In the middle between Heaven and Hell

Rating: 7/10 (24 July 2012)

"Alien" by Ridley Scott is a classic movie, which changed the history of the cinema. The attempt to return to the same world, thirty years later by much older and not-so-visionary-anymore director was a bold move. We all saw great creators from the past wearing out and destroying their own legend (George Lucas, Steven Spielberg or James Cameron, just to name the few). It is sad to see how, after years of silence or decline, they finally hit the bottom. Ridley Scott shares the same patterns - after brilliant beginning ("Alien," "Blade Runner") he was going up ("Gladiator," "Black Hawk Down") or down ("G.I. Jane," "Hannibal"), to go dangerously low recently (with atrocious "Body of Lies" and "Robin Hood"). Return to the genre he abandoned many years ago could be as well an outstanding success, as ignominious defeat. What is the verdict?
Firstly, I have no doubt that everyone saw all the trailers before going to the cinema. The person responsible for releasing the last two, should not be working in the movie business anymore. The problem is that after you watch them, you already know the main parts of the story and this changes the perspective of the viewer. Secondly, the word "Alien" set expectations extremely high, as if returning to the same franchise in identical style was possible. This probably explains so many negative reviews from people who wanted to see the continuation of the original "Alien" with the same quality (come on, people, after two "Alien versus Predator" disasters??).
So is this movie good or bad? Well, a little of both. Let's start with good sides. Firstly, the story. Although it seems to be pretty straightforward, it has some interesting twists, making the 2 hours in the cinema a memorable time. The plot involves asking important philosophical questions about the origin and destiny of mankind. Sure, this is not the smartest way to ask them, but still the movie is much more serious than most of the contemporary so-called sci-fi pictures. Special effects are really good. While in Cameron's "Avatar" you have the cartooned world all the time (unbearable in 2D), Prometheus presents the REAL world with real spaceships and monsters. Visual effects are more than acceptable, surely not the best in the history, though. Characters are believable and well played. The best performance comes from Michael Fassbender, whose David can easily stand next to Ash or Bishop. Charlize Theron, Noomi Rapace and Idris Elba are not that impressive, but still deliver some good acting. Also, beautiful landscapes (shot in Iceland), nice designs of ships and their interiors (outstanding job, everyone!) make the movie worth watching more than once.
Now, drawbacks. This movie tries to be in the part of the "Alien" franchise, which is its major flaw. Unfortunately, the original movie was outstanding, in terms of the script, cast, special effects, design, etc. Prometeus is just the decent movie, with well conceived story, nice special effects, good (but not excellent) actors and... some annoying links to "Alien," which are totally unnecessary. In fact, they make watching the movie harder. Designs from H.R. Giger were ingenious, regarding the creature, the alien spaceship design, space jockey... Here these ideas are used and spoiled. Yes, we see space jockeys alive, we now know, who they are. Unfortunately, this is the main disappointment. Through the years probably everyone developed in his mind the true form of this being behind the bizarre space suit. What we see on screen is not outstanding at all, just a set of typical ideas from the B-class movie and impressions about alien races. In fact, every time there is the reference to "Alien", it is hardly watchable. I have no idea, why Giger was not the main visual creator in Prometheus. Imagine the whole planet created by his twisted mind... The music, although with a good main theme, is sometimes misplaced, deteriorating the whole quality of Prometheus. Add to it some stupid, senseless scenes and you have the general view, placing this creation close to "Gladiator", but significantly below "Alien" and "Aliens".
I am a little surprised by the statement from the esteemed director, who claimed that the second part would be in the works. To me Prometheus is a closed story, without any possibilities to move on, especially if H.R. Giger would not be responsible for the creatures. Despite some complaints by the audience, there are no mysteries to solve, no additional questions to ask. Luckily, Prometheus is not a prequel to "Alien", rather a spin-off, which expands the universe in a better way than "Alien: Resurrection," both "AvP" and in many aspects "Alien 3". Until now, I watched it three times and was never bored, therefore despite all flaws, the movie is attractive. By comparison, I also watched "Avatar" for the second time and it was one of the worst experiences within the last month... Finally, this movie, although not perfect is much better than any "superhero" installment, beating mercilessly such poor movie-dummies as "Avengers", "Iron Man", "Dark Knight Rises", "Transformers". Let's hope that we will see more hard sci-fi attempts in the nearest future.
To sum up, the movie has a good idea, unfortunately spoiled by poor scenes and unnecessary references to the previous pictures. Ironically, if we watch forgetting this is the "Alien" franchise, the picture looks much better and the disappointment fades away (a piece of advice: forget the very last scene of the film). However, I'm not sure if this was the director's intention. Prometheus is neither excellent, nor atrocious, just somewhere in between, probably closer to the former. The current average grade given by IMDb users is probably the most fair one (I give it about 70 percent). Sadly, this film probably proves that it is not possible to create another masterpiece in the "Alien" world, therefore maybe the best thing to do is to just let it rest in peace...