Not Quite A Great Film

Rating: 7/10 (22 October 2016)

The camera pans across a primeval landscape and over wild water as portentous music plays. Then we see a spacecraft hovering over that landscape. Sort of human-looking beings, dressed in cowled garments (like monks) trek across the landscape to the water. One of them drinks something and it clearly doesn't agree with him since he dissolves, and the residue falls into the water. It was this, we subsequently learn, that kicked off that part of evolution on Earth that produced the human race.
Now, in the year 2089, an expedition is crossing space to investigate a barren planet that is, it seems, where these beings came from. They left behind artifacts and cave paintings on Earth so that we would know they wanted us to come. Of course, things turn out not to be as simple as that!
Though that quick introduction might make this film sound rather clichéd, it isn't really. There are exciting sequences, awe inspiring ones, amusing ones – everything, in fact, you'd need for great entertainment. Unfortunately, it's stretched over too much time so that the third quarter of the film loses its footing a bit, degenerating into the kind of chase and shoot'em up that was all there was to the third Alien film.
It does find its way again though, to give as a thrilling and thought-provoking conclusion.
The acting is a definite strength of this film. Charlize Theron, Noomi Rapace, and Idris Elba tackle their parts with gusto, but what really anchors it is a startlingly good performance from Michael Fassbender as the android David. Though he seems friendly and courteous, there is an air of somewhat chilly reserve about him that means we can never quite trust him. Should we? Watch and see!
The music is excellent, matching the mostly convincing, even stirring, special effects, and the great camera-work.
Rating: 7/10 (15 minutes shorter and it would have been 8/10)