Impressive, very good, but not quite great

Rating: 8/10 (11 July 2012)

Saw a lot of 3 stars for this one, but deffo a 4 out of 5! :) Maybe folks went in looking for more along the 'alien' lines, and to be honest I was a bit surprised how different a 'beast' the movie was. Much more thoughtful, big ideas, big set pieces, grand scale. Love sci-fi, suspense, not being spoonfed - so this was an entertaining trip. So why no 5 outa 5? Well it felt a tad rushed, like it was trying too cram to much in. And agree with some reviews re. character dev, and not really giving enough background or generating enough empathy. And some of the best bits were the head-melting, disintegration scenes, maybe he coulda worked a little bit more in without taking from the high-falutin philosophising. All in all though, enjoyed it a lot, better than I thought it would be based on some initial underwhelming reviews, but missing something (where's the soul Ridley (literally!)) that would have made it stellar :)