The Zen Kitchen

Alien

I don't really have a favorite genre of film. When I describe what kind of film I like, I generally tell people, "I like them either really smart, or really dumb." But, I do have to admit that very few movies can grab my attention like a really smart horror film. The problem being that this is an incredibly rare breed.

Alien is a part of that breed. Ridley Scott directed Alien in 1979 and made many stylistic choices atypical of your usual science fiction and horror film to push it a cut above the standard B-movie fare this could easily have become.

First, we have the alien itself. Its not some random creature which happens to attack our crew. Over the course of the movie we get to see it in great detail, while not actually "seeing" it for a large chunk of time in the film. We know about its biology, its life cycle, its temperament. We know that we essentially have an ultra-adaptable parasite with a temperament free of anything even remotely resembling a conscience. We don't see the final stage of the alien itself in all its glory for a long ways into the movie. This is a tried and true horror method of building up fear and suspense, but by the time we do finally see it, we are all the more terrified of it knowing where it came from, what it can do to us, and how it grows and develops.

Secondly, we have the crew itself. This isn't a group of gung-ho space army types, or prisoners or any of the long list of your usual bad ass heroes in heroines found in science fiction. These are essentially "truckers in space." We know these people. We talk with them and work with them every day. They argue about pay shares. They complain when asked to anything outside of what is specifically in their contract. They have a certain cameraderie while remembering that at the end of the day they have to look out for number one. And, when the crisis hits, they aren't action heroes who immediately know what to do. They fumble, they panic, but unlike typical horror panic, they still buckle down and do what it is they have to without completely freaking out.

One particularly brilliant choice made about our crew, is that there is no one stand-out hero. Everyone knows today, of course, that that position falls to Ripley. But, watching the film for the first time you have no idea that that would ultimately be the case. The more obvious choice at the start, in fact, would appear to be Dallas, or perhaps Ash. This is truly an ensemble, an ensemble you begin to like and appreciate each for their own separate qualities, and that is what makes it all the more horrific when each member of this ensemble is taken down one by one.

I saw somewhere that Ridley Scott had his actors ad-lib quite a few of the scenes, in particular the scene around the dinner table right after the captain is killed. I used to think that these scenes were examples of incredible acting, but now I know that they are examples of great directing. The actors don't know what they are going to say next, whose turn it is to speak. This makes the sense of real horror all the more real as the cast itself is fighting for screen time while also trying to make the conversation seem natural. It doesn't end up looking entirely natural, but it certainly does look like a group of people panicking and unsure what to do next.

Alien is not a completely original film. All the tricks pulled have been done before. But rarely have they all been used in one film, and never before or since had they been better done. Its truly a smart horror film that can evoke empathy, terror, and suspense without resorting to cheap tricks (too often, anyway) and stupid throw away characters and scenes. Alien does exactly that, and that's what makes it the best horror film of all time.

"Whenever he says *anything* you say "right," Brett, you know that?"
"Right."
"Parker, what do you think? Your staff just follows you around and says "right". Just like a regular parrot."
"[laughs] Yeah, shape up. What are you some kind of parrot?"
"Right."

posted by Shaun @ 4:13 PM