Vanity, vanity, all is vanity

Rating: 2/10 (26 December 2014)

Ridley Scott made this movie...WHY? All kinds of visual sumptuousness and every cheap "gotcha" trick in the book. But all roads lead to nowhere. Couldn't he find any writers, real writers...instead of guys sitting around throwing around things like "Hey, how about if she aborts the alien growing inside herself...huh?" "Oh, and we have to have a decapitated robot, right?" To many of these scenes are "how about" questions that we don't care if they are ever answered. What about plot, motivations and yeah, real character development! I watched the protagoness run and run and run and get nowhere. It was like watching a headless chicken in a barnyard. That would be less painful than watching this pointless exercise in cinematography. Could the producers of this ponderous pile of pseudo-science fiction be as empty-headed as the characters of the drivel-fueled screenplay seem to imply? They behave dumber than dirt, touching everything in sight, walking around with their helmets off in an alien environment they know is infected with "something". No scientific protocol, no adherence to quarantine procedures and no real reason to do anything that they do. I mean without the "don't touch that", or "don't open that door" moment most or all suspense movies wouldn't have a reason for being, in this case there is no suspense. You KNOW they are going to touch that, open that door, drink that drink and, Oh yes, the alien will pop out. How many ways will it pop out and how many different creatures will it pop out of are the only questions. And once again, I stopped caring after the first one. I am a huge fan of the first "Alien"! Great plot, fantastic editing, well-developed characters. How can the same name be at the top of the credits on both these movies? Most video games have better development than this horrible excuse for CGI effects. By the way, I really tried to give this movie a chance. Watched it 3 times to try to wring some saving grace out of it but came away as dissatisfied as having eaten a dry out-of-date bodega sandwich. You see, experience is not always a good thing!