There is plenty of gore and gross special effects to go around, but not enough flair and scares to resurrect the series

Rating: 4/10 (25 May 2017)

The Alien franchise had a promising debut when Ridley Scott ignited the first film in 1979, and James Cameron embraced the spirit of the film with a highly enthralling follow-up in 1986. This series however, met an unexpected downward turn when the third installment came in, not only butchering the franchise but placing director David Fincher on a not-so-compelling directorial debut. Since then, Fincher is now disowned the film. There was only hope that this unexpected fourth installment would be pull the franchise out of its rusty pit. Unfortunately, that was a dream that went to die. Taking the director's chair this time around is French filmmaker Jean-Pierre Jeunet who manages to strip the film of the beauty that made the first two entries hits and slaps it with an inept script by Joss Whedon, placing this installment in a borderline laughable debacle. Now the franchise opens the door to the question of how and who is supposed to get this now-gloomy franchise back on its feet. Set in 200 years after the events of 'Alien 3', this film follows a space crew consisting of Call (played by Winona Ryder), "tough-guy" Johner (played by Ron Perlman), wheelchair-bound Captain Vriess (played by Dominique Pinon), Christie (played by Gary Dourdan) along with several others who conduct a biological experiment to extract the Queen Alien out of the long- dead Ellen Ripley (played by Sigourney Weaver)and resurrect her back to life. However, her DNA has already been paired with the Queen, and the crew must now face against a vicious alien bloodbath that places the lives of everyone in grave danger.
This dour fourth entry suffers from not only failing bring anything new to the table rather than recycling the nearly all the same elements from before, but somehow managing to produce more unintentional laughter than scares. If there are any accolades that surround this movie besides taking the crown of drenching the screen with most gore and slime, is coming up just a few fun action sequences involving the space crew chased down the tunnels by the ugly extraterrestrial creatures and a few scenes of our heroes mowing down the aliens with loud, noisy bloodbath. Beyond that, it appears that Jean- Pierre Jeunet struggles to execute the action without it feeling like a tug-o-war between the grim atmosphere and Joss Whedon's otherwise more light-hearted script. Recycling on run-of-the mill formula, this movie journeys through the characters' battle for survival, while adding some awkward elements to the mix including giving Ellen Ripley what appears to be sexual tension between her and the Queen Alien. This accounts to an awkward scene toward the end that is bound to spear viewers with a sense of embarrassing discomfort than scare. Who wants to see Ripley get intimate with a flesh-eating xenomorph? If that isn't farcical enough, Whedon's script also manages to pair each character, particularly Ron Perlman, with a large surplus of one ludicrous one-liner after another. In addition, how funny does this trying to by poking fun at Dominique Pinon's character being in the wheelchair in the midst of all the chaos? As for the performances, there is not much gold to offered here, even from Sigourney Weaver. While her performance is not necessarily bad, the unwholesome portrayal of her character strips the actress of all her charisma that made her a powerful character in the beginning.
Alien: Resurrection marks a dismal attempt to revitalize the broken franchise, and settles for both an unpolished direction and script that accounts for more silliness than white-knuckle thrills. Not many can doubt that this entry had a fair amount of potential. But oh boy! It only corresponds to a soul-sucking letdown.