Alien

Alternate titles : None

Tagline : "In Space, no one can hear you scream"

It's hard to believe that this classic Sci-Fi / Horror, starring a then unknown Sigourney Weaver, came out way back in 1979 and that they're still making sequels and spin-offs to it to this day.

Set in the farthest regions of outer space, aboard the space freighter the "Nostromo". The crew are awoken from hypersleep prematurely, when their ships computer picks up a distress beacon from a crashed ship on a nearby planet.

Heading down to the planet in their shuttle, they find the wreckage of an ancient space craft. The cargo hold appearing to be full of giant "eggs". But when one of the crew, Kane (John Hurt), decides to have a closer look at one of them, he gets a nasty surprise, as he stoops down and a creature bursts out and attaches itself to his face.

Efforts to remove the slimy "facehugger" creature fail, as it has acid for blood and so they can not amputate its legs. Eventually though, the creature detaches itself and appears to die. All seems well, Kane regains consciousness, none the worse for his ordeal, and the crew prepare to return to their hypersleep chambers.

But then, as they sit down for a last meal, Kane starts convulsing violently. As the crew try to hold him down, his chest explodes and an Alien creature bursts out from within him (blood everywhere). One quick funeral later, and the hunt is on to find the alien. Unfortunately, the small creature that emerged from Kane's chest isn't so small any more, much to the dismay of crewman Brett (poor old Harry Dean Stanton) who becomes the first victim.

And so the scene is set for a battle to the death, as the crew prepare to fight for their lives. There are some really great suspense scenes, particularly when captain Dallas (Tom Skerrit) meets his demise in the ventilation shaft, and when the creature sneaks up on Parker and Lambert, (Yaphet Kotto and Veronica Cartwright) when they're trying to abandon ship.

Directed by Ridley Scott, the film is a definite "must see" for all horror and sci-fi fans alike. If you haven't seen it yet, where have you been? You also get to see a young Sigourney Weaver being chased around the shuttle in just her underwear, so what more excuse do you need?

Overall Marks : 9/10.

Terrifying Trivia

• Swiss artist H.R.Giger was asked to design the original Alien and Facehugger creatures after writer Dan O'Bannen saw some of his works at an exhibition in Paris. However, the iconic Chestburster was created and built by special effects designer Derek Meddings, based on a thumbnail sketch by director Ridley Scott. Apparently Giger's original sketch of the chestburster looked like a giant, bald, demented, turkey, and the director hated it, so they came up with their own version.
• Over 130 eggs were created out of plaster for the scene in the egg chamber.
• Several scenes were cut from the film prior to release. These included, Ripley asking Lambert if she'd ever slept with Ash. A longer take of Kane waking from hypersleep, then making breakfast for the rest of the crew. Part of a scene with the crew listening to Parker over the headset, who's cornered the Alien but before he can flush it out the airlock someone sounds an alarm and scares it off. Additional scenes of dialogue between Brett and Parker and a scene showing Ripley finding Dallas still alive, but cocooned for safe keeping in a scene similar to that used in Aliens. These can be found as extras on various special edition DVD and Blu-Ray releases.
• The Alien creature was played by 25 year old Nigerian born student Bolaji Badejo, who was studying in London, when the producers, quite literally, bumped into him in a pub. Being almost 7ft tall, with long spindley arms and legs, the producers thought he would be the ideal body type for the creature, so they just went up and asked him if he wanted to be in a horror film.
• The laser beams, creating a field of light over the top of the eggs in the chamber, were borrowed from Rock Band "The Who", who were testing out their stage equipment in a neighbouring studio.
• Sigourney Weaver was an unknown theatre actress when she auditioned for the film and was the only cast member who wasn't already an established film actor. In fact she wasn't even that bothered about a career in film, being more focussed on her theatre work at the time and almost didn't go to the audition. Fortunately, the film makers wanted to cast an unknown for the role after being spurred on by the success of Star Wars, which featured all relative unknowns in the lead roles. She eventually got the part after Ridley Scott showed her screen test to all the women at his office and they liked her performance the best.
• Veronica Cartwright's reaction to the Chestburster scene was not staged, the cast were not aware of how much blood as going to spray out during the scene and the shot of her screaming in terror after getting hit in the face with blood was geniune shock.
• Writer Dan O'Bannon reportedly fell out with Ridley Scott on the set of the film over changes he had made to his script. As a result, the director and producers refused to give him proper credit for the success of the film.

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