Alien (1979)

[version]

 

[version]

There's some nice landscape stuff from Covenant too.

 

[dilbert1]

Annihilation was pretty good, strange in a ‘now’ way (cinematographically, soundtrack and acting-wise) but also laudably so. It bracketed a lot out to focus on the themes it wanted to raise which is respectable and the final sequence where there’s a climax of otherworldly revelation that doesn’t resolve anything but makes things even more mysterious was compelling. Funny resemblance to The Thing where the solution to eliminate the intruders is the brute elemental force of fire but there remains the cliffhanger of our hero being compromised by the experience.

 

[dilbert1]

Think we’ll do the 70s Invasion of the Body Snatchers tonight

 

[version]

Böcklin nod here, presumably a nod to Giger too as he did his own version of 'Isle of the Dead'.

 

[sus]

Fuck knows, maybe it's just a bright light? But now I've said it, wouldn't a film where you go underwater and find a sun be really cool. I always used to love "journey to the centre of the earth" when I was a kid

Yeah "hollow earth" is another interesting theme in these kinds of romances, a la Jules Verne. I think it comes up in the new Kong x Godzilla films yeah?

 

[sus]

they are scraping whatever they can get out of these old things.

Notice that's exactly what the zoomers in Romulus do. Find an old ship from the early films, patch her up, get her to fly.

 

[sus]

The same way that, in the Disney Star Wars sequels, there are ruins of Star Destroyers in the sand all Ozymandias.

These little metatextual nods to the quasihauntology of undead IP'dom

 

[version]

Annihilation was pretty good, strange in a ‘now’ way (cinematographically, soundtrack and acting-wise) but also laudably so. It bracketed a lot out to focus on the themes it wanted to raise which is respectable and the final sequence where there’s a climax of otherworldly revelation that doesn’t resolve anything but makes things even more mysterious was compelling. Funny resemblance to The Thing where the solution to eliminate the intruders is the brute elemental force of fire but there remains the cliffhanger of our hero being compromised by the experience.

The major difference between The Thing and Annihilation is the latter's ambivalent about whatever the alien's doing. The emphasis is on change rather than destruction.

 

[sus]

the acid blood and so on. idk i guess there's some good ideas in there isn't there

I like the acid blood concept because it's vaguely like karma or bloodfeuds/revenge cycles or the idea that hate is a disease

That there is "splashback" from committing violence; in injuring the thing, you also harm yourself, there is a splashzone of collateral damage and often you're in it

 

[sus]

There's concept art floating around from when the Prometheus sequel was Alien: Paradise Lost and not Covenant.

Prometheus deleted scenes show a much more explicitly Christian parable

 

[version]

I like the acid blood concept because it's vaguely like karma or bloodfeuds/revenge cycles or the idea that hate is a disease

That there is "splashback" from committing violence; in injuring the thing, you also harm yourself, there is a splashzone of collateral damage and often you're in it

Also part of the idea that every part of its body's a weapon, even its lifeforce is corrosive to other lifeforms. It can still kill you even if you kill it.

 

[sus]

Annihilation was pretty good, strange in a ‘now’ way (cinematographically, soundtrack and acting-wise) but also laudably so. It bracketed a lot out to focus on the themes it wanted to raise which is respectable and the final sequence where there’s a climax of otherworldly revelation that doesn’t resolve anything but makes things even more mysterious was compelling. Funny resemblance to The Thing where the solution to eliminate the intruders is the brute elemental force of fire but there remains the cliffhanger of our hero being compromised by the experience.

Annihilation always struck me a feminist remake of Tarkovsky's Stalker, like the way they made an all girls cast of Ghostbusters? They talk about their trauma, their breast cancer, their husbands, very Girls Trip but scifi

 

[sus]

Think we’ll do the 70s Invasion of the Body Snatchers tonight

That "we" include the missus? Good man!

 

[sus]

Böcklin nod here, presumably a nod to Giger too as he did his own version of 'Isle of the Dead'.

Great spot good eye. Covenant's the only one I haven't seen. What do you reckon the symbolism is?

 

[sus]

Cyprus trees like that remind me of Italy. Rome. Romulus.

 

[version]

Yeah "hollow earth" is another interesting theme in these kinds of romances, a la Jules Verne. I think it comes up in the new Kong x Godzilla films yeah?

Pynchon too.

 

[sus]

It can still kill you even if you kill it.

Mutually Assured Destruction

 

[IdleRich]

Böcklin nod here, presumably a nod to Giger too as he did his own version of 'Isle of the Dead'.

Always loved that Isle of the Dead.... remnants of teenage wannabe gothdom I suppose

 

[version]

Great spot good eye. Covenant's the only one I haven't seen. What do you reckon the symbolism is?

You should watch it. I think you'll get something out of it. If nothing else, it looks and sounds absolutely gorgeous.