trick never works"                            *
* ITS Branch      *  "Nothin' up my sleeve - PRESTO"                     *
* CSIRO Australia *  "No doubt about it - I gotta get another hat"       *
From: scott@nv10.uswnvg.com (Scott Eckelman)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Memoirs of an Invisible Man
Date: 21 Aug 92 15:35:43 GMT
Organization: US West NewVector, Inc., Bellevue, WA

In article <1729hfINNlf3@ensta.ensta.fr> corwin@ensta.ensta.fr (Gilles Gravier) writes:
>
>	Anyone notice the GREAT special effects in this movie? Just so
>bluffing! They thought just about everything... Even up to searching for
>him using 2 coupled cameras, one Infra Red, on Visual, to spot the guy who
>appears on one, but not the other... But...
>
>	- If he is Invisible, meaning light just flows through him... Why
>doesn't Infra Red (just adjacent to plain Red on the light spectrum) also
>flow through him?

Well, it probably does, but he's also _generating_ IR due to his
body temperature of (presumably) 98.6 F.
From: mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Natives Down the River (was re: ALIEN^3 Eggs on Sulaco)
Date: 19 Aug 92 14:50:36 GMT
Organization: DB and ES Subdivision, TU Vienna

From article <Bt8HDK.HBy@immd4.informatik.uni-erlangen.de>, by uhschreg@cip.informatik.uni-erlangen.de (Ulrich Schreglmann):
> Because if they die it's like you die, and that's not life!

This sentence leaves open three avenues of interpretation.

(1) "it's like you die, and that's not life".  Well, it is.  One day,
you may be in for quite a shock, you know.  No further comments on
this.

(2) "I cannot identify with a character on the screen who dies because
I, after all, live on." Do you really expect to be guillotinized in
films about the French Revolution?  

(3) If somebody that I identify with on the screen is killed, I cannot
identify with him anymore and the illusion is broken.  Your problem.
I would diagnose it as lack of imagination.

> Other people die, but you can never experience dying, because you'd be
> dead. Or in other words: Did you ever die? See!
> That's what sucks.

No.  You don't watch the film out of Ripley's eyes, either.
Identification has nothing to do with how the protagonist is
presented.  Killing the person one identifies with is a valid and very
powerful technique for shaking the viewer, and has been used in
excellent and powerful films (Parallax View, To Live and Die in L.A.
are two that come to mind right now). Saying that is wrong because you
are not identical (as opposed to identifying yourself) with the
protagonist is like saying it's wrong to make a film that shows that
person walking the streets of, say, Seattle because I've never been in
Seattle.  Or, people can't eat icecream in films because I can't taste
the right flavor if they do.  That the film can go on after such a
event (which it doesn't have to) is an *advantage* of the medium, not
a fault.

What it adds up to is that some people can't stomach films with
downbeat endings, but that's life <sic>.


-- 
Markus Stumptner                                mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at
University of Technology Vienna                 vexpert!mst@relay.eu.net
Paniglg. 16, A-1040 Vienna, Austria             ...mcsun!vexpert!mst
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
From: dododge@wam.umd.edu (David O. Dodge)
Subject: Re: Laser and tape questions
Organization: University of Maryland, College Park
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 09:15:29 GMT

In article <1992Aug13.034635.9682@ultb.isc.rit.edu> cjb3701@ritvax.isc.rit.edu writes:
>In article <98940010@hpopd.pwd.hp.com>, dug@hpopd.pwd.hp.com (Dug Smith) writes:
>>Over here in Blighty, we have a different refresh rate than you guys, so if 
>>they don't edit the films, they play faster.  Could this be what you mean?
>
>Sorry, but I don't think that your info is accurate.  Yes, people in the U.S.
>don't want a tape made in the U.K. if it is in PAL format (the U.S. uses
>NTSC).  NTSC refreshes half of the screen 60 times per second.
>
>However, this has nothing to do with EDITING films or videotape.  It is
>strictly a TRANSFER process and a PAL copy should be almost identical to a
>NTSC copy in terms of what you see.  The only difference, besides needing a
>different VCR to watch them on may be a few dropped frames (were talking
>differences of much less than a second here).  The films are not actually
>edited and don't play "faster"....

I've always understood that PAL film transfers *don't* drop frames,
but rather actually run the film at 25 fps (sometimes playing with the
sound to keep the pitch right). So a PAL version of a film actually does
run 4% faster than an NTSC version.

This only applies to actual film->video transfers, of course -- standards
conversion between the two formats shouldn't introduce this kind of
timing discrepancy.

                                           -Dave Dodge/dododge@wam.umd.edu
From: mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Got IT! ALIENI (4)
Date: 19 Aug 92 21:57:46 GMT
Organization: DB and ES Subdivision, TU Vienna

From article <1992Aug19.211719.15216@nntp.uoregon.edu>, by dcutter@oregon.uoregon.edu (dann cutter):
> More as I figure it out... I think its pretty nifty tie in and ending
> though, cause we can fuck the company, get some nasties on earth... and not
> have a stupid sequel to T2... comments anyone... mail or post. thanks...

It's not bad, but a Terminator past doesn't tie in with what we know
about the culture those guys in the Alien universe live in.  Everybody
who produced something like Ash and Bishop would be hunted out and
killed outright given a past with Terminators in it.

On a less serious note, of course, if you include Terminators, you
absolutely have to bring the Predators into it, too.  Plus a Nexus 6
hit team that tries to hide the fact that Tyrell was Dyson's successor
in Terminator research at Cyberdyne.

-- 
Markus Stumptner                                mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at
University of Technology Vienna                 vexpert!mst@relay.eu.net
Paniglg. 16, A-1040 Vienna, Austria             ...mcsun!vexpert!mst
From: mlush@crc.ac.uk (Mr. M.J. Lush)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Naming Alien 4
Date: 18 Aug 92 16:27:57 GMT
Reply-To: mlush@crc.ac.uk (Mr. M.J. Lush)
Organization: MRC Human Genome Mapping Project Resource Centre, Harrow, UK


	How about 'Aliens 4 :  This time its peaceful negotiations...'

-- 
Michael

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
NPC rights activist           |      Nameless Abominations are people too.
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
From: dlb@fanny.wash.inmet.com (David Barton)
Subject: Re: E.T.
Organization: Intermetrics Inc., Washington Division, USA
	<QeUJxTa00VpNQitkom@andrew.cmu.edu>
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1992 19:55:41 GMT

In article <QeUJxTa00VpNQitkom@andrew.cmu.edu> lb2e+@andrew.cmu.edu
(Louis Blair) writes:

   I wish you would tell us where you get all this without
   -due-process-or-the-consent-of-the-participants stuff.  In the film
   that I saw, yes, the mother was unnerved at first by the appearance
   of the guys in the space suits, but very shortly after that
   everyone seems to be getting along in a quite friendly fashion with
   the scientists talking to the family and so on.

Unnerved?  She was cowering on her living room floor, screaming.
Unnerved?

   You seem to be a lot more upset than the mother was.  In fact, the
   mother did not seem to be upset at all.  She brings the "key"
   scientist to the landing where E. T. is going home, and I got the
   distinct impression that the film was hinting that some sort of
   relationship was starting between the scientist and the mother.
   I'm not really sure what point you are trying to prove, but if you
   are trying to say that E. T. is an anti-scientist movie (as some
   others have been claiming, it certainly doesn't follow the usual
   pattern for such movies.

True, she (and her children) seemed reconciled with Keys (I think that
was his name --- we never actually heard it) at the end, and the
medical team acted with compassion to Eliot's feelings concerning ET's
death.  I continue to remember (maybe I made it up) his mother
attempting to go to Eliot earlier, and being physically prevented by a
nurse.

If anything, the film was not anti-scientist, but anti-bureaucrat ---
and perhaps not intentionally that.  Recall that all this started with
the Brin comments concerning Wizards and ET --- that we were often
"tricked" by Hollywood and our culture into "rooting" for the bad
guys.  It is not clear to me that the scientists are the "bad guys",
but when people who have purportedly been taught about basic
constitutional rights watch that movie and declare that the
"scientists" (perhaps not their decision) "did nothing wrong" then
something is very wrong indeed.

You don't go bursting into people's house without a warrent or
probable cause.  You don't separate a mother from her child without a
court order.  I got the "due-process-or-consent-of-the-participants"
stuff from the movie.  If the above sentances are not self-evident to
most of the readers on the net, then we have lost something very
valuable.

Whether the mother was "upset", and regardless of eventuall
reconcilliation, what was done was wrong by the laws of our country.

					Dave Barton
					dlb@hudson.wash.inmet.com
From: jamesbs@mundil.cs.mu.OZ.AU (JJ Glamma)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Natives Down the River (was re: ALIEN^3 Eggs on Sulaco)
Date: 19 Aug 92 14:34:28 GMT
Organization: Computer Science, University of Melbourne, Australia

mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner) writes:

>Yes, that makes it especially glaring.  (Anyway, here's that p-word
>again.  He was not "programmed" to do it.  He was instructed to.  God,
>that reminds me of 2010.)

I should have known better than that... you're quite right. I was just
emphasising the point that Ash's motivations were very one-dimensional - given
that he really has no choice.

>I would say most of the Marines are caricatures.  I would agree with
>you on Ripley and Hicks, and Bishop (Note: I really like the way they
>presented the androids in Alien and Aliens.  If you want to see a
>painfully stereotypical android, look at Data in ST:TNG).

Oh God, yes! (I forgot about Bishop). What is really worriesome is that Data
is about the best character on that excuse for SF TV.
-- 
-----------------------------------+-------------------------------------------
JJ Glamma                          | "Doctor, I can have an airstrike here in 
aka James William Patrick Bennetts |  minutes."
jamesbs@mundil.cs.mu.OZ.AU         | "That won't do any good, Brigadier!"
-----------------------------------+ "No, I didn't think so."
A bird in the hand is messy.	   | 	-- Doctor Who:Battlefield
-----------------------------------+-------------------------------------------
From: trent@mailhost.hsas.washington.edu (Sigfried Trent)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Aliens 4 plot
Date: 20 Aug 92 21:38:22 GMT
Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.movies
Organization: Academic Services, UW

How about this....

The company finaly succesfuly recovers some alien or another from the 
alien ship that had not been compleatly destroyed in number two or from 
a different ship.  This procces would take a while.  Intreege and
danger abundant of course.

The company brings back the specimins to earth for careful study etc.
The company is very carefull with the specamins so as not to make ane
mistakes
and have aliens running arround lowering profit margins and such.

Menwhile a less company oriented scientific mission is out exploring the
depths
of space by some means or another.  Vertual space travel perhaps.  At any
rate they discover a strange planet that once had life, inteligent life to 
boot.  It turns out that it was the planet of the creatures who created
the aliens.  As the movie progresses they discover more about the planet
and
its history.  Turns out that these creatures were at war with some other
group, internal or external.  The aliens were developed as wepons but
got out of controle and destroyed the society, along with whomever their 
advisaries were.  The culture of these things is also learned to some
degree
and through cleaver cuts back to the company capturing alien story line,
which
will of course show sceens of earth, we learn that although the two
cultures
seem very different they are actualy simmilar in important ways.  Ways such
as how they backstab eachother to make a buck.

During this the story on earth progresses.  Various groups are involved in
espianoge to get the aliens for their own pourposes to such a degree that
they all lose and the aliens get loose or at least thats what we the
audience
surmize.

This catastrophy will coencide with the discovery of the fate of the 
beings that created the aliens.  Thus foreshadowing the fate of earth.

End of film...  Great opportunity for an action and human interest filled
sequel, dont you think?

Also note this plot has some great opportunities to expand the ammount
of Geiger like sets and such.  Could be cool.

"We live in an age when lemonaid is made with artificial flavoring and
dishwashing soap is made with real lemons"    Alfred E Newman
From: corwin@ensta.ensta.fr (Gilles Gravier)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Naming Alien 4
Date: 14 Aug 92 15:52:23 GMT
Organization: Ensta, Paris, France
NNTP-Posting-Host: ensta.ensta.fr

In article <1992Aug13.150937.12740@syma.sussex.ac.uk> michaell@cogs.susx.ac.uk (Michael Lazarou) writes:
[Joshua Bell (jsbell@acs.ucalgary.ca) wrote:
[: In article <edd151s.713586079@nella1.cc.monash.edu.au> edd151s@nella1.cc.monash.edu.au (Mr I.P. Rayner) writes:
[: >dcutter@oregon.uoregon.edu (dann cutter) writes:
[: >>As the Alien series has bben able to avoid the regular structure for naming
[: >>sequels, how they could name alien 4 has bugged me for a while. I have come
[:
[(...)
[: Or, we could always go for Aliens' (on the homeworld), A Fistfull
[: of Aliens (set in the old west), 7 Hosts for 7 Aliens (a few
[: sequels down the line...)... sigh, I remember the speculation for
[: III - Three Aliens and a Little Lady, The Three Aliens,
[: Alienses... :)
[How about "For a few Aliens more", "An Alien too far", "Son of Alien",
["Dances with Aliens", "RoboAlien", ......
[

	Well, of course, there is also "Star Aliens", "The Alien Strikes Back",
"Return of the Alien", "Back to the Alien (1|2|3)", "The Hunt for Red Aliens",
"Basic Aliens", "Raiders of the Lost Aliens", "The Alien of Doom", "The Last
Alien", and, for thos good oldies, "Gone With the Alien"...

	I guess we'll be seeing Alien movies for some time yet!


-- 
 This message has been brought to you by Gilles GRAVIER - corwin@ensta.fr
                       ***** Amber Forever! *****
    I know you believe you understand what you think I said, but I am
       sure, you realize,  that what you heard is not what I meant.