Less is more......

Rating: 8/10 (9 May 2017)

Commercial spaceship Nostromo intercepts a distress SOS from a distant moon. The seven-member crew are woken up from hyper sleep and the ship subsequently descends on the moon.
While exploring the moon, a three-member team discover a derelict spaceship and chamber inside it containing eggs.
When a team member goes too near the egg the parasite inside the egg attacks him, rendering him unconscious.
After a little while the parasite dies and his host wakes up seemingly unharmed.
Everything returns back to normal - but not for long.......
Alien deserves all the plaudits it's received in almost its forty years of release, it's a relentless ride, Scott has made something that changed the Sci-Fi genre in a way that nobody could have expected, and it paved the way for so many copycats, but none have even came close to the taut, claustrophobic feel we get through it's running time.
Having such a small cast helps the film, and the characters, we learn so much about them, and begin to actually care for them, that it becomes more than a 'who dies next' horror film, you really begin to feel empathy for them, even though it's clear that many are imminently meeting their demise.
And this is where the film excels, it doesn't show the Xenomorph fully right until the final act, and this makes the tension even more unbearable. Even though camera angles are predictably placed so you expect something to appear behind a character, you only see brief glimpses, and this is used to wonderful effect, especially when Kotto meets his maker.
The practical effects are wonderful, and makes one wonder why they had to use CGI in the later films, Gigers creation is one of the most fantastical beings ever created for cinema.
The cast are wonderful, and as always, that scene in the mess where Hurt decides to 'spill the beans' is still one of the greatest pieces of cinema, even though the phallic metaphors are rife throughout.
This film will always stand the test of time, and even though it's spin offs and sequels never quite make the impact of this, it's legacy is wonderful.