Alien (1979) - Director's Cut: An incredible feat of horror filmmaking, with technical achievements and storytelling principles that set a strong precedent for films to come.

Rating: 10/10 (16 January 2018)

Dan O'Bannon, Ronald Shusett, and Ridley Scott's 'Alien' hails from a time of creative innovation in horror films. From 'Carrie' and 'Halloween' before it in 1976 and 1978 respectively, to 'The Shining' in 1980, 'The Thing' in 1982, and even 'A Nightmare on Elm Street' in 1984, horror as a genre experienced a sort of renaissance. Sure, there were still plenty of unimaginative slasher flicks on the market, but the above films including 'Alien' changed popular perception of what made a truly good horror film.
The difficulty in discussing components of 'Alien' is that they meld together so well. Discussing the characters initially tends to end, at least for me, with a discussion on the direction and the pacing of the film. The technicals and the story just blend together nearly seamlessly; however, I'll still try.
THE STORY
From a basic storytelling perspective, 'Alien' is quite simple. A mining crew of the spaceship Nostromo are woken up early from cryosleep to investigate a mysterious radio signal of potentially alien origins on an unexplored planetoid. There, they discover an alien race, a member of which manages to be born on board and kills them one by one. Also in contention is the duplicity of one of their crew members in regards to this seemingly unstoppable alien creature's value. Fairly simple stuff, and it follows a typical horror film formula. It manages to hide some depth, however.
One of the premises the film explores is the role of an individual worker in a corporate environment that is so large it is literally in deep space. Obviously, this doesn't get in the way of the central proceedings, because a deliberate social satire would seriously clutter the sharp pacing of the film itself. The idea, however, manifests itself in subtler ways: Brett and Parker's pay dispute over shares, Ash's duplicity, as he is ordered by the company to retrieve the alien lifeform for corporate purposes, at the expense of the rest of the crew. The pay dispute subplot is one small piece, and really only adds development to the characters, but Ash's duplicity creates real horror and tension, as well as challenges the audience to ponder a more deep question. Horror films don't often challenge the viewer in this way, nor do they do so while still crafting an effective film in general.
Though it follows a fairly straight-forward structure, the film has very well-written characters acted beautifully by every cast member. The dialogue is sharp yet realistic, and the Nostromo crew rank as some of the best horror ensembles in the history of the genre, in cinema at least. As a result, their deaths aren't morbidly gratifying like in many horror films, but terrifying, and it almost seems as if the film is toying with the viewers like the Alien is toying with the crew themselves. Every death is impactful, uniquely scary, and yet internally plausible.
The ending is fairly optimistic (though a tad bittersweet), and though a downer ending may have been more thematically impactful, the viewer would have just been gripped by nearly two hours of relentless horror and tension. Seeing these characters endure so much, it's truly satisfying to see Ripley come out on top. All in all, a finely tuned story.
THE TECHNICALS
'Alien' boasts some absolutely amazing technical achievements. When I think of the film, I think of a katana; both are comparatively sharp. The pacing and editing of this film is damn near perfect. Every scene serves a purpose, not only in developing characters, but in building tensions, and in many cases, surprising the viewer. Many scenes achieve many things at once. The revelation of Ash's duplicity, to again return to this point, achieves all three. The exploration of the crashed alien spaceship also does all three. If the editing had been wonky, the story would have crumbled. Thankfully, David Crowther, Terry Rawlings, and Peter Weatherley do a spectacular job on that front.
As well, I would be remiss if I didn't talk about H.R. Giger's designs. The ingenious thing about these designs is that they play directly on the viewer's mental states. The film, in concept, is quite conventional, but Giger's horrific and yet fascinating designs are alien enough to create wonder in the viewer, but horrifyingly familar enough (in the anatomical sense) that it's repulsive and frightening. The creature designs and the atmosphere created by that are also essential to the film's execution.
Lighting, sound, and visual production are top-notch as well, for the most part. Some beautiful lighting at the beginning allows the viewer to take in the Nostromo in wonderment; the restrained lighting at the end allows the viewer to be in desperation with Ripley. It's not just her escaping. The production design is, of course, iconic. The 1970s retrofuture design is sleek and eye-catching, and really sells the setting. It's so good that 'Alien: Isolation' years later would continue with the design choice. The sound is also mostly quite good, with a very atmospheric soundtrack and great sound effects. Only in Ripley's meeting with Brett and Parker down in the lower decks did I notice some mistakes in sound mixing, and I personally don't really care for the ending score. Other than that, sound production is also top-notch.
Lastly, Ridley Scott's direction and Derek Vanlint's cinematography is quite notable as well. Many horror films tend towards short, punchy shot lengths and frenetic, underexposed cinematography. 'Alien' does just the opposite: its shots are long and deliberate, and show just enough to indicate to the viewer exactly what is intended. There is no visual manipulation here, and though there are many things that happen off-screen, 'Alien' does not shy away from using its visual design to burn the implied image directly into the viewers' minds. It is daring, scary stuff that horror films could stand to do more of today.
All of the film's characteristics mesh together beautifully to create one of the most effective horror films ever made. 'Alien' is at once horrifying, tense, profound, enchanting, and beautiful. No wonder it spawned a franchise. Sadly, no subsequent film ever tried to take the concept and continue on with it. As well, few horror films today seem to operate from the 'Alien' school of horror filmmaking. Thus, 'Alien' stands in a league nearly of its own, but with what it boasts, it does just fine on its own.
NOTE: I've never seen the original theatrical cut, so I'm not aware of what specific changes were made. Keep in mind this review is based on the 2004 re-release, and is about a minute short from what I understand.