A L I E N Romulus

Holm On The Range

A  L  I  E  N  Romulus
Directed by Fede Alvarez
USA/UK/Canada/Hungary/New Zealand
2024  20th Century Fox
UK cinema release print

Warning: There are things people need to be starting a conversation about so, yeah, there are huge spoilers in here. Don’t read if you don’t want to know.

Okay, before I start with this somewhat problematic review, I’ll preface it by saying that Alien Romulus is the best Alien movie since the fourth in the series, Alien Resurrection (and certainly blows away the last two terrible movies). It’s entertaining and feels like it’s part of the Alien franchise but also has a level of suspense which is up there with the best of them. So, before I cover the plot set up and then get into the pros and cons, I want you to understand that I had a, mostly, pretty good time with this ethically unsound film. But, as I said in the spoiler warning, there’s a bigger conversation to be had.

Okay, so the set up is that the film starts off with a ship picking up a certain piece of ‘Alien’ debris from the floating, exploded remains of the Nostromo, which Ripley destroyed near the end of the original Alien (how it got in that piece of debris, though, I have no idea... she was well clear of the Nostromo by the time she did that) and, a few months or more have moved on since this opening scene, is my guess but, the movie properly takes place between Alien and Aliens (yeah, their will be reviews of those movies coming to the blog at some point, when I get around to taking the Blu Ray set out of shrink wrap and revisiting them one day). So this film really is set some 20 years after the first movie... and many decades before the second one (so, sometime while Ellen Ripley is sleeping away in hypersleep).  

The film features a group of ‘young adults’ being exploited on a Weyland-Yutani colony on some planet when some of them get wind that an abandoned space station, comprising of two halves (the titular Romulus, where the action mostly takes place and Remus), is about 36 hours away from burning up in their planet’s atmosphere. Everybody wants to get off the colony and Weyland-Yutani are pulling a Catch 22 on anyone who reaches their years of servitude in their mines, upping the number of years when they get to their agreed target).

So, with the help of Rain (played by Cailee Spaeny... who I’ve seen in a few things and is a pretty good actress) and her android Andy (or synthetic human, if you like, played by David Jonsson), they stage a heist on the apparently deserted space station to try and steal the hypersleep chambers on board so they can get to a more welcoming and functioning colony.  And of course, things happen when they get up there as the station was the ship where the dead xenomorph and other things ended up and... yeah... experiments have been done. Everyone on the station is actually dead and its full of face huggers and big aliens alike. Also, something happens to up the ante because the ship shifts a couple of degrees and there’s now less than an hour before the craft burns up in the atmosphere. So the film becomes a race against time... and some other, added biological complications... while what’s left of our raggedy band try to survive the running time as best they can.

Okay, so the good stuff first because, the other stuff is going to take me a while to sum up, I suspect.

The acting is brilliant. All the cast in this are great and with a special mention for the phenomenal talent that is David Jonsson, who plays not one but two very different iterations of the same synthetic human (that’s not a spoiler, you know what he is right from the start). I won’t give away why but, yeah, he does an amazing job throughout this movie, it has to be said.

And the film looks a lot like the first two movies, somehow mixing outdated looking ‘future speculation’ technology from the first two films with modern day expectations to a degree that it does, at this moment in time at any rate, seem to seamlessly blend in with those first few earlier outings in the franchise. And Benjamin Wallfisch’s score (sadly unavailable as a proper CD at time of writing) is suitably sedate and sinister in a not dissimilar vein to what Jerry Goldsmith and, to an extent, James Horner were doing in the first two films.

Plus, it’s chock ful of suspense and ‘oh no, I can’t believe you just did that’ moments. And the full size aliens are felt rather than seen a lot of the time... only really overly used in an Aliens inspired shootout in zero gravity towards the end of the film. So this stuff is all pitch perfect and there are some lovely call backs to the other films such as sound samples, computer screen displays and even one of those nodding/drinking ducks I like so much which were prominent in the original movie. Now to the big spoilers... you were warned...

Yes, there’s an alien/human hybrid in this movie. But it is kinda terrifying this time and works a heck of a lot better than the one they came up with in the fourth film in the series (which looked more like a Casper The Friendly Ghost Alien and was the one bad thing about that entry). It retains some H. R. Gigerish details on an essentially humanoid frame and, yeah, it’s relatively effective (in the lighting they use... I suspect it looks awful in broad daylight but these kind of movies are always about smoke and mirrors anyway and it works effectively here).

Okay, lets look at the bad stuff then.

Those call backs to the other movies are not subtle (which half works some of the time) but some of them are waaay too much. Certain lines and even paragraphs of dialogue associated with other actors in the franchise seem like they’ve just been pasted into the mouths of the characters here, to the extent that it feels like those actors are stepping out of character just to get the call backs in. You will definitely know them when you see/hear them and some of this stuff was just popping me out of the movie... because that’s what it seemed the characters kept doing. Popping out of the movie to make a ‘cool reference’.

Also, ridiculously, some of those homages don’t go far enough. If you’re going to reference the long, voyeuristic shot of Ripley in vest and knickers getting into the space suit at the end of Alien, maybe hold the shot longer than a second... the whole point of the way that first one was shot in that scene seemed to be to enhance the sexuality of the actress to the audience gaze, so this small nod seems undercooked, for sure. Why have it at all?

And, by the way, future generations who decide to watch these movies in order of when the story takes place, are not going to get half of the references yet because they haven’t taken place so far in the order they are watching it in. They may well think, for instance, that Corporal Hicks’ gun tuition speech from Aliens is a call back to this movie, if they don’t pay attention to old timey release dates. It just doesn’t really work.

Then we have the other big problem with the movie... which has a couple issues tied up in it.

So perhaps the biggest call back in the movie is the return of Ian Holm as an android from the same model series (and identical looking) as the android he played in the first movie, Ash. This one is called Rook, presumably to try and link it into Lance Hendrickson’s Bishop character from Aliens, Alien 3 and, kinda, Alien Vs Predator but... well let’s put it this way... it’s way much more than a cameo. The studio has resurrected this dead actor with the use of CGI and mimicry to give a new performance (albeit one which includes some dialogue from the first film) and he’s in several scenes and is a main plot point.

So two things about this because, his inclusion makes this movie morally reprehensible.

Firstly, it looks pretty bad. This CGI actor replacement rarely works well and this looks just as bad and fake as Peter Cushing and Carrie Fisher did in Rogue One (reviewed here). It looks like someone’s just pasted the face on in Photoshop and it doesn’t quite match, looking really flat and useless.

Secondly, when Harold Ramis was brought back as a ghost for a few scenes in Ghostbusters Afterlife (reviewed here) everyone was accepting of this because the usage was respectful and, heck, everyone knows that in his lifetime, Ramis was trying to get another Ghostbusters sequel off the ground for decades so, he would have agreed to it. Ditto when a computer generated younger version of actress Sean Young was used for Blade Runner 2049 (reviewed here)... she was on board with it and had been in talks with the film makers. But, honestly, I don’t care how involved his family or estate were in this decision (or how much money they were compensated... if they were, I hope... that’s another can of worms), Holm may well have decided to not take part in this one. He may not have liked the script. He may well have thought it would diminish his classic performance in the first movie (which I feel it kinda does but, that’s just me). And, no, I don’t think Hollywood should be allowed to bring back dead actors as anything more than a fleeting glimpse, or cameo. The problem here is that it’s a whole performance of a major character and, not only that, it feels really flat and unreal.

And, bottom line, did we really need him to be here for yet another call back to previous elements of the franchise when another actor/character would have done just fine and the film is already overpacked with references anyway. Bringing back a dead actor to just fizz up your movie is a really low move in my opinion and I really hope Hollywood stops this terrible practice soon. It’s one thing to see a fleeting glimpse of George Reeves as Superman in The Flash (reviewed here) but it’s quite another to create a new performance. It just feels wrong to me and, frankly, should be outlawed.

But that’s me done with Alien Romulus, I think. Good effects (apart from the CGI Ian Holm, which just looks bad), great acting, some nice callbacks (too many) and, apart from the ethical issues, which may give you pause, a mostly great time at the movies.

The Girl In The Spider's Web

Salander Girls

The Girl In The Spider's Web
2018 UK/Germany/Sweden/Canada/USA
Directed by Fede Alvarez
UK cinema release print.

Oh man... this is an absolute travesty of a travesty.

It’s also a problematic film for me to write about since, if you treat The Girl In The Spider’s Web as just a film with no strings attached, so to speak, then it’s not a bad little movie on its own terms. Trouble is... it’s not trying to be a stand alone action thriller on it’s own terms. In some ways, the film is a lot like the 1966 adaptation of Peter O’Donnel’s Modesty Blaise (which I reviewed here). As a film without anything to compare it to, it’s a nice piece... as an adaptation of the original source material, it’s worse than just a bad adaptation, it gives a completely false impression of what any of the characters in the novels and comics are like.

The same thing applies to the movie ‘version’ of The Girl In The Spider’s Web. Not only is it a bizarrely twisted and completely off the mark attempt at an adaptation of the source novel, the original novel also has some atrocious problems of its own. So this film not only reflects the terrible liberties taken by David Lagercrantz in the ‘fourth’ novel, it also ridicules the characters and situations further (if such a thing is possible).

I’ve already said just how I felt about Lagercarntz’ novel in my review of it here but, for the record, he completely seems to dumb down the main characters of the original trilogy and, in the process, loses some of what made them so special in the first place. Not to mention completely ignoring certain twists and turns of the original characters... even going as far a ignoring the existence of main characters completely... so the people left in the equation aren’t as progressed in terms of their story arc as they were in the previous novel. And, yes... continuity went out the window on that one, as far as I’m concerned.

So why did I even bother to see this movie, you might ask?

Well, two reasons, the most prominent being composer Roque Banos. I like this composer a lot but I don’t have much of his stuff and this seemed a good way to be able to hear one of his scores in the context of the movie before the CD comes into my life towards the end of next month.

The other reason is... I saw the trailer to this and was astounded, bearing in mind it has the same title as the novel, at just how far removed from the events and situations in the book the film seemed to be going. So I wanted to see if the director had tried to make it more like the original Millennium trilogy or had just done the usual Hollywood thing of completely changing the content of the property that was purchased.

Well, I can confirm that the content of this film bears, in my opinion, only a superficial resemblance to Lagercrantz’ novel. Normally I might be happier about that but, honestly, it’s like they’ve tried to commercialise the characters even more and turn this property into some kind of James Bond action franchise. It even has its own Bondian style opening credits sequence which wouldn’t look out of place on any of the EON produced films of Ian Fleming’s popular character.

There are also some terrible choices in terms of casting. Mikael Blomkvist and Erika Berger are played here, competently enough, by Sverrir Gudnason and Vicky Krieps. Krieps, especially, looks as you might imagine Erika to have looked like in her youth. But that’s just the problem - these two people here are nowhere near old enough to be playing these two iconic characters. And, bearing in mind that the story must be set a year or two after the events of Stieg Larsson’s The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest, this makes absolutely no sense. There’s barely any age difference at all between Blomkvist and Salander in this movie, for starters and... well when did they think Blomkvist and Berger were making their names in the newspaper industry? When they were 5 year olds? This all seemed fairly wrong.

However, I said the film is problematic for me to review and here’s why.

For starters, it’s beautifully shot, beautifully scored and, in and of itself, is a nice piece of action thriller cinema. If it’s trying to be James Bond then it’s definitely James Bond with a much darker, rawer edge than what we’ve been getting in recent years. It’s easy on the eye and, if you can divorce the characters from who they are meant to be, then you might find yourself sucked into this one fairly easily.

The other thing is Claire Foy as Lisbeth Salander.

Now I’ve only ever seen Foy’s work in one other film but she is the third movie incarnation I’ve seen of this character and I’d have to say that, for the most part, I was quite impressed with her interpretation of the role. Each of the actresses who have played Salander so far... Noomi Rapace, Rooney Mara and now Foy... have each had their own ways of interpreting the character and, they are all equally valid. Admittedly, Foy’s character shows a lot more vulnerability around other people than she might have in the books but it’s clear that Foy has put in the research and, presumably, read more than just the source novel for the movie she is headlining... she’s obviously gone back to the original, classic trilogy... The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest... to piece together her version of the character and so, ironically, the version of Salander on screen in this movie is way closer than the one in Lagercarntz’ sequel novel. And, despite that occasional twinge of ‘pain seen by others’... I got the sense that the character really wasn’t compromised in the way she’s been portrayed on screen so, honestly, my respect goes out to this actress for managing to pull off such an alienating character so well in a film which is really trying hard to be a popcorn movie, to an extent.

And, yeah, the director films her and the situations she finds herself in admirably, with a lot of style and edited in a way which doesn’t leave you confused or pummeled by the train of events. Which brings me back to my dilemma because... I can’t say I hate this version nearly as much as I hated the novel it purports to be based on. Even Salander’s lost sister, introduced in the same book, seems to have some kind of credibility to her and the casting of Sylvia Hoeks, who played the lethal replicant in Blade Runner 2049 (reviewed here), was a good one. Although, the whole, almost albino whiteness of her didn’t look credible in terms of her make-up, I thought.

Okay so... I really have nothing much more to add on this so I’ll quickly conclude with this... if you are a fan of slick action thrillers with a bit of an edge to them and you’re not invested in the characters from Stieg Larsson’s original Millennium trilogy, then you should probably try and catch The Girl In The Spider's Web on the big screen. If, however, you are a fan of the characters in the original books then, well, I’d say give both the fourth novel and this bizarrely transformed version of it a wide berth. This is not, quite, the Salander you are looking for.

Don’t Breathe

Rooms Of The Blind Head

Don't Breathe
2016 USA Directed by Fede Alvarez
UK cinema release print.

I was quite up for seeing Fede Alvarez’ new movie Don’t Breathe when I first heard of it because the title, at least to me, implied that it was a horror movie. As it happens, a few weeks later I found out that it is not, in any way, an example of the horror genre... more of a ‘home invasion’ movie. Now I’m not a big fan of home invasion movies, as it happens. They tend to be nasty and sadistic in the intent of their main protagonists but... you know... not nasty and sadistic in a good, wholesome fun way. More something else. However, while there are some caveats in terms of the morality on display in this movie, it’s actually more of a heist goes wrong story than anything else. So that’s kind of cool and, once I’d understood that after seeing the trailer, I figured I might as well give it a go. Especially since it seems to have taken America by storm a few weeks ago.

Okay, so the film is about three burglars, one of whom 'borrows' the keys to various houses from his dad’s security firm so they can let themselves in and help themselves to people’s belongings when they’re out. Some minor character stuff is set up so we can get the idea that... not all of the criminals are bad. Some of them have just fallen on hard times and have other responsibilities. Yeah... okay that didn’t really work for me, to be honest. It’s much like the first time I saw Attack The Block (reviewed here), in that the film asks me to choose between a bunch of thugs (or burglars in this case) and another, possibly, depending on your point of view, even worse character or set of characters.

And that's one of only two real problems with the movie... I didn’t really care too much as to who got killed or didn’t make it to the end of the movie. They’re all as bad as each other so, that takes the heat off in terms of worrying about what’s going to happen to anybody, to be honest. That’s not to say, however, that the film is lacking in tension. Indeed, the film is to be praised as being unbearably taut and intense the entire way through. So even when you don’t care who gets what done to them, you will certainly be on the edge of your seat as the movie progresses.

To ratchet up the tension, the director uses the very simple trick of shooting the film almost as if it’s a certain kind of modern horror film. As I said, it’s not a horror film, it’s a straight thriller, but the director does his best to make you jump throughout the movie and he does so quite successfully, as far as I’m concerned. I must have reacted more jittery to this movie than most genuine horror movies I’ve seen at the cinema and even one of the ‘jump scares’ that is included to little effect in the promotional trailer, works so much better in the finished product, especially with some ferocious sound design kicking in, that it’s a brilliant set up to help make the audience feel uneasy, even before our three looting protagonists/antagonists (take your pick) have even made their first attempt at breaking and entering into the main central antagonist’s home.

The trick here is that the owner of the house is blind but he's ex-military... so he’s fast, tough, ferocious and agile when it comes to protecting his 'millions of dollars pay off' which a court of law awarded him after his daughter was killed in a car accident. So he not only wants to defend his home, but he bears a grudge against anyone who goes after his loot. He also has a ‘creepy secret’ in his basement which further enhances the moral slant of the story... just in case you were having any trouble with siding with 'heroes' who want to rob you of your money. Yeah, okay, there are a lot of clichés in this movie, including killing off one of the ‘so called’ good guys early on in the proceedings to show how tough the main antagonist is and just how much trouble the others are in, as he locks them down in his home with him.

At this point the film turns into a survival movie, relying heavily on what I call the cinema of predetermined chaos. Everything gets turned around in the confusion of a constant battering of intensity and people go back for objects or people they shouldn’t, drop things which will help the opposition, and just generally make silly mistakes so the writers and director can manipulate your emotions even more when those particular threads are pulled. However, like I said before, it’s a really well oiled example of this kind of cinema and, as I alluded earlier, my heart was pounding in my chest throughout a lot of this movie.

The film also has some nice little set pieces too and one in particular comes to mind, when the director tries to ‘out-Spielberg’ Spielberg’s work on one of his more inventive sequences in The Lost World (Jurassic Park II)... but I won’t say what that is because I really don’t want to spoil this one for you. There’s also an interesting sequence involving grey filters/overlays and some black contact lenses to make certain character’s eyes look like they are dilated but, again, I’ll leave that for you to discover for yourself.

Don’t Breathe opens strongly with a visually arresting sequence which, again, is something I won’t describe here but, in this particular case, I’d have to say that it was possibly a mistake to put this opening sequence in here. It’s basically a flash forward to a sequence right near the end of the movie, before the final act is played out and this means that it gives away certain truths about which characters are still in play in the main body of the film at this unspecified point in time. So the tension gets diminished somewhat by having that reveal play early on in the picture. But, there are still a few spills and chills left once the movie catches up to this point and, despite a little ‘sleight of hand’ in terms of one of the characters who keeps seeming to come back from certain death, one can only respect the writer/director’s call here in that the trade off between that opening and the majority of the rest of the movie was obviously worth it to him so... yeah, may have been the right call.

Also, more so, perhaps, than a lot of movies, this film owes an incredible amount of its tension and excitement to the beautifully unsettling score by veteran composer Roque Baños. I’ve admired his scores on other movies and this one is quite heavy and is dialled up in the mix a lot of the time, allowing some beautiful percussion effects to come to the fore and help to move the story along. There is supposed to be a CD release coming towards the end of this month and, I have to say, this one is most certainly ‘on the list’ of required purchases.

And that’s about it. I thought the ending of this film in terms of the very last scene was a little weak... with producer's eyes firmly looking towards the possibility of a sequel but, ultimately, this is absolutely cracking movie making and I would recommend Don't Breathe as a great, if jumpy, time at the cinema. Don’t miss this one if you enjoy films which genuinely make the blood pump faster and your hands grip the arms of the cinema seat. A very punchy and morally ambiguous film which will make you think for a while after the final bolt has been shot, so to speak. Catch it while you can.