Review of Alien Resurrection (1997) by Jh K — 11 Oct 2012

*1/2 out of ****.

Ripley (Sigourney Weaver), the heroine of the "Alien" franchise, just can't seem to catch a break. At the end of the pretty-much-terrible "Alien 3" - the first bad movie of the series - we thought she had died, only to learn right from the beginning of "Resurrection" that she's literally been resurrected from the dead. In my opinion, Ripley died at the end of "Aliens", since that's where they should have just stopped it. Neither of the films that followed did anything for her initially fascinating character of the universe that all these wonderful people had once come together to collectively create. Just like its predecessor, "Alien: Resurrection" is nothing more than a cash-in brought to us by a talented director, this time Frenchman Jean-Pierre Jeunet of "Delicatessen" and "Amelie", whose distinctive craftsmanship seems to have been lost in translation.

The plot picks up approximately two hundred years after "Alien 3". The reincarnation of Ripley was made possible by blood samples taken just before her death by military scientists (headed by General Perez, played by Dan Hedaya) aboard the vessel USM Auriga. As one might remember, Ripley had a nasty little alien embryo growing inside her at the time of death; and the scientists (one of them played by the illusive Brad Dourif) are able to successfully remove it. However, Ripley will never be the same again. She's somewhat of a human-alien hybrid now; with a different set of skills and an even closer/deeper connection to the extraterrestrial beasts that not once, but thrice now have killed off everyone relatively close to her.

The scientists have kidnapped several human beings who were in stasis to be body hosts for the eggs of the facehuggers. They want to conduct an experiment; grow a few Xenomorphs of their own to try and train and stuff. Ripley assures them that this won't be possible and that her concerns about how they might react to such attempts could prove fatal are more or less irrational. After all, the ship is filled with varied talents; such as mercenaries Call (Winona Ryder) and Johner (Ron Perlman) and the disabled mechanic played by Jeunet-regular Dominique Pinon. But we know better to assume that the Xenomorphs will take kindly to staying locked up inside a glass cage for too long. Remember; the bastards have got acid blood.

And that's where "Resurrection" becomes yet another mindless by-the-numbers slasher pic set in space. It's not really that much different from "Alien 3". It annoys me in a variety of different ways; although both films annoyed me immensely nonetheless. The problem I have with "Resurrection" can be traced back to my absolute adoration for Jeunet's work that came before and followed, respectively. He's made some wonderful, fairy-tale like films and I'll say the same of him as I did of Fincher; if the studio had given both men the freedom to do so, they could have done something interesting with this material. It seems as if the studio let Jeunet have more control over his project than they ever let Fincher have, but his style simply does not work here. He creates a few stunning images, collects the paycheck, and then just gets up and leaves; no shits given.

This is too good looking a film to dismiss entirely. In some areas, it's significantly less "dull" per se than "Alien 3"; and there are a few stellar sequences, like the underwater one. But for every good thing about "Alien: Resurrection", there's at least a dozen that are absolute shit. Jeunet's visual style feels over-indulgent and excessive, the CGI effects are TERRIBLE, the new characters are all disposable stereotypes, the attempts at humor are for the most part pretty damn horrid, the acting is even worse, and the whole thing just feels like it was fucked over by the studio. I like some of the gore, I like the make-up job on the "Newborn" alien that is introduced towards the end, and it's nicely shot, but otherwise there's no tension whatsoever, and I was struggling to find out what tone the film was aiming for. There are a lot of talented people present; just another one of them who has gone unmentioned thus far being Joss Whedon. But his screenplay went through too many re-writes, and in the end it was just another thing that the studio took and rooted up the ass. I'm just glad that Ripley's "epic" saga didn't continue after this installment. See, sometimes we can have good things.