Traditionally underrated

Rating: 8/10 (29 April 2020)

So. You have a low budget sci fi horror film that is a huge success...Fans wait a few years while the studio wrangle over how best to capitalise on the success of Alien and then come up with the tried and tested commercial solution: make it bigger with 2D characters, guns and more explosions! Job done. Aliens is a lot of fun - but deep it aint. Then comes the problem - how to progress the story and make even more money without just repeating Aliens which would be risky? And what director in his right mind would want to tackle such a poisoned chalice? The answer was a director not in his right mind who wanted a wooden ( yes wooden ) monastery in space complete with monks... Luckily he was expelled through the airlock and David Fincher came on board instead and made something special. Sure there are no big crashes and bangs for the thumb suckers but plenty of wallop in terms of story progression.
If Alien was about survival and Aliens was about war then Alien 3 is about sacrifice and redemption: with Ripley's realisation that she can't beat the company and the creature and live too and the prisoners decision to sacrifice themselves to help her. The premise of the prison with no weapons works very well. The who's who of British acting talent is great. Brian Glover, Pete Postlethwaite, Mark McGann and Charles Dance perfect. Of course there isn't the bullet chewing dialogue of Aliens but the more nuanced conversations between Ripley and the other characters are just as strong. Charles S Dutton is superb and does get the John Wayne line near the end. 'You can choose to fight. To die on your feet - or begging on your knees....I've never been much for beggin!'
At the time many fans were disappointed with Alien 3 and like so often with films it takes a while for the dust to settle and see a film for the intelligent gem it is. I hadn't seen Alien 3 for years and was dreading it being poor on rewatching. It isn't. In hindsight this quieter, more reflective and melancholic sequel to Aliens was the only sensible way to take the story. If
I strongly advise anyone coming to this film for the first time to ignore the comfortable consensus and really understand what the story is doing here - reaching a logical conclusion for Ripley that starts when she reads the crew expendable message in the Nostromo in Alien.