Craft and Style but no Substance

Rating: 7/10 (8 June 2012)

The movie is a good blockbuster. I did enjoy the movie. I saw it in 3D on a 70FT screen and it really does have a mood. It's all there - the bio goo, the Geiger backdrop, robots in the uncanny valley. As much as I enjoy escapism and the cinema of sensation there are 3 major flaws that show themselves at least every 3 or 4 minutes destroying any ability to lose yourself in the world Ridley has created.
The first is a visual flaw. Some of the shots were clearly there for the 3D experience but too many of them exist outside the reality of the story and you are shown a shot that has no relevance to anything other than the technique of 3D. This highlights the technical fabrication of cinema and so destroys the illusion of reality. You know you are watching a technique and it is so clumsy and ill fitting to the story that it breaks the spell. Still as an experiment in 3D I can forgive this and some of the 3D is stunning.
The second flaw is the countless and seemingly endless plot holes or parts that are just weakly scripted. Again they are so frequent they destroy the reality and illusion of the film. They really are outrageously bad in parts. You think OK it is Hollywood just eat your popcorn and keep watching but you expect more and are given less and so you are let down.
The final and fatal flaw is in the characterization. The characterization is patchy and haphazard - with some characters seeming to exist in different films types. You are not sure who you are supposed to root for as there is no strong lead and as a result you do not care about any of them meaning there can never be any tension no matter how loud and staccato the music gets or how gory a scene becomes. You just do not care. If there is no lead you should then fall back on a great ensemble but again the characters do not gel. They never come together as a team. They are not believable as humans or as characters. This is not a reflection on the acting but rather the characterization and script development.
I enjoyed the film, the visuals, the experience of 3D, the extension of the Alien universe - I just wish it was a better story with more believable characters. The fact that one of the 3 flaws I noted shows itself at least every 3 or 4 minutes really makes it difficult to let the film carry you away to it's world. Too much technique not enough heart.