Aliens

After the success of the 1979 sci-fi horror film, Alien, plans of a sequel were put into talks almost immediately, but it took a lot longer than expected to get off the ground. Not only was there a lot of push back from 20th Century Fox, who feared the risks of another Alien film weren’t worth the cost, but considering how revolutionary Alien was with how it showcased the sci-fi genre in a gritty and disturbing light (which hadn’t really been done before in a large-scale way), managing to produce that same level of quality again while still being different, would’ve been incredibly challenging. After a long period of debate, the film was eventually given a chance with relatively newcomer director, James Cameron, taking over the reins and bringing his own spin to this space tale after his surprise success with the 1984 film, The Terminator. The results were more than worth the risk, with Aliens becoming one of the highest grossing movies of 1986 (earning a rough estimate of about $183.3 million against a $18.5 million budget), and while some critics were divided on its excessive violence, the film is nowadays seen as one of the greatest action films ever made and even in some ways superior to the original. 57 years after the events of the first film, Ellen Ripley (played again by Sigourney Weaver) is found and rescued from her stasis pod, yet no one within the corporation she works for believes her account about an alien creature wiping out her old team. Before she has time to grieve the realization that her past life (and the people within it) is now gone, Ripley is cruelly called back into action by a representative of the Weyland-Yutani Corporation, Carter Burke (played by Paul Reiser), who asks if she can assist a team of military soldiers who are going down to investigate why one of the newly established colonies (which was built on the same exomoon Ripley’s crew found the Xenomorph eggs on in the first place) has lost contact. Agreeing only on the condition that they plan to eradicate any specimen they find, Ripley travels to this now inhabited moon to discover along with the marines that all the colonists outside of a young girl named Newt (played by Carrie Hehn) have been wiped out, with the cause of that slaughter being all too familiar to Ripley. With stellar action, amazing visuals that manage to be both gritty and flashy, a wonderfully told and engaging story, and fantastic acting, Aliens added onto the first film in such a great meaningful way that it resulted in a movie that offers up high-octane, blood pumping action, yet contains enough dramatic weight and heart to help it last the test of time.

With Cameron and his collaborative partner and producer girlfriend, Gale Ane Hurd, spearheading a lot of this film due to Fox’s unwillingness to comply with seemingly basic requests like a decent budget and even keeping Ripley as the leading character, this movie had so many troubles bubbling under the surface including Cameron’s inexperience and overly determined attitude often conflicting with the crew behind the camera, which resulted in several walk-outs and firings. With this in mind, you can’t really feel this when watching the movie as it seems to flow perfectly together in such a strong manner. Since the first film had a plot that was mostly kept bare minimum and relied on its creepy atmosphere, premise, and production value to suck people in, this movie’s narrative handled by Cameron along with David Giler and Walt Hill, does roughly the same idea, just with enough new tweaks and additions to make it feel like a proper advancement, which could be said for every component of this film. Going from a secluded spaceship with a bunch of space truckers being picked off by a singular creature, to an entire fleet of marines having to fend off an army of these extraterrestrial beasts, is a great elevation to the threat, tension and even spectacle, of this idea, providing more opportunities to show these creatures off and even allowing them the chance to take part in big action sequences without losing their expected creepiness. With Cameron at the helm and writing the script, the film is definitely a lot more of an action film than a horror flick, and everything from the way the characters interact, to the look and sound of the production, to even the pace and flow of the story, gets that point across. However, much like how Terminator still had this intimidating slasher-esque vibe to what was otherwise a sci-fi action film, Aliens still houses a sense of dread and fear underneath its gritty harshness to not feel like a completely different (or ‘alien’) package. The engagement level for this film in general is improved upon, as it constantly builds and adds onto itself before concluding on a climax that is insanely entertaining, enthralling and cements this film as a staple film for the genre. The dialogue is blunt and not the most creative, but works in delivering what the movie is trying to get across, the screenplay is also fairly brisk and to the point, but does a good job mapping out the world they live in as well as almost redo the first film in a light that doesn’t just feel like sloppy seconds, all the actors and characters are wonderfully realized, the action scenes can be close-quarters and filmed in a shaky manner but never feels dull and annoying to watch, and even though Cameron has in more recent years fallen off in terms of bringing quality material to his films outside of the technology, he really knew how to handle an action film back in the day and make it grand, epic, and incredibly human.

What this film does leagues better than the first film is how it handles its characters. While the first film was very clever in orchestrating the situation to be about a group of people that don’t get along trying to survive this threat, they weren’t people you really remembered outside of their actors and how they ironically did good at having poor chemistry with each other, whereas here, this cast is just oozing charisma and it results in almost every character of focus leaving a memorable impression. You get an idea of every person’s motivation, drive, and overall identity without a lot of dialogue, which comes from how they are designed, the actions that they do, and particularly how they are performed, as every actor in this movie is incredibly strong. It’s honestly presented how a good horror film should be; introducing you to a cast of characters that you want to get to know more about and feel bad when they die throughout the course of the film. Sigourney Weaver was already made famous for her role as Ripley in the first film, but her evolution from survivor to proper action heroine in this follow-up is incredibly well-handled. Weaver has that great balance of being able to play reserved and controlled with a frantic underside to her, but she really shines as a woman who can get stuff done and isn’t going to be held back by fear or dumb orders. Her connection with the other characters, particularly Newt, is very sweet and nicely realized and it feels like a shame that Weaver never managed to get another role as strong as Ripley because most studios weren’t willing to do a female-led action film. Carrie Hehn as Newt can have an odd delivery at times (like she’s juggling between British and American in random sentences), but it’s not too noticeable and her connection with Ripley is pretty nice, Michael Biehn has very strong chemistry with Weaver and despite minimal screen time, is a likeable face to be around, Lance Henriksen as another synthetic android that Ripley is skeptical of is a small but memorable role, Bill Paxton should come off as annoying as his role of Hudson (which in some areas, he kind of does), but he’s a role that you almost like to be annoyed by in a weird short of way, Paul Reiser plays a very easily hateable character by the end of the film, but up until that point, he blended in pretty nicely, Jenette Goldstein might awkwardly be doing brown-face in this film, but her acting is pretty solid and the character of Vasquez is pretty cool, and even most of the other marines played by William Hope, Ricco Ross, Al Matthews, Mark Rolston, Daniel Kash, Tip Tipping, Trevor Steedman, Colette Hiller and Cynthia Dale Scott are all acted in a very believable manner.

The look of the film has typical Cameron-ism that you would normally see in his other films, but it still really works in making this environment feel claustrophobic and isolated, but also weary and lived in, which can be said for the world in general. The conceptual design for Alien helmed by Rob Cob was already a great visual design that brought this ethereal essence to an animalistic species, and the sequel further establishes and builds upon this personality, with most of the interior set and production design by Peter Lamont and Crispian Sallis giving the environment a feeling of rustic futurism; a world that feels technologically advanced and features a lot of fancy tech and gadgets, but still has a retro industrial quality to it that takes the hollow polish away from would could be a sterile environment, and makes it feel genuine. It really matches with the aggressive vibe the film is presenting, and while the grotesque alien horror is not as prominent this time around, with former designer for the Aliens, H. R. Giger, being unable to return for the sequel, his replacement in special-effects creator, Stan Winston, still does a great job at bringing that imposing, unnatural look to these creatures. Due to the bigger budget and enough confidence from Fox, they have the ability to show off so many more of these creatures in better quality, which leads to more opportunities for scares, thrills, and even an alien queen for a final boss (which is just a marvel to look at from an effects standpoint). The way the cinematography by Adrian Biddle enhances the action in certain portions by providing an almost first-person viewpoint, is very effective, making a lot of the action feel very up close and personal and forces you to feel the tense mayhem present whenever one of these monsters are nearby. The musical score by James Horner is strangely not very present throughout most of the movie (more than likely due to Horner only being given three weeks to create a score without much context on the film he was composing for), but when it picks up during the climax and bigger moments, it still gets the expected point across.

Aliens is one heck of a fantastic movie and even if it didn’t have the easiest ride to completion, most people nowadays view it as one of the greatest action films of all time as well as one of the greatest sequels of all time, so it was definitely worth it in the end. You’d expect a film that goes from a slow-pace, tense, and shockingly disturbing sci-fi horror film to a high-flying, blood-pumping action shoot-em-up flick, to be a jarring transition, yet it never comes across like that and instead acts as a wonderful evolution of the Alien brand (one that would only continue to be assaulted as each new movie came out). It has a great pace, wonderfully simple yet clear writing, an effective premise, strong visuals, and an incredibly likeable cast that makes even usually unlikeable people very enjoyable to watch. A breed that seemed to evolve from hunting its prey through lying in wait, to viciously devouring it in a frantic scramble, this follow up is definitely a worthy successor.