A group of "space truck drivers" in stasis when their ships AI, Mother, wakes them up prematurely to investigate a distress beacon on an unmapped planetoid called LV-426.

Rating: 10/10 (1 May 2016)

Alien is the 1979 classic horror creature film, it follows a group of "space truck drivers" in stasis when their ships AI, Mother, wakes them up prematurely to investigate a distress beacon on an unmapped planetoid called LV-426. Tom Skerritt plays the captain, Dallas, who convinces the team to suit up and investigate the distress beacon of unknown origin. Ripley, who is played by Sigourney Weaver, is second in command and seems to advise against the risky protocol. When Kane, played by John Hurt, looks into a pod on the abandoned ship a face hugger springs out and attached itself to him, incapacitating Kane. Ripley follows the quarantine procedure when notified that Kane has an unknown organism attached to him, disregarding the captain and various crew members begging to be let back on to help Kane. The medical officer on board, Ash, played by Ian Holm, decides to let them on anyway. After quarantining Kane finally, the organism dies and falls off. During dinner, before the crew is to go back to the stasis pods, Kane begins seizing and in a shocking turn of events a small creature is birthed out of his chest killing him instantly. The first theme appears here, it is uncomfortable because it is a theme of rape, and the concept of unwanted birth. The crew searches for the animal with nets and a cattle prod, only to discover that it has grown to be approx. 7-9 ft. and devours them one at a time when they least suspect it. The Alien uses its inner mouth to puncture and penetrate its victims, very disturbing imagery to convey rape. The Alien designer is a mechanical artist from Germany, who focused on sexual themes. His most prominent works include the Necronomicon, translated to "The book of the dead". Ripley, after communicating with the ships AI, discovers that the medical officer and mother have been in contact the entire mission, and that there is a mission protocol only made known to Ash that states: "All other priorities rescinded, bring back life-form". This begins to make more sense as Ash is a robot sent by "the company" which is Weyland-Yutani, to fulfill that mission even if it means killing the rest of the crew. Ripley finds out that the company had meant for all of this to happen before they had even left, finding the ship on LV-426, and bringing the creature back. The government is also working with the company Wey-Yu, Weyland-Yutani shortened, to develop this creature as a biological weapon. The main motivators for this behavior for the Govt. and the company is money, greed, and power. It would appear that the corruption of these powers at play would be a theme for the film as well as the entire franchise. Finally Ripley is the only one left, and she blows the ships reactor while escaping on a lifeboat pod to hopefully ensure the Aliens death. She realizes the Alien is also on the lifeboat in a state of hibernation, she suits up quietly and blows the Alien out of the air lock with a harpoon gun. She sets off in her vessel and goes into stasis hoping to be found by anyone in that section of the star system. The most effective scenes in my opinion would be through the uses of camera angles as well as lighting. For example, the scene where the full grown Alien attacks its first victim on the ship shows an angle that you can see the Alien in the background but it is so still in such an unnatural position that you don't take notice until it unfolds itself into the perfect predatory position to kill the crew member. Another example would be when the alien gets its first close up, the lighting mixed with the heavy drooling, and a terrific sound design makes for such a frightening moment. The captain goes into the bowls of the ship to snuff the creature out, when the motion detector becomes hard to read he runs right into the alien without knowing. Armed with a flamethrower that emits a flickering light, and a flash light, the alien is exposed with a quick turn of the lighting. The Alien leaps in full blown aggression screeching through the small ventilation shafts killing the captain. All of these things make for one of the best if not the best horror film of all time, arguably. I have personally seen this movie over 100 times, and it never gets old or less disturbing. Its themes are still relevant and I cannot recommend this film enough, if you have not seen it you are missing out on a cinematic experience that is on the top tier of film.