The Alien franchise has never really disappeared for long from movie screens. It’s surprising at just how long this series has lasted (and has been mostly good). However, I want to talk about a game, released in 2014, called Alien Isolation. It’s a straight up survival-horror game where you play the daughter of Ellen Ripley, looking for her mom. Her main obstacle in her mission is a singular xenomorph that hunts you the entire game. Every step and noise I made, came with a risk. The simplicity of a hungry hunter stalking me in an abandoned space station made it one of the most thrilling and tense games I’ve ever played. That simplicity in horror is when Alien is at its best.
I have a love/hate relationship with Prometheus and Alien: Covenant. They took such major swings and I couldn’t help but be excited for a weird conclusion. However, Disney bought Fox and killed off the potential those movies built. I was worried we’d get a milquetoast reboot of the series in a way that only Disney could produce. Then, director Fede Alvarez (Don’t Breathe, Evil Dead 2013) was brought on. His horror roots gave me promise for a potentially scary installment.
Essentially, that is exactly what we have now with Alien: Romulus. Alvarez, co-writing with Rodo Sayagues and Dan O’Bannon have created a movie that fits so well thematically and structurally between Alien and Aliens.
We follow our protagonists, Rain (Cailee Spaeny) and Andy (David Jonnson) as they seek to escape from their life on a mining planet and are reluctantly recruited to steal supplies from a abandoned space station and find a better life elsewhere. Clearly the station is abandoned for reasons, but the crew they’re with have never seen a movie, nor have proper judgment.
I don’t really need to list off any of the crew. They’re one-dimensional cannon fodder that purposely fall into every horror movie trope. Well, obviously things go wrong on the station and these young criminals have to run for their lives at every sign of danger.
No one will ever be able to match the legacy of Sigourney Weaver (from the originals), but the series purposely passes the torch to the final girl of the moment. Cailee Spaeny (Civil War) does a serviceable job in the role and is a worthy opponent to the terrors she faces, but her story is extremely weak. Her best moments all have to do with her traveling companion Andy. Jonnson owns every scene he’s in and gets to stretch his talent beyond the fear and confusion that most characters show when placed in these situations.
I mentioned the game, Alien Isolation for a reason earlier. I don’t intend this to be a slam against the movie, but rather a credit. Romulus is at its best when it feels like a video game. By that, I mean it’s inventive in its horror. It feels dangerous, but somehow fun at the same time.
There’s a ticking clock situation that brings constant anxiety for the characters. They are surrounded by threats, from the facehuggers, the xenomorph, planetary gravity, and secret agendas from without. Those dangers in a two hour movie, make this experience feel tight. Much has been said about an insane third act. And truly, it is insane. I was fully on board. The movie goes from a simple alien cat and mouse game to a straight up horror flick that’s meant to disturb viewers. I was happily along for the ride.
Alien: Romulus isn’t perfect. Most of the characters are only there to get killed off and help with the pacing. It gets cheesy when it panders to fans of the better movies. Yet, this will have so much replay value and potentially only get better over time. The action is thrilling, the set design is perfect, the horror (even jump scares) is effective. It may never be Alien or Aliens, but in this case, third place is still really good. B+
Comments are closed.