Alien - 1979

I actually saw it now for the first time ever! Yes, it’s incredible and yet it’s true. Well, I couldn’t have seen it when it came out, but I should have seen it twenty years ago :-/   I understand why it’s so famous, when it came out it must have been really something! It’s a good movie even now, considering that all their technology seems silly now (lots of lights to mean big technological procedures going on, and all the computer written interactions), and that we’ve seen those kind of tricks to scary people many many times.

It starts slow, obviously, even boring in a way: A cargo starship is heading home to Earth. The crew of seven people wakes up from their hibernation, and we meet them when they sit around the table to eat: five men, two women and a red cat, Jones :-) He woke up too of course :-p

Lambert (Veronica Cartwright) informs them that they are only half way home, and it turns out the main computer that they call Mother woke them up because it received an unknown message that might, just might be a distress call, so they are forced to check it out or they won’t be paid for their work. They head towards the signal, land, and three of them go check the place out. They find some kind of starship stranded there, and go in to see. Kane (John Hurt) finds a sort of cocoon on the floor, and it seems to be moving, and he can see something inside… then thirty minutes into the movie a strange thing jumps out at him and hits him on the helmet! After that the three of them head back towards their ship, the ‘Nostromo’.

Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) had been trying to figure out the message meaning, and is not convinced it’s a distress signal, she actually thinks it’s a threat, so when they come saying what happened, she refuses to open the door for them. They insist, saying that Kade needs to be taken to the infirmary, but she refuses even if the commanding officer (Dallas=Tom Skerritt) is outside ordering her to open. Quarantine procedure obviously don’t allow for unknown, mysterious things to be brought in without being checked before. Ash (Ian Holm), the science officer, meaning medical officer too, opens the door breaking procedures. They bring Kane to the infirmary, and see that the thing has broken the helmet and attached itself to his face. They don’t know what to do, so Dallas orders Ash to take it off him: they try cutting its fingers-like-tentacles, whatever they are, but immediately a yellow liquid comes out and burns a hole in the ship floor. It’s a powerful kind of acid, they can’t do anything, but after a while it detaches itself. When it jumps on Ripley she doesn’t know yet what’s going on, but it falls on the floor, dead. Ash insists on doing some tests, on taking it back home with them. 

Dallas wants to get the hell out of there, of course, so they take-off: it’s still a ten months journey before getting home, so they plan on going back to sleep. Kane seems fine enough now, but is very hungry, so they sit to eat together before hibernation. All of a sudden Kane starts feeling sick, couching and trembling and they can barely hold him still when something comes out of his chest, spreading blood everywhere. A little alien looks around then ‘runs’ away. Ash’s words that he did what he thought best to save Kane’s life, his opening the door for him brought them to this: Kane dead and a little alien loose on their ship.

They plan to search the ship for it, with a net and an electrified stick: I think they wanted to capture it at this point, not kill it. They think they have found it but it’s actually Jones :-p Poor thing runs away and Brett (Harry Dean Stanton) goes looking for him; he finds Jones running away for his life, and a much-bigger-than-before alien kills him. Now they are more serious in their search, but Dallas gets killed too. 

Lambert wants to abandon the ship and escape in their shuttle, but Ripley - now in command - says there isn’t room for four in it so they must find this alien and kill it. When an angry Ripley confronts Ash, he attacks her trying to choke her (in a strange way, trying to force a rolled-up-paper into her mouth) but Parker (Yaphet Kotto) saves her and hits Ash, swinging a metal bar or something at his head. Which almost detaches itself from the body.

They see now that Ash was actually a robot: they activate its head to find out what is going on, and it reveals that the secret mission was to bring back new life forms at any cost, that was the priority, not their safety. Ripley wants to know how to kill it, but Ash says that they can’t, that it’s a perfect lifeform…

Now it’s only three of them, so Ripley wants to escape together with the shuttle. While Parker and Lambert gather the things they need for the long journey they are ‘confronted’ by a now-very-big alien: Parker shouts to get away, but Lambert is petrified, so instead of using the flamethrower Parker tries to attack the alien himself, but of course is killed, and crying Lambert is killed too right after him. Parker had gone looking for Jones, had found him and put him in his carrier when she hears their screams. Now alone, she activates the ship’s self-destruction then heads towards the shuttle with Jones in one hand and a weapon in the other. At a turn, she sees the alien, so leaves Jones there and runs in the opposite direction. She’s too late to stop the self-destruction procedure, so her only chance is to go back to the shuttle. She only has five minutes. Alien is no more in sight, so she picks up Jones’ carrier and enters the capsule (the door was already open..)

She only has one minute to escape, so she take-off and watches the Nostromo blow up. She puts the cat to sleep, meaning in its hibernation-capsule, then takes off her clothes to go in her own pod, but right then she sees that the alien had hidden inside the shuttle! It doesn’t move much, seems somehow weaker, and she hides in a closet: she looks at it and slowly puts on a spacesuit, then she sits down and straps herself to the chair with a belt. She uses something to make it come out of its hiding place (don’t know what, don’t think it’s gas because she’s in there too, but it could be since she’s in the spacesuit), then she opens the airlock in the intent to have it sucked out of the shuttle. She fires at him some kind of harpoon and then activates the engines to burn it, or at least have it away from the ship into space. Finally alone, she records her final report on what happened, and then puts herself in a pod to sleep until she gets home or until someone finds her and rescues her, the only survivor of the Nostromo.

At this point we don’t know if she gets home safe, the last image is Ripley sleeping…