Inferior, but its still good

Rating: 7/10 (14 September 2005)

In my opinion Alien 3 is not getting the respect it deserves. That being said there are obvious flaws that detract from the otherwise high quality of the film. Nevertheless, Alien 3 remains a good film and a worthy third film in a series that should have ended while they were still ahead.
First and foremost I will focus on the positive sides of the film in my review as I believe they outweigh the negative sides very heavily. It is pretty clear that the third film was an attempt to go back to the basics from the first film. There is only one alien that is very different from all that we have seen before. The fact that the alien is so different gives it back its mystique and adds to the tension as you never know when it is going to show up. This brings me on to another thing I found worked very well in the film. The atmosphere. The film is nearly as atmospheric as the first film but the atmosphere is very different. The first film felt darker as the color palette was very different. Different isn't necessarily bad, however, and even with the slightly brighter colors this film are still very atmospheric and tense. The atmosphere is also achieved through brilliant set work. The sets can be both quite awe inspiring and also quite claustrophobic and it all works from where I'm standing. In fact all the sets and props work beautifully. This is largely due to the fact that David Fincher was a music video director before moving into film and this makes him very visually oriented. I felt that his new interpretation of the Alien mythology was a small breath of fresh air.
The actors are mainly very good. Even though Sigourney Weaver's performance is weaker than in the previous two films she is still believable and can still portray the emotional state of her character very clearly. Especially the despair of the character. In conclusion her performance is a bit tired (I don't understand why she returned in the fourth film) but still passable. The best performance in the film belongs to Charles S. Dutton. He is perfect as the semi-reformed convict leader who is ultimately a hero. The rest of the supporting cast is pretty good. Of these especially Charles Dance and Pete Postlethwaite do very good jobs.
The design of the alien is very, very good. It works brilliantly in the close-up shots but in the wider shots where you actually see it moving it seems pretty obvious that it is a puppet and that is a shame because it lessens the credibility of the film. Still its nice to see a different kind of alien that retains the frightening features of the original alien but is new as well. I was very happy that H.R Giger returned to design the alien in the third film because even though the aliens in the second film were nice they lacked something design wise and H.R Giger certainly gives that something extra to the alien design here in the third film.
Where the film comes out a little short is in the actual story. The overall story is decent if a bit like the first film but with a twist. Instead of having somewhat ordinary people confront the alien we have convicts this time around and that is both a good and a bad thing. I found it to be an interesting approach that was very different from what we've seen before but the fact that they are thieves, murderers and rapists somehow makes it harder to feel for them. This of course does that its harder to feel exhilarated when the alien chases one of them. Also the fact that the film never really had fully completed screenplay did that there are a few annoying plot holes. However, the fact that there never was a fully completed screenplay also increases my respect for the director who still made this film into a highly watchable piece of cinema history.
All in all the third part of the Alien series is not without its flaws but it is still a highly watchable and recommendable film to horror fanatics.
7/10