Alien: Covenant

On such a lovely weathered day I thought the best place to be was in the dark, air conditioned atmosphere of a cinema. I did have a lovely run earlier today and managed 7 miles or so.

So, off to Rochester cinema I went. Worriedly. The last film I saw I walked out of. I’m not sure if that was because the film was truly terrible or maybe I was just having a minor head-fuck moment. It was with trepidation that I entered the theatre this time. I was also worried because Ridley Scott’s last foray into the Alien series had distressed me so much.

This film was largely OK. Hence I rated it a 6 on IMDB.

So, in more detail here’s some thoughts after I steal quotations from some source. If you read my Prometheus Arrrgh communication you will understand what I was worried about. I have since heard people say that Ridley Scott makes gorgeous films, but when he’s been given a shit script, it’s still a shit script.

Finally we have much more involvement of the synthetic human and he has gone mad. This pleased me because the entire series should have been about the relationship that humans have with the alien within their system, within humanity itself.

There were still some issues with this film. You don’t land on a new planet without surveying it THOROUGHLY. You’d also check toxicology reports etc. Humans are quite fragile really!

Now, if I ignore all that, I will admit that the rest of this film was pretty darn good. Really it was an horror film and an awful lot of it was filmed in the dark. Don’t wear sunglasses in the cinema, you won’t see a thing! There was gore and the Alien and stuff.

In all honesty, this film is nowhere near as good as Alien. It’s almost a cross between Alien and Aliens. I fully recommend that you go out and buy Alien and watch that instead.

Oh, and how to kill an Alien? Blast them out into space. EVERY TIME.

Alien

Here’s #2 son with a bike helmet on. Most amusing I think you’ll agree!

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Prometheus aaarrrgghh

I have some serious issues with Prometheus! About two months ago I saw a trailer and knew nothing else about it. Wow, space stuff with Ridley Scott! That’ll be a really interesting film then. Put head into “protect” mode and don’t look at anything connected to ensure the pure film experience. Persuade wife that it’ll be a great film to see on one of the three times a year we get out to the cinema. Booked the tickets online and as far in advance as I could, even coughed up for gallery seats at Bluewater cinema. Now I could say I’m not grumbling but about GBP45 for two cinema tickets is a bit steep, even for a double leather sofa and as much coffee as you can drink. I even booked a 3D viewing and I think that is mostly a con.

The actual day came along and I was still persuading WW that it’ll be ok and not that scary or gory as it’s only a 15. Little did I know how horrified I was going to be.

Glasses – got
Free nachos – got
Free celebrations – got
Free coffee – got

Adverts and trailers – over.

Film start. So excited.
Big white man, ok. Ancient drawings point to a star system, yeah, bullshit but ok. Man, that looks good. The whole thing just looks so bloody sexy. Oh, he’s a robot, others sleeping, seen it before but it still looks good. Everyone wakes up and ok. Still looking good.
Let’s go and land, and just drop the ship down without circling around and scanning for a little while – now I’m starting to hurt a bit. I’m not sure it would happen like that.
Hold on. You wouldn’t do that. Film looks gorgeous. Oh dear, I think they are losing it a bit. Why don’t you map the building before going in. Why take your helmet off? Why try to pet an alien worm creature? Oh shit. I think this is causing cognitive dissonance. Wait until end of film, try to cope and tally the expectation with the experience.

I have spent the last two weeks reading reviews of this film. I have tried to find out why it was causing me so much pain and I think it comes down to the fact that it was shit. Ridley Scott has made a gorgeous looking film but the script and story line we probably just ideas on post-its that were thrown in the air and those that landed upwards were kept. It was shit.

So, so very disappointing. For a film that looks so lovely it stank. I would recommend you go and watch – Moon. It’s far better and greater in terms of everything.

I want to thank George Hrab for his thirty one minutes of PrometheusBoo on his podcast. He managed to say everything I couldn’t because I’m still in shock. I would also like to point out that this review here is a crock of shit. Man, I could link any film you care to mention to Jesus and the message of Christianity.

Oh, it still hurts. I still can’t juxtapose the gorgeousnous of the film with just how much it stank.