ALIEN (1979) is an overrated movie....it's success is based on gimmicks

Rating: 4/10 (24 July 2009)

ALIEN (1979) is an overrated movie....it's success is based on gimmicks which make it a successful video game experience, packed with unending lights flashing and sudden explosions and scary, slimy teeth (the monster has two sets of teeth...one inside of another...the inside set jumps out of the outer set).
The science isn't detailed or knowledgeable.
The movie simply uses a doubtful damp, dank basement type spaceship filled with wet, unattractive pipes on all walls and ceilings to tell a "Curse Of The Cat People" type story where the scary monster is mostly unseen, in the shadows, and lurking, lurking, lurking, while the actors get more and more nervous...until the monster pounces!
"B" movie stuff! Clever and gimmicky...but great art, it's not.
The characters are a set of unlikely and predictably uncooperative (with each other) people similar to WWII "B" movies where the bomber planes include representatives of various ethnic groups to sell the war effort to every group which buys tickets to the movies...regardless of how unlikely the association of these groups may be in real life.
The hero of the movie is a taller than average actress (Sigorney Weaver...5'10") whose body language is aggressive and pushy....radical feminism was big in 1979, and girls taking over jobs guys traditional had in the past was big theme.....so we got Sigourney Weaver (famously tall at 5'10") served up as the female hero and remaining survivor who vanquishes the hard to get rid of pesky monster who invades several spaceships, and somehow is maneuvered out of the escape vehicle Weaver operates after she blows up the big space ship the monster invaded earlier. The crew was unsuccessful in evicting the monster, and everybody part of the crew dies except Sigorney (who plays "Ripley").
Good classic science fiction movies, of which ALIEN (1979) is not an example, provide good and fairly detailed science both verbally and visually, and are aesthetic in a way ALIEN (1979) was not.
The difference between George Pal's DESTINATION MOON (1950) and FORBIDDEN PLANET (1956) and ALIEN (!979) is a big difference, and ALIEN looks bad compared to these much better made sci-fi space travel classics.
The aesthetics provided in ALIEN (1979) are ugly...director Sir Ridley Scott served up the same thing in his famous (and equally ugly) BLADERUNNER (1981) movie two years later.....the outside of the big spaceship seen when the movie starts is inspired by the ugly 2001 SPACE ODESSEY (1968) hardware store plumbing parts welded together eccentrically design, neither likely, logical, or aesthetically appealing.
ALIEN (1979) pandered to political and social trends of the times (the 1970's) when feminism and defaming big business were trendy, and also the fact that video game explosions, flashing light, and bizarre monsters combined with a perpetually moving camera combined with extreme facial closeups flooded with body sweat and whites around all eyes shown were distracting....
People bought tickets to movies to obtain distraction (still do), and movies which serve up distraction sell tickets.
ALIEN (1979) was a success (still is) for that reason. But it's not good art, and time spent with other, better (and usually older) sci-fi space travel movies (and sci-fi non-space travel movies, too) is a better investment of time and money spent on famous movies which became famous videos.
Some famous movies just aren't good art, and it's important to have standards about that.
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Written by Tex Allen, SAG Actor. Visit WWW.IMDb.Com and choose "Tex Allen" "resume" for contact information, movie credits, and biographical information about Tex Allen.
He has reviewed more than 42 movies posted on WWW.IMDb.Com (the world's largest movie information database, owned by Amazon.Com) as of January 2011.
These include: 1. Alfie (1966) 29 July 2009 2. Alien (1979) 24 July 2009 3. All the Loving Couples (1969) 17 January 2011 4. All the President's Men (1976) 16 November 2010 5. American Graffiti (1973) 22 November 2010 6. Animal House (1978) 16 August 2009 7. Bullitt (1968) 23 July 2009 8. Captain Kidd (1945) 28 July 2009 9. Child Bride (1938) 24 September 2009 10. Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) ------------------ Tex Allen's email address is TexAllen@Yahoo.Com.
See Tes Allen Movie Credits, Biography, and 2012 photos at WWW.IMDb.Me/TexAllen. See other Tex Allen written movie reviews....almost 100 titles.... at: "http://imdb.com/user/ur15279309/comments" (paste this address into your URL Browser)