Subject: REVIEW: ALIEN 3

From: [email-masked] (Terry Gaasterland)
Date: Mon, 8 Jun 1992 13:15:32 GMT

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				    ALIEN 3
		       A film review by Terry Gaasterland
			Copyright 1992 Terry Gaasterland

              ALIEN 3 tarring Sigourney Weaver, directed by David
         Fincher, with a story written by Vincent Ward and a
        screenplay by David Giler, Walter Hill, and Larry Ferguson
        is a disappointment in every cinematic sense.  Rated R.
	 
My recommendation: 
     No matter how much you enjoyed ALIEN and ALIENS, stay away from
this movie.  If your curiousity about Ripley's fate is going to drive
you nuts until you see it, wait until it comes to the $1.49 theatres.
The wait will entail more suspense than you'll get out the entire
movie.

     ALIEN 3 tells of one more encounter between Lieutenant Ripley
(Weaver) and The Alien.  The movie opens with a very well done sequence
of shots interleaving long, silent views of space and stars with quick,
sharp shots of fire breaking out in a ship containing Ripley and her
cohorts.  Unfortunately, the visual drama of the interleaved shots is
interrupted by endless film credits.  The four travelers lie in
hyperstasis as crisis breaks out around them.  Their life-sustaining
units automatically slide into an escape vehicle and plummet to the
surface of a nearby planet.

     The rest of the movie is unbearably predictable.  Ripley learns
that the Alien has also landed on the planet.  Together with her and
about twenty dangerous convicts, it lurks in a massive, heavy, dark,
wet, moldy, underground refinery.  The convicts have adopted a religious
fanaticism as a way of controlling their inner drives.  They consider
Ripley to be a destablizing force.  Unfortunately, their resentment and
prejudice toward her is two-dimensional and bland.  For the remainder
of the movie (the remaining hour and a half), we follow Ripley as she
challenges the warden of the convicts, tries to convince everyone that
the alien is a dangerous entity, and then organizes an alien hunt
through the dimly lit ductwork and tunnels of the refinery.  Ripley's
character is central to the movie.  Yet she remains lifeless,
glamorless, and drab.  Her charisma, so strong in ALIEN and ALIENS, is
disturbingly absent.  As she moves through the movie, one almost does
not care what is happening to her.

     The camera work of the chase is interesting.  The camera follows
the point of view of the alien.  The alien has a tendency to run around
on the ceiling during the chase, so the picture flips up and down and
around in a compelling manner.  Unfortunately, this one clever
technicality fails to carry a long, drawn-out, repetitious, sometimes
confusing scene.

(Hit 'n' now if you want to avoid minor spoilers) 


     The only interesting character, the medic who cares for Ripley as
she emerges from hyperstasis, meets an early end.  The other character
with potential, the religious leader of the convicts fails to be
charming, appealing, or inspiring in any way.  The plot development is
so confused that when he finally sacrifices himself for the good of
all, it is unclear why it is necessary and why Ripley does not join 
him.  

     The thread of action looses sense many times as the movie unfolds.
Several times, one has no idea what just happened or why.  When the
prison warden is looking at a CAT scan of Ripley's head, we are
supposed to be horrified at what we see, as he describes it to Ripley,
but the horrifying sight is impossible to pick out.  The audience sits
confused, peering at the screen as the warden announces the worst to
Ripley.

(Hit 'n' now if you want to avoid a slightly bigger spoiler) 


     Ripley's final sacrifice is utterly melodramatic, predictable and
boring.  The outspread arms in the symbol of the cross falling into the
fire project a lame image.  Instead of emanating noble self-immolation,
the falling body seems pitiful.

     In summary, wait until a friend rents the movie and watch it for
free -- with the Sunday paper in hand for the long, boring parts.