Visuals All but Make Up for a Wanting Script

Rating: 8/10 (19 May 2017)

What arguably made the Alien franchise (1979-Present) such an extraordinary success back in its day had less to do with the alien itself and more to do with the franchises overwhelming sense of dread. It permeated through, at the very least the three good movies (shut up, Alien 3 (1992) is too a good movie) in everything from their dark existential themes to their imposing and surreal external features. There was no escape from the darkness, whether that darkness came in the form of the alien itself, a sinister and omnipresent company or the emptiness of space which rumor has it, no one can hear you scream.
Prometheus (2012), for better or worse, changed all that by elevating the existential dread from being a feature to a recurring theme. It's a subtle shift and one that's impossible to notice when the newest batch of expendables are running for dear life. Yet while most remember Prometheus as "the one where a professional biologist gets cozy with a hissing vagina snake," they forget that the movie often stopped cold, to wax poetically about the nature of God, the search for meaning, and man's tenuous relationship with nature.
Alien: Covenant follows the same thematic arc started by Prometheus five years ago, only I'm glad to say this time it largely sticks. The story begins when a ship of colonists intercept a signal from an Earth-like planet and decide to change course in order to investigate it. Once they arrive on the surface of the planet with thoughts of long-term colonization, the landing crew quickly discover the ruins of an ancient civilization (and a little something more).
Say what you will about Scott, He's always been a visual director Out of all the subsequent films in the Alien franchise, Alien: Covenant arguably comes closest to recreating the bold visuals and overall feel of the original 1979 film. This film is admirably beautiful in its framing and composition. Cinematographer Dariusz Wolski imbues nearly every frame on the planet with an off-putting balance of natural splendor and glowering foreboding. When the Captain (Crudup) says "this could be home," you'd be inclined to believe him, that's if you didn't already know this was an Alien movie.
Much credit must be given to director Ridley Scott for trying to give the world of his franchise a sense of scope. One can draw a straight line from Prometheus's bronze age aesthetic to Covenant's imposing classicism to the eventual discovery of a/the Gothic derelict ship. Not satisfied with ornamentation, Scott supplements some of the film's most dire and profound moments with visual parallels to the Drowning of Ophelia by Millais, The Garden of Earthly Delights by Bosch and The Last Days of Pompeii by Bryullov.
Yet if there's a weak link to this film - and trust me it's a doozy - it's the film's rather wanting script written partially by playwright John Logan. The introduction of Walter, played by an uncharacteristically straight-laced Michael Fassbender conjures memories of Fassbender's take on the maltheist synthetic David in Prometheus. And as such, his inclusion begs the script to reach for the same level sophistication as Scott's unforgettable visuals in both that film and this one. If only references to Percy Shelley and Wagner made it so. Unfortunately for Covenant, anything meant to be muse-worthy and bleak just comes across as silly or worse, the pretentious preening of a screenwriter who wants everyone in earshot to know he went to Northwestern.
Alien: Resurrection sucked but admit it, you remember this guy The film then uneasily balances its lofty ideas on the shoulders of some of the blandest characters in this franchise to date. If asked for a list of character names, fans of the franchise could arguably name a good five or six (not including Ripley) spread out between all the Alien films. Here however our hero Daniels (Waterston) and her erudite crew lack a lot of the hallmarks of being a memorable and sympathetic lot; even when the film spends more time than usual getting to know them, their habits and their motivations. Yet because there motivations are so tenuous, their decisions so baffling and their psychology so dependent on the need to fill time, we as the audience just can't invest all that much in them.
Yet for every delta we add to the list of what's wrong with this movie, the visuals, not to mention the arrival of the dreaded Xenomorph are enough to overtake them. The gore, the shock, the visceral moments of absolute dread, beckon to the original in just the right ways. Covenant may not be as exciting and expertly paced but it does have enough of an oomph to live on its mythological laurels.