My Eyes Still Burn From The Pain -- What A Horrible Film

Rating: 3/10 (19 April 2001)

Oh, what a rancid waste of film. Alien: Resurrection is pure garbage, plain and simple. The dialogue is awful, the acting is awful, the plot . . . well, if there actually was a plot, it would've been awful, but since one never existed, it's a moot point. Yet again, humanity is being threatened by the Alien menace, and since humanity has apparently spent the 500 years between Alien3 and Alien: Resurrection doing nothing but picking the collective lint out of its navel, scientists decide to clone the charred remnants of Ripley into an ultimate Alien killing machine. Of course, these same geniuses somehow don't notice that they've alos included some Alien DNA in their new Ripley clone, making her equally dangerous to both humanity and Aliens alike. Gratuitous, badly directed combat scenes ensue.

Sigourney Weaver gets to chew some scenery by playing the Ripley clone, who's far more aggressive and violent that the Ripley of past Alien films. At least she was fun to watch, even if the character made absolutely no logical sense. And then there's the latest android/human fascimile of the series . . . Winona Ryder, as Annalee. Hee, hee; she's unwatchably bad. She pouts and whines her way through the film, trying to act tough but ultimately looking nothing short of pathetic. Bring back Lance Henrickson as Bishop. Hey, bring back Ian Holm as the homicidal Ash, at least he'd be better than Ryder. How Winona Ryder got into this film will probably go down as the greatest mystery of the Twentieth century; she's THAT bad.
About the only saving grace of the film are the sets, which faithfully recreate the moods and claustrophic creepiness of "Alien" and "Aliens" . . . unfortunately, by reminding you of those films, you're also constantly reminded of how bad "Alien: Resurrection" really is. This film stinks, avoid it like the plague. Grade: D-