Chilly horror masterpiece

Rating: 9/10 (4 November 2003)

A chilly horror masterpiece. There's a meaty concept at play behind the spookhouse façade, a healthy--and slightly paranoid, in the best seventies sci-fi way--subtext about not trusting corporate and government establishments (here rolled into one in `the Company'). But mainly it's just a clammy horror movie, as the simple but well-drawn characters fumble around in the dark, alternately looking for the alien and running from it. Ridley Scott's technique is elegant, but we don't see as much of the stylistic polish (some would say pretense) here as we do in his later work. In this case, that's a blessing, as it gives the film an air of sweaty, almost `Das Boot'-like realism largely absent from his florid recent efforts.
The `Alien' series has had quite a mythology grow up around it, and it isn't hard to understand why. There isn't really another movie series quite like it, with each episode being guided by a different, competent and completely distinct auteur. It is not a flawless series--there are those who find `Aliens' too macho and thuggish, `Alien³' too black and misanthropic, and `Alien Resurrection' too self-indulgent and empty (and, perhaps, too badly acted). But each film is so unique, and yet has so much in common with the others (the opening `wake-up calls,' the androids, the Company, and most notably, of course, Sigourney Weaver's iconic Ripley), that it's safe to say there's been no more perfect genre series thus far. This first film seems to be the only one everyone can agree on, and I can see no reason to argue with that. 9.5 out of 10.