Mediocre script saved by great visuals

Rating: Null/10 (13 December 1999)

1997 was a really good year if you wanted to see sci-fi movies by non-American directors (the directors of this film and The Fifth Element are French, the director of Starship Troopers is Dutch (but lives in the US), the director of Mimic is Mexican). It's interesting to see the sensibility brought to the films by these directors. I think it's really interesting to see the style of Jean Pierre Jeunet, director (with Marc Caro) of Delicatessen and City of Lost Children, both visual wonders and among the best films of the 90s (up against some stiff competition); applied to an Alien film. I think it's interesting how all the Alien films have different directors, and the series is kind of like that game children play where one writes the beginning of a story, and another writes the next part, and so on. Of course, a lot of series fans don't like this, and were upset by the unfairly maligned Alien 3 after the slam-bang actioner Aliens.
In a lesser director's hands, Alien: Resurrection would probably be the worst of the Alien films to date. The rather hackneyed script by Joss Whedon doesn't help anything. What saves the film is the remarkable visual style of Jean Pierre-Jeunet, along with the photography of Darius Khondji, one of the best cinematographers working today. Some of the action scenes are good too, like the long underwater sequence (I think underwater scenes are a Jeunet and Caro trademark). John Frizell's score is serviceable, but far from the eerie Jerry Goldsmith score for the original film by Ridley Scott. I would've liked it if Angelo Badalamenti had been retained from City of Lost Children.
I think the film has a very French, avant-garde style to it, much like HR Giger's designs (Giger is Swiss, I know); and has has a similar Gothic feeling to David Fincher's Alien 3. The script and some of the performances (like those of Dan Hedaya and Brad Dourif [not that I don't like them]) lend the film a slight tone of camp, which feels a little incongrous with Jeunet's direction. Sigourney Weaver is good as usual, and I enjoyed seeing Dominique Pinion, from Delicatessen and City of Lost Children (his line "who were you expecting, Santa Claus?" is from City, although it was Miette who said it, not him); I probably would've cast someone other than Winona Ryder in the role of Call, though. Even though this is the first Alien film with a European director, the series has had a European connection from the first film, with Giger's designs, and much of the first half of the film being inspired by Mario Bava's Planet of the Vampires. I think if Dario Argento directed an Alien film (that would go against the pattern of the Alien films being helmed by fairly new directors), it might be a little like this one.
Another complaint I have is that the screenwriter doesn't really explore the possibilities of the technology that must have developed during the 200 years between Alien 3 and this film. I know it makes for an interesting horror film concept, but why did they have to kidnap people in hypersleep to infect with the aliens? You'd think they'd be able to clone humans by then or do something else.
I think Jeunet was a really interesting choice of director for this film. I nominate the Wachowski brothers to direct Alien 5 (with Bill Pope as DP, of course). This film certainly isn't as good as Ridley Scott's classic Alien, but still a worthwhile entry into the series.