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Xenomrph posted:The grim, dour tone was intentional, though. The problem is that it's not necessarily what audiences coming off the fist-pumping high of 'Aliens' were expecting, or looking for. Oh I know. And I wasn't trying to characterize it as a problem. The Assembly Cut version, at least, was a stimulating and intense film and pretty darn good from my perspective. Its thoughtfulness is much more apparent on the surface than that of Aliens, too.
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Sep 27, 2016 15:32
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Neo Rasa posted:This is a pretty valid description of the theatrical cut. I dunno, it doesn't really feel anything like a slasher movie. if you wanted to be disparaging, comparing it to one of those Jaws-knockoff killer animal movies like Grizzly or Orca feels more apt.
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Sep 27, 2016 19:12
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:I dunno, it doesn't really feel anything like a slasher movie. Cujo would be a better analogy. There's a reason why the alien bursts from man's best friend and is terrorizing the one woman on a planet full of men.
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Sep 27, 2016 19:45
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:I dunno, it doesn't really feel anything like a slasher movie. The point was a bunch of identical white guys and Malcolm X in space being killed in dull ways in the dark is more like a slasher film than the high quality first two movies.
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Sep 27, 2016 19:52
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504 posted:The point was a bunch of identical white guys and Malcolm X in space being killed in dull ways in the dark is more like a slasher film than the high quality first two movies. but slasher films usually have women and people getting killed in not-dull ways. like the point of most of the Friday the 13th movies is to see how many different weapons and techniques he can use to kill sexy young people. Alien 3 is a bunch of extremely unsexy bald old guys (and one woman, who's deliberately desexualized) being eaten by a monster. John Carpenter's The Thing would probably be a closer comparison also, but then critics hated that one when it came out too. edit: hell, for that matter, the original Alien hews closer to a slasher movie mold than any of them. It even ends with a protracted sequence of the killer squaring off with the young female lead after she strips down to her underwear. Uncle Boogeyman fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Sep 27, 2016 |
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Sep 27, 2016 20:02
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ruddiger posted:Cujo would be a better analogy. There's a reason why the alien bursts from man's best friend and is terrorizing the one woman on a planet full of men. Ehh I'm not sure on that analogy - the Alien kinda murders the poo poo out of everyone equally except for Ripley, which it specifically refuses to kill. Then again I've never seen/read Cujo, does the dog do the same thing? And yeah, 'Alien' absolutely draws from slasher/monster movie tropes, one of the reasons /it's remembered as fondly as it is is because of the way it bucked some of those tropes (coupled with the fantastic production values and great, believable acting).
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Sep 27, 2016 20:23
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Cujo attacks the woman but the story is about her protecting her son - you never feel her in danger as much as her not being able to get her son out of the situation. And everyone killed in Cujo is male, specifically, with Dee Wallace's character being the only woman around (the other leaves on vacation or to see a family member pretty much immediately).
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Sep 27, 2016 20:38
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:but slasher films usually have women and people getting killed in not-dull ways. like the point of most of the Friday the 13th movies is to see how many different weapons and techniques he can use to kill sexy young people. Alien 3 is a bunch of extremely unsexy bald old guys (and one woman, who's deliberately desexualized) being eaten by a monster. Oh good lord. In slasher films a bunch of unremarkable completely interchangeable uninteresting persons "there to be killed" are killed. Just like the 98 bald dudes in brown. That's the comparison. Also, the comment is "this is more like a slasher film than a character driven Alien film" not "This is exactly like a Friday the 13th movie in every way shape and form" The critics still hate the original release of A3. Its only been redeemed by the AC. (Critics including everyone that saw it, which is a fairly legit point by now I think)
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Sep 28, 2016 00:55
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504 posted:Oh good lord. In slasher films a bunch of unremarkable completely interchangeable uninteresting persons "there to be killed" are killed. Just like the 98 bald dudes in brown. That's the comparison. Also, the comment is "this is more like a slasher film than a character driven Alien film" not "This is exactly like a Friday the 13th movie in every way shape and form" It's not a good comparison. About the only thing they have in common is a body count, and like I said, Alien has way more in common with slasher movies than Alien 3. I don't know if you have the review handy, but it feels like something included less to make a cogent point and more because it makes a good snarky one-liner and the Friday the 13th movies were film critics' favorite whipping boy at the time.
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Sep 28, 2016 01:06
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:It's not a good comparison. About the only thing they have in common is a body count, and like I said, Alien has way more in common with slasher movies than Alien 3. I saw Alien 3 in theaters the day it came out and me literally everyone on earth that I ever spoke to about it regardless of age or walk of life was like "there wasn't a lot going on it was just a bunch of bald people running around in the dark like a lovely slasher flick" like basically this exact sentance. This is a totally valid way to think of theatrical Alien 3, it's like The Dead Pit or Death Machine or Halloween 5 or a bunch of other lovely quasi-prison/horror movies of the time where a bunch of indistinct characters are gathered in a decrepit shithole with a non-existant script and a thing systematically kills them off. It's surprising to me that anyone would think this is a particularly off the wall thing to take away from theatrical Alien 3, especially when crap slasher flicks of all kinds were around en masse then and that's what the movie is most like the minute the funeral scene ends. I'd say it's even worse than those actually because half the surviving cast just sort of vanishes after the plan fails in the theatrical version. Without the excellent cast it would be indistinguishable from Mutant or whatever. The theatrical cut is literally a half-baked Alien ripoff. Are there any other movies like that actually where it's an inarguable a night and day difference from theatrical release to alternate release? Kingdom of Heaven maybe.
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Sep 28, 2016 01:34
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Neo Rasa posted:Are there any other movies like that actually where it's an inarguable a night and day difference from theatrical release to alternate release? Kingdom of Heaven maybe. I don't feel nearly as strongly as you do about the difference between versions of Alien 3 (depending on my mood, I might even prefer the theatrical cut), but, Blade Runner. Uncle Boogeyman fucked around with this message at 01:44 on Sep 28, 2016 |
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Sep 28, 2016 01:41
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drat I feel like and am a huge dumbass for forgetting Blade Runner. The Final Cut is incredible (even from someone whose favorite movie ever was the 90s director's cut until the final cut came out).
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Sep 28, 2016 01:51
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:It's not a good comparison. About the only thing they have in common is a body count, and like I said, Alien has way more in common with slasher movies than Alien 3. This was a pre-internet time and was a fairly common way people were putting it. Alien was literally described as a "haunted house in space" but it didn't just have a bunch of nameless same looking people running around screaming before being killed off to the sadness and fear of absolutely no one. When Alien arrived there was one Friday the 13th, by the time Alien 3 arrived there were fricken EIGHT of them (and god knows how many other knock offs), all full of nameless, exactly the same people being killed in the dark. Use the first Alien as an example, How many people that died in that movie can you name? How about the first Friday? Not to mention we had 5/6 years of teasers telling us that this time the Alien would be chowin' down on earth!! We were all expecting a super action Alien shoot fest.. Aliens jacked up to 10!! We got one goofy looking Alien, a bunch of nobodies, a plot hole ridden mess that somehow crawled out of the development hell abortion bucket.
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Sep 28, 2016 04:42
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504 posted:Use the first Alien as an example, How many people that died in that movie can you name? Kane, Dallas, Brett, Parker, Lambert, Ash kinda... am I forgetting anyone? That was all off the top of my head, I've seen Alien way too many times.  quote:How about the first Friday? uh... Alice is one of them I think?
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Sep 28, 2016 04:47
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Ash was framed imo
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Sep 28, 2016 04:57
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I'm curious as to how many other people were certain that Ripley would survive Alien 3 and they'd figure out a way to remove/kill the chestburster. My dad let me and my brother marathon the trilogy when I was all of 6, and the fact she suicided into a smelting pit/furnace completely blew my idiot child mind. I was just dumbfounded that the only guy to survive was some rando prisoner. Then again, the thing I remember most clearly was that we had to stop the movie because I got upset and started crying when the chestburster was coming out of the dog. And though it's only kinda related to the Alien franchise there's (or was) a documentary about HR Giger up on Netflix. It talks a bit about his work on the xenomorph designs, and is pretty cool. His house decorations were kind of horrifying though. But he had a little train set up in his back yard 
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Sep 28, 2016 06:56
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504 posted:Ash was framed imo He could build a complete working metal hand but when he went back to the real world he could only land a job at the S-Mart.
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Sep 28, 2016 10:10
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504 posted:Not to mention we had 5/6 years of teasers telling us that this time the Alien would be chowin' down on earth!! We were all expecting a super action Alien shoot fest.. Aliens jacked up to 10!! This sounds like a personal problem. "I don't care about a bunch of forgotten prisoners dying horribly" is some interesting metacommentary though. Uncle Boogeyman fucked around with this message at 13:12 on Sep 28, 2016 |
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Sep 28, 2016 13:10
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So basically It all comes back to Ridley Scott.
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Sep 28, 2016 15:23
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:This sounds like a personal problem.
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Sep 28, 2016 15:26
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david_a posted:Oh come on, that's not exactly a unique opinion. The build up to the movie was blatantly misleading because Fox had no idea what they were doing for most of the development. Expectations play an enormous role in how a film is received - see Prometheus as a modern example. It's still not a problem with the movie, it's a problem with the commercials for the movie. If you can't get over an ad campaign 10+ years later I dunno what to tell you. Plus, so many of those complaints seem to boil down to "I'm upset that it wasn't Aliens again," but one of the things I love about the trilogy is how each one is such a unique directorial vision. I think it's dope that they feel like they could've come from three different franchises. Uncle Boogeyman fucked around with this message at 15:34 on Sep 28, 2016 |
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Sep 28, 2016 15:30
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Slasher movies kill archetypes, which is a distinct difference from the death in Alien 3. You might not know the characters' names in a Friday the 13th, but you remember that the horny guy/nerd/jock/"slut"/whatever dies, and remember how they were killed. Alien and Aliens come far closer to this than 3, especially Aliens. 3 doesn't do too much with archetypes besides Mr. Aaron and Dutton's characters - the rest of the cast is drawn from different lines
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Sep 28, 2016 16:15
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The best part of Alien 3 is the guy from Doctor Who going crazy and trying to help the alien imo
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Sep 28, 2016 16:45
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Understandably Alien fans in the 90s were unable to appreciate that subplot much.  I actually like the assembly cut Alien 3, Alien, and Aliens equally. I think that, visually its influence is often understated, I'd argue it's one of the movies that basically ushered in the look many of us would think of when we think "90s movie." But my hatred of the theatrical version wasn't because "where are the guns" or "OMG Newt," I had fun with it when it came out along with everyone else I knew. But it was enjoyed the same way you "enjoy" any of those other examples and crap slasher flicks of the time, seen once to kill time on a slow weekend and forgotten. Its visually unforgettable to me, but the rest of it being what it is makes is a joke compared to any version of Alien or Aliens. But seeing the assembly cut years later really makes you see how much the thematic heart of the movie was ripped out of it to get it released in theaters, and the entire theatrical version is unfocused crap because of it no matter how nice it looks.
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Sep 28, 2016 18:03
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Neo Rasa posted:Understandably Alien fans in the 90s were unable to appreciate that subplot much. Not that this contradicts your point, but I think the 90's look you're talking about is more of a Fincher thing than specifically an Alien 3 thing. I think Fincher more than any other filmmaker aside from maybe Michael Bay has helped to define the typical "look" of a modern American movie. Its been refined since the 90's but I don't think its really changed all that much in the 2000's.
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Sep 28, 2016 18:08
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Basebf555 posted:Not that this contradicts your point, but I think the 90's look you're talking about is more of a Fincher thing than specifically an Alien 3 thing. I think Fincher more than any other filmmaker aside from maybe Michael Bay has helped to define the typical "look" of a modern American movie. Its been refined since the 90's but I don't think its really changed all that much in the 2000's. It's another reason that I think nobody appreciated it until after Seven.
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Sep 28, 2016 18:13
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Basebf555 posted:Not that this contradicts your point, but I think the 90's look you're talking about is more of a Fincher thing than specifically an Alien 3 thing. I think Fincher more than any other filmmaker aside from maybe Michael Bay has helped to define the typical "look" of a modern American movie. Its been refined since the 90's but I don't think its really changed all that much in the 2000's. This is true of course, but even before Seven I think you can definitely see the effects of Alien 3 even in some stuff we take for granted like how comic book/sci-fi stuff started having a ton of dutch angles again. This could be an interesting topic itself, like what were the movies that came out around 1989~1992 that ended up having the most influence on 90s TV and cinema. Alien 3, The Killer,* Hard Boiled, Terminator 2, what else? *EVERYONE I show this movie to for the first time thinks it was made in like 1994 and not the late 80s. Neo Rasa fucked around with this message at 19:21 on Sep 28, 2016 |
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Sep 28, 2016 19:13
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:This sounds like a personal problem. I like that your defense has come down to "Its your fault for believing the advertising" and then some strange leap to "You don't mind prisoners dying you are clearly bad" I've tried to explain why people hated this movie, why critics bashed it and why it generated bad feelings, but every single answer you give boils down to "No, I liked it, therefore everyone else is wrong" So.. Alien 3 is complete poo poo. The AC is much better, but if you enjoyed the original release, you are an idiot.
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Sep 28, 2016 20:00
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504 posted:I like that your defense has come down to "Its your fault for believing the advertising" and then some strange leap to "You don't mind prisoners dying you are clearly bad" You are very weird
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Sep 28, 2016 20:01
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504 posted:Alien 3 is complete poo poo. The AC is much better, but if you enjoyed the original release, you are an idiot. I enjoyed the theatrical release, but I am Xenomrph, and quite possibly an idiot. Seriously though, while the AC is better overall, there are certain things I prefer in the theatrical cut.
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Sep 28, 2016 20:07
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What I was getting at with the prisoner thing is that a big part of the movie is the idea that this time the Alien attack is happening to a bunch of the lowest members of society out in the rear end-end of nowhere and they're completely on their own. It's another way of scaling up the bleakness, because if the company doesn't care about a spaceship crew or a platoon of marines, they really don't care about a bunch of prison inmates. So yeah, one of the primary complaints about the movie being "I don't care about a bunch of no-name prison inmates" is kind of an interesting reflection of that. It's also another reason the Friday the 13th comparisons don't really hold water to me, those movies are specifically about a bunch of pretty young people, you won't find a single one about a bunch of gross bald British dudes. The movie is very much about undesirables' place in the world and how they're shunted away by society. That's deepened in the extended cut, but it's still right there on the surface in the theatrical cut.
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Sep 28, 2016 20:15
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I guess I'm desensitized or maybe this makes me a bad person, but I've seen so many movies where scores of people are killed who don't deserve it, and the bottom line is that yes I need the characters to be more clearly defined as individuals more than they are in Alien 3 if I'm going to care about them.
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Sep 28, 2016 20:24
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Basebf555 posted:I guess I'm desensitized or maybe this makes me a bad person, but I've seen so many movies where scores of people are killed who don't deserve it, and the bottom line is that yes I need the characters to be more clearly defined as individuals more than they are in Alien 3 if I'm going to care about them. Nah I get that. For me I think in large part it's the unique setting that makes the figures within it more interesting. Like, the prison warden in Alien 3 is so unlike the typical prison warden you see in these stories. I love the way the whole society of the prison has seemingly evolved to suit its ignored, ugly place in the universe. Another interesting aspect of it is how the alien arriving almost gives them a purpose. Like, this weird apocalyptic sect actually gets the apocalypse they've been waiting for. Again, this is deepened in the extended cut, but it's still there in the theatrical cut. The furnace dying out in the end while the score reaches its zenith is a spine-tingling moment. Man I love Alien 3.
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Sep 28, 2016 20:30
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:Another interesting aspect of it is how the alien arriving almost gives them a purpose. Like, this weird apocalyptic sect actually gets the apocalypse they've been waiting for. I do like that aspect of the movie actually, you get the sense that at least a few of these guys are just happy that the crushing boredom and monotony is finally coming to an end.
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Sep 28, 2016 20:33
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Yeah, the whole foundry comes back to life just to help kill the alien in the end. The alien landing woke the whole colony out from its coma. The residents were all essentially already dead, as far as them selves and greater society were concerned. Killing the alien let them be alive and accomplish something, and finally put the whole planet out of its misery.
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Sep 28, 2016 21:17
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Baronjutter posted:Yeah, the whole foundry comes back to life just to help kill the alien in the end. The alien landing woke the whole colony out from its coma. The residents were all essentially already dead, as far as them selves and greater society were concerned. Killing the alien let them be alive and accomplish something, and finally put the whole planet out of its misery. But did it really? To build on that, I think the key thing we're forgetting here is that the guys on the planet are not prisoners. They voluntarily stayed behind, like monks in the countryside, so that society couldn't corrupt their spiritual journey to enlightenment. The alien is an agent of escalation, but to say that it put them out of their misery is akin to saying we should put poors and undesirables out of their misery because their lifestyle doesn't jive with conventional standards (an extreme example, but you get what I'm saying). I think it's more a commentary on how isolated societies can't achieve enlightenment, because true enlightenment comes from learning and understanding the world, ne, universe around you, which you can't do when you're shut off from everything else. Charles S. Dutton has to "reteach" some of the brothers after their failed assault on Ripley in the junkyard. He doesn't lock them up or put them out of their misery, he tries to bring them back in God's graces (and does, which is even more evident in the Assembly Cut, as it's the lead rapist who sacrifices himself to trap the alien in the vaults below). The third act is them realizing that their self-imposed isolation isn't the way to be truly saved, it's to face the unknowns of the universe head-on, death be damned. The outcome (death) is the same whether they act or just sit around and do nothing (like they've been doing the past however many years) in the grand scheme of things, but they find themselves and their salvation in confronting the unknown, no matter the outcome. There's something there too, with how the Alien is brought to the planet by basically the Butterfly Effect, which is pretty much saying "hide all you want, the universe will eventually find you." ruddiger fucked around with this message at 23:00 on Sep 28, 2016 |
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Sep 28, 2016 22:51
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Theyre still prisoners they just requested to stay instead of getting relocated to another prison. Thats why the warden and 85 and the doc are still there.
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Sep 29, 2016 03:10
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I thought the prisoners came to an understanding that they were just bad people and to me it seemed they found Christianity or some other future space religion. And that's why they were staying out there.
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Sep 29, 2016 04:12
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Aaron mentions them all having life sentences and Andrews wants them all in lockup after the funeral so yeah still prisoners. I doubt either Andrews or 85 would be there and I doubt WY would still be sending supply ships if they were free.
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Sep 29, 2016 04:43
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I always got the impression the prison was kept baaaaarely technically functional just to keep an active claim on the planet just in case it ever became commercially viable again. It's probably cheaper for them to keep the prison supplied than to pay and properly supply a minimal staff.
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Sep 29, 2016 04:47
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