Aliens

This movie is pretty awesome and a million times better than the first. I think it’s the best sequel I’ve ever seen.

We return to where we left off, with our heroine Ripley in hyper sleep after she escaped from the first film. Sorry if you haven’t seen it but you must know there’s a sequel and everyone knows that someone from the first film has to survive to continue to saga. Anyways, the first film was called Alien because there was just the one alien. This one is called Aliens because there is more than one. A whole lot more than one.

I’ll be honest, I got so wrapped up in this movie that I totally forgot to write notes so I only have a few but I’ll try to make up for it with my ending paragraph.

There is slightly more CGI in this than the first but its only for shots of the ships in space, not the aliens. Thank goodness they stuck with ‘real’ aliens and not CGI because I feel that them being real is what made them so terrifying.

Futuristic sets. 80s clothing. Hmmmm…

Its all 57years into the future. Suddenly we learn that Ripley had a daughter. I don’t like this part because there was no mention of a daughter in the first film [at least not what I could hear, which to be honest, wasn’t much] so I felt it was a bit forced to suddenly mention that Ripley was a mother. I say ‘was’ because its 57 years in the future and therefore her daughter is dead. I would care if I’d known in the first place but I didn’t so alas, I don’t. I suppose it builds the grounds for the Newt [the little girl] & Ripley bond which I think they could of easily done without the daughter part. Actually… now that I remember, I was watching the special edition so that included the deleted scenes into the movie and I think that was one of the deleted scenes. So it depends on what version you watch, though there’s only a 15 minute difference between both movies and the daughter scene was the only one I could think of that wasn’t needed.

The court scene was infuriating! I totally felt Ripley’s frustration as no one believed her story about the alien. She’s in ‘court’ because she blew up ‘an expensive piece of equipment’. I think this is a proper dig at the government and special businesses, they don’t care who died or what happened, they only care about the fact they lost millions of dollars worth of equipment. Even though there is a female in the court [aside from Ripley], the whole scene feels very male-orientated and Ripley is talked down to and patronized. However, this is also done by the woman so its not just the men’s fault. Anyways, Ripley can’t prove the alien is real because she blew up the evidence on the ship and blasted the alien into space. Its incredibly frustrating to the audience because we know! We saw it! I want to run into the scene and hand them the Alien DVD and go “HERE’S YOU BLOODY EVIDENCE YOU TWAT!”

Like I said before, the government or special business or something has created a living environment on the planet that the alien comes from, being fully aware that there are dangerous aliens on it. Twats.

Alien

Meh. I jumped a few times and the set is awesome but that’s about it. Its too slow for my liking.

For those who hadn’t figured out by the name, this movie is about people in space and an alien comes aboard and he’s not a friendly alien.

The opening credits are incredibly slow and boring. This turns out to be a recurring theme. The director tries to create tension with large scenes having no music and very little dialogue which is supposed to make us go “OMG didn’t see that coming!” when the alien appears but instead makes us go “finally, something’s happening…” which you really don’t want in a horror/thriller/thing. EDIT: However, after reading & replying to some comments on this post [thank you very much MYMHM, Geeky Fem, moviesandsongs365 and JOnKEnna for taking the time to comment!], I have learnt that the reason I have this view on the suspense scenes is because I was distracted by my brother’s texting [*smacks her brother*] and me and my mum talking to each other, trying to figure out what the characters are saying. So, I recommend you watch this movie in a setting and with people that are least likely to distract you. It will only work if your mind doesn’t wander and you don’t go up for a pee break.

The sound quality is terrible! Me and my mum can to explain to each other what we’d heard. We’d heard different things but managed to piece it all together in the end but most of what the actors say is inaudible.

You can tell this is a 70s film because a majority of the crew is smoking. No one is supposed to smoke in space! What the hell?! Also, mum pointed out that the black guy is always eating, which feeds to stereotype a little.

The cat did some great acting, though! Very good cat acting.

We analyzed some of the scenes in this movie in film studies so I kept pointing out to my mum about all the hidden ‘sex’ that was in this movie, like the fact the alien looks like a penis with teeth, the scientist guy gags the woman with a newspaper in a sexual way and its insinuated that the alien rapes one of the girls before killing her. However, this could just be my teacher reading into things too much but the fact the main lady at the end strips to her underwear does kind of prove my teacher’s theory.

The Year of Living Dangerously

Meh. Its pretty crap but it has some good moments or at least moments I could comment on.

The beginning narrator/Mel Gibson’s camera man sounds like someone from South Park. Then about half-way through watching the movie I was my brother’s taxi service and when I came back I had a look on Wikipedia about the movie and found out that Billy [the camera man] is played by a woman; Linda Hunt! She is fantastic, I didn’t think for one minute that Billy was portrayed by a woman. Hunt is brilliant and kind of what acting is all about; becoming someone else. I think I read somewhere that Hunt was the first woman to win an Oscar for playing a male character and she totally deserved that.

This seems to be the only movie ever were Mel Gibson actually looks good. He also sounds so different with the Australian accent. He’s still very hairy though. His arms are like gorilla arms.

Its horrible seeing what people in 3rd World Countries will do for money, then its even worse when you see the Western people actually pay them to be degraded.

I felt no connection to the any of the characters except Billy and the mother and child who he visits and gives money and food. Mel Gibson and Sigourney Weaver’s characters are just blegh. I just felt nothing towards them and their ‘love story’, it was just crap. I didn’t buy their ‘oh, we love each other but we can’t be together’ bullcrap. It was just crap!!! But, like I said, I felt a connection to the mother and child Billy sees and its so horrible because the poor child is really sick, probably because of their poor living conditions. I’ve said this a few times in my reviews that I love children so seeing this poor boy so ill was heartbreaking. I think that there is nothing worse than a dying child, especially when the death could be so easily avoided if they had money. I gave $2 out of my birthday money to a charity outside Wallmart today and the woman was so grateful and I smiled for hours. Watching this movie and seeing these poor people [especially children] in such poverty makes me so sad and yet so thankful that I am so blessed to be where I am now, that I have a computer, that I have food and water just down stairs and money in my bank account. This movie makes me want to help them. There was a clip where the people are fighting for rice and there are children eating rice off the floor and then in the next scene, Billy asks why the journalists don’t tell ‘the real story’. If you are reading this then please, please, PLEASE, be grateful for what you have. There are people out there who would kill to live in a house and have clean water and food. Whether you’ve broken up with your boyfriend or your best friend just betrayed you or something, just remember that there are worse things that could happen to you.

I thought it was good that they would have a scene based on the poverty then cut to the rich people and journalists having parties. The contrasts are horrible to watch because it’s the truth.

This movie will make you feel grateful for what you have, but aside from that, you’ll probably feel nothing. It’s a bit of a crap movie. I think the only reason it got onto Empire’s top 500 movies is because of the realistic portrayal of poverty [I think it was probably real footage] and Linda Hunt’s Academy Award winning performance.

63/212

Kate
xoxo