Film review: ‘ALIEN: ROMULUS’ by Nick Gardener from ‘Built For Speed’

The original Alien from 1979 was a masterpiece of production design that infused Dan O’Bannon and Ronald Shusett’s ‘haunted house in space’ concept with Ridley Scott’s remarkable aesthetic sense.  James Cameron’s 1986 sequel, Aliens, while lacking the original’s eloquent artistry, inventively expanded some its ideas and reworked the concept into a brutally efficient, white knuckle action film.  After two reasonably impressive but erratic sequels in the 90’s and the messy Prometheus spin-offs, the franchise had lost much of its lustre.  Alien: Romulus makes a formidable attempt to restore the series to former glories but doesn’t stick the landing.

Writer/ director of Alien: Romulus, Fede Alvarez (Don’t Breathe, Evil Dead) clearly recognised that fans mainly love the franchise because of the first two films, so he’s decided to plonk his movie somewhere in the middle of them, both chronologically and stylistically.  Consequently, Alien: Romulus, is set roughly 20 years after the events of the first film and 37 years before those of Cameron’s sequel and attempts to fuse the gritty but intricate design of the original with the pulse pounding action of the sequel.  Romulus even replicates screen graphics, sound effects and music from Alien as well as snippets of dialogue and specific scenes from that film and from Cameron’s movie.

Plotwise, Romulus adheres to a well-established Alien film template: unsuspecting astronauts stumble across a ship laden with spidery face huggers, someone’s impregnated with an alien bub and the creature bursts forth to wreak havoc.  Here, the Alien’s smorgasbord is a group of young people including the compassionate Rain Carradine (Cailee Spaeny), her android adoptive brother Andy (David Jonsson) and Rain’s former boyfriend Tyler (Archie Renaux).  They and their colleagues attempt to escape virtual enslavement on a hellish mining colony by pinching cryogenic sleep pods from a seemingly derelict space station orbiting their planet. Why no one else seems to have detected this ghost ship and why they can leave their virtual imprisonment so easily are issues with which the story doesn’t trifle.  Aboard the vast, dilapidated space station, the group encounter our old alien xenomorph buddy and its extended family.

While this film is clearly in the thrall of the first two movies – it even has an unexpected and questionable cameo from one of them – it never quite achieves the artistry of the first film nor the kinetic excitement of the Cameron film…. but it comes close.

In the early part of the film, Alvarez does a fine job of conjuring an intense atmosphere and a palpable sense of threat aboard this creepy space station.  Sightings of the alien shape emerging in the background are still intimidating and some of the gorier scenes are genuinely confronting.  As familiar plot machinations play out, though, the film becomes a little too predictable and loses some of its grip.

Also, despite a well-worn plot, this film is at times annoyingly confusing.  In the vast, dark and cluttered space station, it’s hard to keep track of where people are, where they’re going and even who is alive or dead.  Occasionally, we’re so busy trying to orient ourselves, it’s difficult to sit back and just enjoy the action.

The problem of keeping track of the characters may be partly due to the fact that they’re not particularly engaging, especially compared to those in the earlier films. People still quote Sigourney Weaver, Harry Dean Stanton and Bill Paxton’s characters but it’s unlikely anyone will be quoting the people here.  Cailee Spaeny, who recalls Carey Mulligan, is fine as the obvious heroine bringing an engaging mix of sensitivity and feistiness to Rain but she’s no Ripley.  As Andy, David Jonsson is much gentler and quirkier than the usually grim Alien androids.  He takes a while to warm to, especially given his penchant for dad jokes, but he eventually proves endearing.  That is not the case for another character, the repulsive gobby geezer Bjorn (Spike Fearn) who’s so unlikeable audiences will be praying for the alien to get him.

There are also opportunities missed here. The oppressive mining colony seems a setting rife with possibilities, both for action and the subtext of sinister corporate activity but it’s quickly abandoned.  There are also suggestions that the brutal world the character’s inhabit is subject to a utilitarian belief system but this isn’t pursued in much depth.   Additionally, Rain’s backstory and her quest to reach her home planet provide some nice humanising context but aren’t explored enough although they might be in a sequel.

While it is derivative, the film makes some attempt to expand the Alien mythology introducing some novel biological ideas including one that could almost be a meta gag about the way this film is so heavily infused with elements of the first two movies.

Alien: Romulus is a mostly well-made piece of sci fi/ action/ horror that for much of its running time does a decent job of creeping people out and triggering popcorn showers through jump scares but despite drawing so heavily on those life changing original films it doesn’t quite have their magic.

Nick’s rating: ***1/2

Genre: Drama/ Action/ Science fiction/ horror.

Classification: MA15+.

Director(s): Fede Alvarez.

Release date: 15th Aug 2024.

Running time: 119 mins.

Reviewer: Nick Gardener can be heard on “Built For Speed” every Friday night from 8-10pm on 88.3 Southern FM.

 

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