SINGLE104

Reproducing would be a better terminology of use.

james2025a

I don't think it sucked as such. It was that it had a lot to live up to with Alien and Aliens and it had some weak elements. I still firmly believe that any movie with Winona Ryder in it after say she did Beeltejuice and Heathers will suck. She seems to have a quiality where you can place her in the best film of all time and she will drag it through the dirt. She simply cannot act and has zero presence of personality. Other than her though, i liked the idea of the Alien Queen giving birth.....but not the stupid hybrid alien result. It just looked silly. Plus a lot of the action was not exactly quality....i never felt like i was on the edge of my seat. Alien set the standard for a horror picture, and Aliens set the standard for an action picture. This doesn't know what it is. I still actually like the movie, i just think it could have been better. Compared to Alien 3 though this is Citizen Kane. I still can't understand how Fincher could make such a terrible film. Probably studio execs breathing down his neck.

Mordred

These are movies I feel extremely passionate about as Aliens is probably my 2nd favorite movie of all time. I remember leaving Alien 4 feeling like someone had kicked me in the nuts repeatedly for the final hour.

The setup is okay, although the one note performance by Winona was pretty bland. There were some good moments... mostly with the crew, the testing on the aliens, the underwater scenes, the previous cloning efforts, etc.

Where it went wrong starts with the director. Jeunet was just the wrong guy for the series period. The lame and obvious attempts at humor always seemed to hit the wrong note. The lambasted hybrid. Getting rid of W-Y to make a joke about Wal-Mart. Taking the main character, cloning her to change her personality from someone the audience roots for to someone you'd rather would just die. Some lame CGI. Basically ending the damn movie the exact same way Alien and Aliens had ended (voiding the Alien into space... this time with a grosser twist!).


Now Alien 3 I will defend to the end. I know Fincher won't even talk about it, and it's easy to understand why. I think he proved that even in the worst possible conditions a genius can make a very good film... even if it isn't the film he wanted to make. I love the interplay between the prisoners. I love that Ripley is defensless again. I like that they found a new way to kill the Alien. I liked the return of Bishop and W-Y. I even like that Ripley went out at the end (although the CGI is bad). I hate they killed Hicks and Newt, but I'm willing to forgive that (particularly in Newt's case). They took some directions that fans didn't like, but past the "I wish XXXX didn't die in the movie" complaints I don't understand all the hatred. Alien 3 is a very dark, but ultimately beautiful and underappreciated film.

I find it interesting that all four directors of Alien films have become very well known directors and that the Alien films were the first really large productions. However was picking directors for Fox knew how to find talent, even if Jeunet was a terrible mismatch.

Giles

madara

3&4 are just dreams, hicks, newt and ripley are still in cryo, living up the b-rated nightmares. Its only way I could rationalize last two P

SteelWill

2 parts butchered script
1 part ridiculous alien hybrid
a dash of acid spit
serve over ice

Superboy

I was more confused by anything by the ending of the movie. Seriously, when the ship crashes it makes a huge explosion/shockwave...and I was like...they saved the earth?... O_o

UAIOE

New York Vs. the Giant Iguana fits perfectly for that movie.

They made me mad but messing around with Godzilla and taking away one of his key characteristics...fire breath. (no a roar and an exploding taxi do not count)

Even if a part of me forgives them for making an "acceptable" monster movie I still won't buy it.

Anyway....

I can probably say now that other than being kicked in the balls by having two favorite characters killed in "Alien 3"..the other reason seems to be that the movie was cut to hell. I'm curious about the extended cut, but i doubt i'll end up liking the movie any more than 4. Hopefully this footage that is re-inserted explains more and makes me give a damn about some of the characters.

Peep

I'm the only person I know who thought that Jeunet's direction was perfect for this movie. I thought it was the second best of the series, after the first one. Of all of the Alien series, this is the one where the entire cast really comes alive for me. The plot was not the best in the world, but that's why I was so impressed with the direction.

lamphorn

This is a good point, only I don't think Alien 3 was good moviemaking at all.

The problem is Aliens set up a lot of dramatic potential between Ripley and these new characters and when the sequel came, that was just blown away by writers/director who wanted to "make their mark" on the franchise and basically made it suck.

(btw, Newt and Hicks were in one film, but they were not secondary characters, they were integral to Ripley's development from sole survivor to something new, which 3 squandered)

eXcentris

Most people criticize Alien 3, not because it's inherantly a bad film, but because it's not what they wanted it to be. This is, IMHO, hardly valid criticism. While there is some continuity storywise in the series, I could just as easily criticize Aliens for taking a brilliant suspense film and turning it into a mindless action flick with cardboard characters. If I view the films as a series/franchise, then the odd man out is Aliens, not Alien 3. But I just enjoy Aliens for what it is, a great popcorn flick. I think that, if you keep the same story/setting and try to include Hicks and Newt in it, Aliens would have been a lot worse. I think Fincher made the right decision.

UAIOE

Well i watched the "extended" version of "Alien 3". I like the movie more now, its better than 4, but it will never surpass "Aliens".

I have to agree that the inclusion of Newt & Hicks was setting up Ripley to become more than what she was, but that "Alien 3" took the "safe route" by simply killing off the characters in an attempt to make her stay pretty much how she was.

Anyway, the extra footage in 3 did help they story more and made the movie seem less of a mess than it was before. It's still damaged goods, but it plays out better.

eXcentris

I don't agree. The safe route in the Hollywood world would have been to let Newt and Hicks live. As it stands the lesson is that these aliens will kill everyone, including everyone you love. In a word, nothing good can happen to Ripley as long as she's around these aliens. That sounds nihilistic, and again not very Hollywood, but I much prefer that to the sappy alternative of having Ripley fall in love with Hicks and raise Newt as her own.

Giantrobo

Good points.

SteelWill

Alien 3 wasn't a good film, so no it wasn't what I wanted it to be. The first two films (and to a much lesser extent the 4th) had characters where you cared about what was happening to them. Alien 3 was just a snuff film with bald-headed convicts as generic alien fodder and because of this was bland and boring.

onebyone

I agree with that. Originally, I didn't like Alien 3 at all, but the extended cut helped it a lot. I like it on its own, but I think it marks a bad step in the Alien movies. I think killing off Hicks and Newt (I really HATE what they did with her) like they did was the wrong way to go. So much potential was just...wasted. I get kind of mad inside just thinking about it really. Apparently, I still haven't let my bitterness about that go.

I like all versions of Alien 3 better than Alien: Ressurrection though. The extended cut of that was just a longer crappy movie. My main problem with that movie was the story. It was bad. Very, very bad. At the end of that one, I would have been happy with them just killing everyone.

ShagMan

The way I look at the Alien franchise is: each movie is a trademark of it's director.

Alien: Ridley "throw some more smoke on it!" Scott
Aliens: James "more action/guns!" Cameron
Alien^3: David "make it like a gritty music video" Fincher
Alien Resurrection: Jean Pierre "I love whimsey and over the top visuals" Jeunet.

you can also add:
Alien V Predator: Paul W.S. "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot!!!" Anderson

:-D

UAIOE

How many times can someone be a sole survivor and have to explain and "prove" these aliens exsist? Ripley was almost exactly the same as she was at the begining of "Aliens" and for the most part she was in the same situation.

That to me smells of lazy story writing. Same character in the same situation *AGAIN* reeks of "safe route". More Ripley in Danger! More Ripley trying to warn others of the Xenomorphs!

But I'm not really sure how i can take any of "Alien 3" seriously after they tried to pan off that "Super Facehugger" bullshit in the begining. And while i enjoy the tone of the movie i still think the script is not very good.

lamphorn

I gotta agree. While I haven't seen Alien 3 in many years, I found it really underwhelming and trite. Aliens put a twist on the first movie and was a sequel worth making whereas Alien 3 conveniently invented an excuse (which didn't make sense) to kill off the characters who stood in the way of rehashing the nobody-believes-Ripley-except-the-evil-company-which-is-trying-to-capture-the-alien-yet-again
plot. Typical unoriginal sequel.

That said, I have to admit that I'm not a fan of David Fincher. While I liked The Game a lot, I find his other films just annoying. A lot of clubbing the audience over the head with "dark" and "moody" attitude and very little substance.

riley_dude

Studio interferrance like with Alien 3? Too many cooks?
I think a lot of studio execs were probably running around trying to figure out how to undo what could have been a longterm franchise that was messed up with the third film.

Why undo the what was the whole story arc of the second one?? Ripley loses her daughter after years of being in hybranation. The Newt story was a way of her getting meaning back in Ripleys life. Hicks made it the complete family. When she loses all of this and has no reason to live and doesnt care about anything, why should we?
Even Cameron has said that he cant watch 3 or 4 because they undid what he spent so much time on building.

Johnny Zhivago

Exactly... I've always dug Alien 3, dig it more now in it's extended form. It's a dark film and the perfect ending to the trilogy (wish the CGI was better however). No one gets out alive. Aliens is a great action film, love it, but Alien is the crown jewel of the series.

As for Resurrection, I have nothing to add... It's a terrible film for all of the reasons that have already been posted. As far as I'm concerned, it doesn't exist.

UAIOE

Add to that the fact that she landed on a planet with convicted killers and rapists.

Even if the extended cut of the movie makes the inmates there a bit more interesting, they are still Double-Y inmates and are still relegated to spending thier whole life in jail. Either the alien kills them or they rot in jail...why should we care either way?

I find the whole idea about them finding god and having a religion a bit "forced" and it really seems like an excuse for viewers to actually care about them.

AGuyNamedMike

Personally, I rank the films in their chronological order. As said, they are four distinctly different films from unique genres, and markedly so because of their directors. I also put Resurrection a bit farther behind the rest because it was 1. too french (sorry Jean-Pierre, I love much of your work) for an american action-thriller and 2. too Whedon to be scary or thrilling, as he tends to inject too much comedy to "lighten the moment"(again, sorry Joss, I really am a huge Firefly fan).

Side note: I think the religion idea was there to, as you said, humanize the convicts for us, and explain why the Double-Y, so-evil-and-vicious-they-eat-schoolkids prisoners hadn't already killed the guards and each other, leaving the prison empty. Pretty boring movie that would've been.

eXcentris

As I said earlier, Ripley's life has no meaning as long as she's around those aliens. But then again, I like nihilism in films. Alien 3 is without sympathetic characters worthy of redemption, and if there is the remote possibility of redemption, it can only be achieved thru sacrifice. A truly wonderful change from the traditional film status-quo B.S.

Well that sounds a tad narcissistic... Cameron introduced 2 characters Ripley cares about in a mindless action flick and the next director is supposed to go "well I'll just pick up where he left off then!". I don't buy it. Again, why doesn't Cameron get blasted because he screwed up the mood of the 1st film?
Because people view his film for what it is, a great action film.

eXcentris

That's a big generalization which I could counter with why should we care about the marines in Aliens when they are just there to serve as alien food? Why should I care more about the Hicks character than the Clemens character? Or the Dillon character? Both of which were more interesting and better acted characters than anyone in Aliens. Regardless, I see your point. But the main theme of this film is nihilism and the only possibility of redemption is thru sacrifice. But I understand this is bound to put a lot of people off.

I'll admit that I like films in a prison setting so I'm a bit biased. I also like the dark, depressing, claustrophobic mood of the film, the way it was shot using a lot of low angles, and the acting. The film isn't perfect and there are some inconsistencies and lack of character development which the extended cut somewhat addresses, but it's nowhere near as bad as people make it out to be. Especially since the overwhelming majority of criticism is based on the "he killed Hicks and Newt!" argument. Which makes perfect sense (killing them) in the context/theme of the film.