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Prometheus
Awesome looking forward to seeing it, its good to see ridley back to what he does best.
I can only imagine what Noomi does to the aliens.
Oh, I saw the trailer for that! I'm jealous. It hasn't shown up in my area, in the U.S. northeast.
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So... I don't really do gore. What's the level of gore in this?
Sporadic Reviews wrote: "So... I don't really do gore. What's the level of gore in this?"It's not huge -- it's rated 15 in the UK, which is much lower than the earlier Alien films. Details spoilered... (note: I just mention where red sauce gets used, not the results or consequences of that use)
(view spoiler)
Meh, My girlfriend is dragging me to see this cause she loves horror movies... she's trying to appeal to my sci-fi nerd... I may enjoy watching it, but I would have skipped it had it been my choice...
Tamahome wrote: "I can only imagine what Noomi does to the aliens."Something tells me that no matter what she tattoo's on the aliens' chest it won't shame them into behaving.
Nick wrote: "Tamahome wrote: "I can only imagine what Noomi does to the aliens."Something tells me that no matter what she tattoo's on the aliens' chest it won't shame them into behaving."
I was thinking of other power tools...
Saw it today. It was OK, but I was expecting better. The not-really-a-prequal turned out to be really a prequal, and a fairly straight-forward one at that. The parallels with the 1st 2 Alien films were so extensive it might as well have been a remake. The cast were excellent, but the film promised more imagination then it delivered. My biggest complaint is with the alien creator race -- the Predators from AVP had more depth of character. Still better than Indiana Jones & the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Less suspense & a quicker pace than Alien, less gore, violence & panic than Aliens, & no real humor to speak of.To give you an idea of my personal taste by which you can judge my review, my favorite film of the franchise was Alien Resurrection, followed by AVP.
Second time I watched it with a more critical eye ("Tim stop looking at the eye candy and pay attention!"). There are no spoilers.* It starts out trying to be a high-concept Hard SF movie dealing with the origins of mankind, and what it means to be human. Fair enough. But we all know Hollywood's track record with this kind of subject matter (remember Star Trek 5?)
* Michael Fassbender as David was the standout performance of the film. The early sequenced in the ship where we see his daily routine were brilliant. I loved the way he was watching Lawrence of Arabia and trying to be Peter O'Toole.
* The first real cracks show when the crew is woken. We're supposed to believe these people are scientists? I mean, really? Okay I can accept the looks (I know some archaeologists), but they don't talk like scientists, they don't act like scientists, they do dumb things that no scientist would ever do. Ever. We have no sympathy for them and don't care what happens to them. Big fail.
* Idris Elba as the Captain. Okay this guy *is* believable as a character: Pilot through and through, very convincing. Excellent performance.
* Guy Pearce. WTF? I mean why? Unless there was a massive flashback scene that got cut or wasn't filmed for some reason, putting a young guy in bad "old age" makeup is just dumb.
* Charlize Theron: Ice vixen. A much more measured (and better) performance than in Snow White.
* Noomi Rapace: First leading role in English. Wisely I think, she doesn't try to hide her accent (I've always had a thing for Swedish accents anyhow). Very good performance.
* The entire third act: Fumble. I had to check this is a Ridley Scott film, right? It's all over the place. Maybe it'll be better in the extended edition, I really hope so. The last 10 minutes or so are just blatant set-up for a sequel.
* The alien planet sequences were shot in Iceland, which is where the 'beyond the wall' segments of Game of Thrones was filmed. I can't help but wonder that it would have been like if Prometheus had encountered White Walkers and Wildlings instead of...
* This is not a horror film. It's SF with a few (not many though) horror elements. It's only a 15 rating (the original Alien was an 18). Which is not to say it *can't* be scary -- The Woman in Black managed to be a very scary movie and was only a 12A -- but this isn't particularly scary either.
* Visually it is stunning. It was filmed using Red Epic 5K cameras, using the Atom 3D rig (Cinematographer Dariusz Wolski (Alice in Wonderland, POTC 1-4, Sweeney Todd, Dark City...) & Stereographer James Goldman). The 3D is very well done, with none of the eyeball jarring headache-inducing "stunts" you often see. It's designed in from the start, and not post-processed as an afterthought.
Michael Fassbender and Noomi Rapace (Girl with the Dragon Tatoo) were just on Charlie Rose. They made it sound really interesting.
I should say I saw it in 2D. The search for the origins of mankind plot element (which turned out to be just an excuse to get them to point b & went NOWHERE) had my expectations set way too high. If I had gone in expecting a PG13 version of an Alien film, I would have been less disappointed. The concept of (opening sequence) (view spoiler) was a cool concept.
It was okay but there were a lot of things in the movie that made little sense. Why does David do the experiments he does mid movie? (view spoiler). How did he know that would happen? If you take the Alien vs Predator movies as prequels to this movie then maybe you could say he was experimenting to see if these were the same creatures but otherwise it was rather out of nowhere with no further explanation later as to why he did it. And what was with the alien guy in the first scene at the waterfall? At the time I thought that was supposed to be the same alien planet but I've read elsewhere that it was supposed to be Earth. Regardless, what was it about?
Overall I found Michael Fassebender's performance as David to be awesome beyond words and the rest the movie to be very much let down by its plot.
My cinema was only showing it in 3D, which was an expensive bummer. After the title card they never really had a use for the dimensionality, and it exacerbated my headache something fierce.Fassbender and Elba were great at their roles, but I can't recall anyone else doing particularly well. I'm surprised by the praise Rapace has taken in, for she seemed like an utterly generic naive scientist stereotype throughout, and some of the situations she went through were lamentably laughable. A lot of the flaws in the film were due to the screenplay's pacing and the director's execution, but it was such a lugubrious and fumbling mess. If only we could transplant Fassbender's David into a motion picture more worth re-watching.
We ran through the movie on our podcast if anyone is interested in detailed response. The first half is spoiler-free, and there's a hard break to spare anyone from when we get into the ending.
http://www.consumedpodcast.com/episode/6
I saw the movie today in 3D. I enjoyed it mostly for the beautiful cinematography. There are flaws in the story, but I don't want to think too hard about that, since I love the visuals. Great outer space visuals are hard to come by in the cinema. My favorite part is when the android launched the 3D galaxy.
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I think if that had been handled better script-wise, it actually could have been kind of great, if still nowhere near a classic. I enjoyed that it didn't try to replicate the intense suspense-horror of Alien nor the intense-action of Aliens, but instead aimed for something else: a lower-key theme-based (origin of mankind) sf story. Coming out of the theater, I really felt like it had been like an interesting but flawed sf novella, as opposed to a blockbuster epic.
Agreed that it was beautiful (I will get it on blu-ray for that (and hopefully some extra scenes)) and that Fassbender's performance was excellent.
Rik wrote: "At the time I thought that was supposed to be the same alien planet but I've read elsewhere that it was supposed to be Earth. Regardless, what was it about?"
See Richard's spoiler comment above - that interpretation makes sense to me. (view spoiler)
John wrote: "My cinema was only showing it in 3D, which was an expensive bummer. After the title card they never really had a use for the dimensionality, and it exacerbated my headache something fierce."Bummer. I've learned the hard way, never go to the cinema with a headache as it'll only get worse. This is true (for me anyhow) even of 2D films, and any 3D film with a headache is my version of hell. Unfortunately I think as a result that may have coloured your reaction to the movie to a greater or lesser extent.
I disagree with your inference that 3D is wasted unless it continually has a massive depth of field (vertiginous cliffs or someone poking a sword up your nose etc). For sure there was some of that -- the cloudscapes, the helicopter tracking shots, the spacescapes, the galaxy plot, the ground opening to let the spaceship out, and those sequences were truly excellent (I have a pilots licence, and dude I was *flying* that ship!) -- but mostly the world isn't like that, especially not when you're in a confined spaceship or tunnels etc. And to have people poking stuff at the lens (the sword up your nose trick) every few minutes just to fake extra "3D-ness" gets old really quickly and would progress your headache to a migraine faster than you could say T.E. Lawrence[*]. No, 3D I think is like special effects and movie music -- the less you notice it, the better it is. We see the everyday world around us in 3D but we're not continually going "wow look at the dimensionality", and that's as it should be. The sword up your nose trick is the movie equivalent of 50 fonts on a page: Plain bad moviemaking.
But the one thing I'm sure we can agree is bad about 3D movies it the obscene practice by cinemas of charging extra to see it. That one thing alone I think is the biggest barrier to acceptance of 3D movies today.
You mentioned Idris Elba's singing as one of your high points, and I agree he was a very convincing and believable character. I think my personal favourite line in the movie, which comes from that same sequence was:
Elba: "Are you a robot?"
[pause]
Theron: "My room. Ten minutes."
[*] little in-reference, if you've seen the movie
Tim wrote: "Second time I watched it with a more critical eye ("Tim stop looking at the eye candy and pay attention!"). There are no spoilers."I think I agree with almost every part of your assessment. To me, it came off as "The Thing" with really awesome production values and art direction, but its attempts to be deep and thought-provoking were undercut by a cast of dumb, unsympathetic people.
The cards might have been stacked against me enjoying Prometheus because of my opinions on the central premise: (view spoiler). If you're going to sell me on such a ridiculous idea, you have to bring a really interesting take on it to the table, or else just play it for high adventure/camp/laughs. Prometheus isn't smart or original enough to pull off the former, and takes itself way too seriously to pull off the latter.
Tim wrote: "* Guy Pearce. WTF? I mean why? Unless there was a massive flashback scene that got cut or wasn't filmed for some reason, putting a young guy in bad "old age" makeup is just dumb."There was a video released a few months before the film of a fictional TED talk with Guy Pearce as Peter Weyland. Having seen it, I wasn't surprised at his appearance in the film, although I still think our prosthetics aren't good enough to make the "old man look" look good. I assume that in sequels/prequels or subsequent method involving Prometheus that Guy will still be playing the role of Weyland.
I really enjoyed the movie quite a bit. First movie I saw this year that caused me to actually physically buzz after viewing it for a couple of hours (no, I'm not part bee). Of course, I've always been a hardcore fan of the Alien franchise, with Ridley Scott's original being my favorite.
I agree with some of the criticisms I've read here, but I was very impressed with a good deal of the film. I think that the fact that the film posed many questions that weren't really answered is actually good, because it let me draw my own conclusions and spawned some great discussions with friends over the subject material.
I really hope that there is some sort of sequel to Prometheus, because i'm still not really sure on some parts of the movie. For example (view spoiler)
Seeing it now. Found out I can't take 3D from eye strain. Switching to 2D.
Well I saw it. I liked the surgery scene. Heh. I was rooting for Noomi to have good scenes all the way through. Sometimes she did. There were some cute ideas here and there but mostly it was like a Syfy movie with a higher budget. There wasn't a scene after the credits was there?Veronica, if you're reading this, you won't have a good time.
my first movie in 3d and it might be my last, it added nothing to the movie and wasnt what i was expecting from 3d at the movies, it was no better than the 3dtv's you can buy at the shops.The movie itself was a big vague mess and very little resemblance or major tie in with Alien.
Guy Pearce's makeup was dreadful imo. Why not use an older actor?
Hypnobobs just had a long podcast about how the original Alien was derivative of other movies like Dark Star: http://www.sffaudio.com/?p=40349 (and Jesse thinks Alien came from A. E. Van Vogt's short story Black Destroyer)Apparently the original Alien screenplay had Ripley having sex under a clear dome on the top of the ship!
Pickle wrote: "The movie itself was a big vague mess and very little resemblance or major tie in with Alien."What film were you watching? What I saw was very definitely Alien Lite.
I felt like this commentary helped solidify some of the ideas that were kicking around in my head after seeing the film. The writing in the film didn't do the best job of conveying some aspects, but there are enough nods, winks, and nudges throughout the film, both in the script and production design, to clue you into the fact that they weren't making a simple sci-fi horror/action/adventure film.http://cavalorn.livejournal.com/58413...
Hahah I like that.Here's an SMS conversation between Dr. Shaw (Noomi Rapace) and an 'Engineer'
Do consider it a spoiler for the film
http://enchantedmitten.blogspot.com/2...
For a prequel about scientists searching for answers, there was very little science or answers.Anyone else bothered by the utter lack of protocol on that ship? Why wouldn't they be recording down to the damn angstrom and every single syllable spoken? So much of the accident and horror would have been negated if people had just stopped to review information, and maybe talked to each other occasionally.
In this way it is identical to Lost. Which is appropriate, because I inexplicably enjoyed it, much as I did Lost.
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Space Preacher, yeah, that's exactly what I mean by the scientists acting like "piss-poor, idiot scientists" - my biggest issue with the film. But somehow I did not feel as burned (ha) by Prometheus as I did by LOST...but maybe by the end of the Prometheus sequel, if it happens, I'll be shaking my fist at Lindehof again. ;)
Leslie wrote: "Hahah I like that.
Here's an SMS conversation between Dr. Shaw (Noomi Rapace) and an 'Engineer'..."
Leslie, yes, that's hilarious too. There's some good discussion of it on this thread - Richard expands on some of his interpretation there.
Thanks Jlawrence, I hadn't seen that thread yet. All great for discussion.
Tim wrote: "John wrote: "My cinema was only showing it in 3D, which was an expensive bummer. After the title card they never really had a use for the dimensionality, and it exacerbated my headache something fi..."Quality Lawrence reference! Though I actually don't find cinemas aggravate my headaches, at least for 2D film. I've gone many times and typically come out with the headache having passed.
I did not mean that 3D can only be used for "massive depth of field." That is simply the only trick the movie employed to any augmentation of the experience. None of the scenes you mentioned were better for being in 3D - they just were, and hence, it's a waste of technology. If surround sound is used to make the movie better, then it's worthwhile. If it's just there, it's unnecessary. It could have been crafted to subtly use 3D for augmentation, but it didn't, and since the movie was so lackluster and lethargic, I had ample time to check when it was and wasn't employing 3D in creative ways. I desperately wanted to find something the movie was doing well.
Gosh, I wanted to like that movie.
This brand new article on io9 has some well written analysis:http://io9.com/5919306/another-theory...
For the record, I loved the movie. I see it as a darker version of 2001: A Space Odyssey. But I'm also frustrated with how poorly science and scientists were depicted in the film.
Having seen Cabin in the Woods this spring, I have to see Prometheus through the Whedon lens. Spoilers for Cabin and Prometheus.(view spoiler)
The only person I hoped would survive was the Asian navigator. I was glad to see some of the 'scientists' go.
I enjoyed it for the "I want something pretty huge, loud, and in my face" factor. And as a standalone movie it was okay. But as a prequel to Alien it was crap.
I didn't like the movie. It was pretty but it was a muddled mess. Ridley has done movies better than this. He has even done some of the themes of Prometheus better than this in his other movies.(view spoiler)As for people saying your not looking hard enough or expect the meaning of the movie to be handed to you on a golden platter I pose that were this any other director those same people would be ridiculing this movie.
I was seriously disappointed and I had so hoped I'd love this movie.
I actually liked the movie as a prequel to Alien, but the little bit of the pre-release hype that I was unable to avoid led me to expect something different, something greater. I can't define what I expected it to be, but this wasn't it. AVP was just the opposite. When I first saw the initial trailer (the one with just those letters & nothing else), 80% or more of the audience let out an enthusiastic "Yes!" When I saw the film, I got exactly what I expected, & then some. At the end, the Predators turned out to have a greater depth of character than had been seen before. AVP Requiem, however, was your typical lame sequel.
pretty undewhelmed with this film, the story was weak, I dont think some of the casting for the crew was good apart from noomi and the android david which was the best part of the film, they werent believable as scientists and all this would have been avoided with proper health and safety procedures, which they would have been bogged down with.
I liked the movie. I thought that the design and scale were spot on. I admit there were lots of WTFery, but I'm not going to let that spoil what I felt was otherwise a good movie. You're right about David, he was the most fully fleshed character. Everyone else (view spoiler). I don't think that was a casting issue though. I think it was a script issue. The only place that makes me pretty sad is with Vickers. I love Charlize Theron and feel that there could have been more there at the very least. (view spoiler)
I'll be picking up the DVD when it releases. :)
I think we should beg C J Cherryh to send Ridley Scott an initial script treatment for Promethiuses so he will have some idea on how to develop an intelligent alien species for us to come into conflict with.
The thing that really popped into my head for this was the fact that Prometheus, rather than being a definitive prequel to the Alien franchise, seems more like the set up to a definitive prequel franchise to the Alien franchise. This is partially because of the way that the answers are given, which are mostly in the "Lost" style of giving answers. Namely, it's the "our answers lead to more questions. Join us later for them" format of answering anything.Still though, the movie is really damned good, even with its flaws. I'm surprised that there were some of the people in the audience who walked out during the showing that I went to. Then again, they were probably expecting something as quickly paced as the trailer was rather than something that was as atmospheric and at a slow but tense pace as the original Alien.
Jonathan wrote: "rather than something that was as atmospheric and at a slow but tense pace as the original Alien. "in my opinion it wasnt even close to being as tense or atmospheric as alien. If it was i would have been delighted but it wasnt...
There's a reason the Prometheus crew is so effective at dealing with aliens: good training! :Dhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFYmv6...
I just saw the movie and really really enjoyed it. I understand why some people would have trouble with it but I don't find myself dwelling on any of the "issues" that some of us are finding with it. I actually really liked its open ended nature and the fact that not all the questions are answered. I didn't feel as if they were setting it up for a sequel. I also don't feel as if it was an actual "alien" prequel. I just really enjoyed it for what it was. Not what I thought it should have been.
Noomi Rapace: The Girl with the Alien Tattoo.
'Nuff Said!