Interesting...

Rating: 6/10 (11 March 2002)

WARNING: CONTAINS SPOILERS
I didn't really become the avid Alien fan that I am now until a year or so ago, when I finally went out and rented all four Alien movies and watched them in sequential order, one after the other. My initial reaction to the first was a stunned awe. The second, while not as good, was still a decent film. But when the credits rolled for the third Alien, I was left with mixed emotions.
The art design for the movie is nice. The warm orange of the prison interiors are creepy and give a nice atmospheric effect. The design of the Alien is a nice change, the improvements much better than the changed Aliens in the second. The concept of the Alien inheriting some of the genetic traits of its host is very intriguing. Despite all of these attributes however, the movie is very hard to enjoy. The death of all of the surviving characters (minus Ripley, of course) in the very beginning of the movie immediately prejudiced my feelings towards the rest. My views on the movie didn't improve after watching the particularly gruesome scenes.
Examples of these are Newt's autopsy (this scene isn't extremely gory, but the quick shots and disturbing sounds are plenty to feed an active imagination), a prisoner being diced by a giant fan, a character who had potential, Clemens, having his skull crushed with plenty of blood. Yuck.
Many of the emotional scenes are not nearly as dramatic as they could have been, and the action scenes are too few and too short.
The film is interesting to watch, and is definitely different from the first two, but the plot is too flawed and confusing.