Prometheus: Sir Ridley Fails To Recapture The Flame

WARNING! SOME SPOILERS TO BE FOUND BELOW.

Prometheus marks Sir Ridley Scott’s return to the scifi genre after a thirty-year absence.

Prior to Prometheus Sir Rid made two sci fi movies – Alien and Blade Runner – both acknowledged classics of the genre and of film in general. Since then he’s been messing around with various other genres with varying degrees of success, his most successful venture creatively and financially being the awesome Gladiator, which single handidly reinvented the big screen historical epic. But post-Gladiator he hasn’t really hit the mark, except for perhaps the tense and brutal Black Hawk Down. His last effort was 2010’s Robin Hood - a dull misconceived bore. Legend has it that after seeing James Cameron at work on Avatar, Sir Rid asked his agent “Why am I not doing something like this?” Which led him directly to Prometheus.

Prometheus has a bit of a history. Originally it was conceived as a direct prequel to Alien, possibly to be two films made back to back. Talk was of James Cameron producing and Sir Rid directing. Ideas were exchanged, scripts written, but then budgets were deemed waaay too huge and risky for two adult-minded scifi horror films. Lets not forget, as great and as popular and Alien and Aliens were and remain, neither were huge box office money makers. They both did very well at the time but made nothing like the money of a Star Wars or even the best Star Trek. No Alien film has ever made more than $80m in the US. Plus Alien 3 and Alien: Resurrection were both critical and commercial flops, which of course then led to the woeful Alien Vs Predator debacle. In short, Fox weren’t gonna spend huge money on two back-to-back prequels to what was only a modestly successful film franchise. But the idea wouldn’t go away. Sir Rid was eager to get back to scifi. Fox were eager to have him back doing scifi. And so new writers were brought in and the focus of the film (now just the one) was retooled in to what we now have, namely Prometheus. It is not an Alien prequel Fox and Sir Rid were telling us. It is a film that expands upon ideas set out in the Alien films but goes beyond them. It is a mystery, an intelligent and thrilling scifi exploration in to the secrets of humanities origins somewhere out there in deep space.

Nope.

Prometheus is most definitely an Alien prequel.

It is set in the same universe, has the same design aesthetic, has the same nasty corporation behind all the bad shit that goes down, and has icky monsters at least part inspired by the great HR Giger.

Sadly, what it doesn’t have is the same focus of narrative, strong core characters, tight editing, and downright pant wetting scares.

You see Prometheus really wants to be deeply intelligent and deeply profound, whereas Alien was simply a gorgeously made horror movie. A haunted house tale set in space. But Prometheus wants desperately to be more. It sorta wants to be 2001 or 2010…with added gloop, tentacles and gore. Unfortunately, though, it doesn’t have the focus or the deep and subtle intelligence of either 2001 or 2010. Yes, it has a big idea at its core (though one that has been done lots before) but it doesn’t do anything especially interesting with that idea. It poses lots of questions, touches on lots of themes around parenthood, creation of life, mortality, what is God, biological warfare, how far is too far for scientific experimentation etc. But the problem is, it doesn’t provide any answers. All it provides is more questions and lots of slime and some crazy tentacles and a big supposed ancient and massively intelligent alien/godlike being who in the end is only there to break necks and run around smashing things up. Yup, Arthur C Clarke sure missed a trick. Not! And what big revelations the movie does provide are pretty obvious early on to anyone who’s seen or read any scifi or who just has half a brain and is paying attention. Because Prometheus has some of the most unsubtle plot sign posting I’ve seen in ages. It almost screams at you, “LOOK, SEE THIS? THIS IS GONNA BE MASSIVELY IMPORTANT LATER ON.” So when the big revelations come near the end, they ain’t that revelatory. I was just thinking, “Yeah? And…?” But the “And” ends up being a standard run around corridors avoiding a hulking monster dude after escaping a big alien space ship that’s taking off (straight out of the end of the X-Files movie). Only with none of the tension and scares of, um, say, Alien.

Basically the script for Prometheus is a mess. There are too many questions posed with too few answers given. And there are too many characters, most of whom are paper thin and do nothing, serving no real purpose other than to do stupid things and get killed (No, don’t take the helmet off. No, don’t go off on your own just cuz you got grumpy…) Perhaps its biggest problem, though, is that there simply isn’t a strong narrative throughline to the story. No clear objective or obstacles to overcome, just the odd appearances of gloopy slime and weird tentacles, with no big, solid, tangible threat. People get infected with stuff and turn in to mutating sub-Thing-like creations who then have to be killed via flame throwers, while others get melted from acidic eel things or get impregnated with baby squids. To be fair, the DIY caesarean section sequence is by far the best and most successful part of the film. It’s intense and utterly gross. Shame it ends with the person then able to run around, jump craters and fight a ten foot tall albino dude despite having just had major abdominal surgery. Huh? I think not.

For the most part Ridley’s direction is good and fine. The film sure looks pretty. The photography, design, art direction and visual effects are all impeccable. The score is lushly sweeping too, with a lovely main theme and hints of Goldsmith’s classic Alien score popping up here and there. I’d recommend people see Prometheus for those reasons if no other. Sir Rid sure makes gorgeous looking and sounding films.

However he drops the ball in two major areas.

First, the film is sloppily edited. Characters appear and disappear for large amounts of time. You have no idea where they are or what they are doing. Several of them I still don’t know who they were or what their purpose was other than to die. When it comes to the big set pieces the editing is fine but never elevates the film to being overly exciting. There is a distinct lack of tension throughout. The most successful stuff (apart from the caesarean) is the smooth and elegantly put together sequences of Michael Fassbender’s David alone on the ship early on, going about his day to day business. Loved that.

Second, despite what some of the blurb might say, Prometheus just isn’t scary. There are a couple of mediocre jump moments (a radio squawk got me) but none of the ‘monster’ stuff is remotely scary or tense. Only the earlier mentioned caesarean sequence really makes you squirm and grip the seat. The rest is just cgi tentacles and oozing slime. Remember Harry Dean Stanton’s demise in Alien? Capt. Dallas in the air vents? Ripley vs. the Alien in the escape pod at the end? Nothing like any of that here. Not so much as a shiver raised.

So what about the cast?

In the lead role of Dr Shaw, Noomi Rapace with her amazing cheekbones is fine. She’s a very good actress and does the job selling her curiosity, her fear and her need to find out the truth of creation, to try and legitimise her own religious faith. She does lots of running and pleading, lots of pained expressions. And that’s fine. But there’s nothing here to rival her extraordinary work as Lisbeth Salander. Meanwhile Charlize Theron (looking awesome in shiny tight space clothes) is icy and coldly hostile as the dodgy rep from the company. Plus oh so sexy as always. Idris Elba is nicely laid back as the ship’s captain. And Logan Marshall-Green is, well, solid as Noomi’s co-scientist and boyfriend. But by far the standout performance comes from the always awesome Michael Fassbender as the ship’s android David. Oddly, as the non-human amongst them all, he’s the one with the most depth and the most interesting character. Fassbender plays him as a cross between Hal 9000, a curious innocent child, a fascinated fanboy (he geeks out for Lawrence of Arabia) and an unflustered wryly-observant butler. And he’s quite brilliant. To be honest, I was always wishing the movie would get back to him, not really caring what happened to anyone else. And then we have Guy Pearce. Ah, Guy Pearce. Love the dude. Great actor. But why the hell was he cast in this? He’s buried under a ton of some of the worst old age make-up seen for a long time. In HD you get to see every rubbery looking wrinkle. He looks like Johnny Knoxville’s old man in Jackass. I kept expecting his old man balls to start swinging. They should have cast an actor of the right age for the role. Should have been Peter O’Tool, which would have worked wonderfully with David’s Lawrence of Arabia obsession.

Now, all of this sounds like I didn’t like the movie. Like I have a major downer on it.

And I kinda do.

But despite all of its problems I did still enjoy Prometheus. Just nowhere near as much as I hoped I would. As I expected I would. It has great stuff in it. The look and design is worth the ticket price alone. As is Fassbender. And Noomi’s cheekbones. And Charlize’s shiny space ass. But it could and should have been so much better. The core idea is fine if unoriginal. It just needed a better writer to come in, hone the script, focus it down, and add some depth and concentrate more on a few less ideas. And it needed Sir Rid to tighten his editing and to inject a lot more tension and some real honest to god scares.

I was really hoping for something special from Prometheus. And the more I think about it, the more disappointed I feel. And I hate that. Alien and Aliens are peerless classics. With Prometheus Sir Ridley Scott had the chance to make a gorgeous looking, smart, rather profound film that made its audience think while also rocking them to the core in terror. He certainly achieved the first of those, skimmed the surface with the next two, and pretty much failed outright with the last.

But, hey, at least it’s a big budget space ship based scifi flick that looks amazing. Something we almost never get anymore. And for that, at least, I’m grateful. I just wish it had been so much more.

3.5 (out of 5)

2011: MY YEAR IN FILMS

It’s that time again.

After some not so careful consideration here’s my favourite and most loathed movies of 2011 plus a brief look at the coolest flicks for 2012.

So here goes…

TOP TEN FAVE FILMS OF 2011:

10. Captain America: The First Avenger

This position was a toss up between Cap and Thor, Marvel’s two in house produced entries in to this year’s summer movie season. Both were excellent with Kenneth Branagh doing a bang up job bringing the God of Thunder to life. However I marginally preferred Cap as it hit my geek buttons slightly more. It’s the 1940’s WW2 setting, the genuinely sweet romance between Steve Rogers and hot English agent Peggy Carter, the uncredited Joss Whedon rewrite (you can tell in places) and that killer ending, plus the teaser for Joss’s The Avengers after the end credits. Kudos to director Joe Johnston and star Chris Evans et al for handling potentially silly and corny material with wit, warmth and a steady hand. Make mine Marvel.

9. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

Tomas (Let the Right One In) Alfredson’s adaptation of John le Carre’s 1970’s spy thriller is a beautifully written, acted and directed film with a refreshingly adult tone. It’s a complex, slow burn film that requires patience, attention and a certain level of intelligence from its audience. As much as I love my fun/escapist movie entertainment it is a welcome relief to go and see something now and again that is unapolagetically adult and demanding of its audience. A smart, thoughtful and engrossing film packed with great acting turns from Gary Oldman as lead George Smiley, Colin Firth, Benedict Cumberbatch and Tom Hardy.

8. Sucker Punch

Haters be gone! Zack Snyder’s pop video/video game/musical/art house movie is a thematically rich and visually stunning delight featuring his usual bravura explosion of cutting edge-and-beyond filmmaking techniques. It’s like Inception meets Shawshank Redemption meets Girl, Interrupted by way of all sorts of hyper stylised video games and fevered fantasies. Sucker Punch is a much maligned and misunderstood feast for the eyes as well as for the brain, if only the lazy and the thick could be bothered to dig a little deeper. Covering thematic areas such as the objectification and abuse of women, it kinda makes for a weird companion piece to Lucky McKee’s The Woman (see below). Wicked stuff.

7. The Woman

Lucky McKee writes and directs only his third major film (after May and The Woods), working once again with his muse and good luck charm, actress Angela Bettis. The Woman is a brutal, shocking, disturbing but brilliant treaties on the way women can be viewed and treated by men. In the film, a feral woman is captured in the forest by the brutal father of a family and kept locked in a shed where she becomes the object of the father’s and his son’s fascination/anger/desire. The father wants to ‘train’ The Woman in to becoming more human, more of what he believes a woman should be – compliant, grateful, subservient – the way he has ‘trained’ his downtrodden wife (Bettis) and teenage daughter. Secrets and brutality reign in this isolated family. But those secrets are about to come out. And the Woman is looking to get loose. McKee is a smart director, unflinching in what he does, what he shows. Angela Bettis is great as always as the poor mother, but it is Sean Bridgers as the vile father and statuesque one-time model Pollyanna McIntosh as The Woman who stun. Hard viewing for sure, but a great film none-the-less.

6. Hugo

Martin Scorsese takes a break from gangsters and thrillers to make a film about a young orphan boy in 1930’s Paris looking to make one last desperate connection with his dead father. Hugo is about several things – family, friendship, our place in the world, how everyone effects everyone else in some way, about the importance of stories to humankind. Most of all, though, Hugo is a love letter to cinema itself, to its origins, its history, its power in unleashing imagination, in lighting up the world. This is all hung on the backbone of a fun and glorious looking kids adventure as young Hugo (the excellent Asa Butterfield) and new best friend Isabelle (Chloe Grace Moretz) try to recover Hugo’s father’s notebook and repair an old clockwork automaton. Scorsese recreates 30’s Paris as a wondrous retro city of lights, full of great gothic buildings, high towers, sweeping snowy vistas. It looks amazing. He also uses 3D in possibly the best way I’ve yet seen it used. It serves as an intrinsic part of the story. Seeing how Hugo is about cinema and its progression, then 3D becomes the latest aspect of that. And Scorsese uses the extra dimension to dizzying effect in some scenes and in some truly weird and cool ways in others. It’s the one film this year I’d say that you must see in 3D if at all possible so it can tell its story properly. Everything about Hugo is brilliant, technically, artistically, and thematically. It might just be my favourite Scorsese picture yet. Way to go, Marty!

5. Super 8

JJ Abrams writes and directs this late 1970’s set homage to all things Spielberg and Amblin as a group of small town kids get together one summer to make a horror movie before events intervene to set them on a scary real life adventure. The story itself may not be very original but, as always, it is the telling of the story that counts. The core of Super 8 is the kids and their relationships with each other and with their parents. Great genre pieces aren’t really about monsters or spaceships etc. they are about people, about life, about how we live our lives. And that’s what Super 8 is. It’s a film about childhood, about friendship, about kids relating to, and dealing with parents, and vice versa. And the kids here are outstanding. They act and sound like real kids, not the usual super sweet or overly adult Hollywood kids we usually get. They are real. They are recognisable. Super 8 is a smart, scary, touching, beautifully made ode to a time gone by.

4. Tangled

Tangled is a joy from start to finish. It's a laugh-out-loud funny and immensely charming CG animation from Disney based upon the classic story of Rapunzel. The character animation here is nothing short of astounding and the warm, sharp script crackles and zings with wit while Zachary Levi, Mandy Moore and Donna Murphy are all pitch perfect in their voice roles. This was almost as big a surprise as last year’s How to Train Your Dragon. I can’t emphasise enough how awesome this film looks as well as the razor sharpness of its script and its performances. Too good for kids, do yourself a favour and see it, preferably in HD. Even the songs are good.

3. Drive

Well now, I didn’t see this one coming. Ryan Gosling is a loner Hollywood stunt driver and mechanic by day/wheelman for villains by night who gets close to his cute neighbour (Carey Mulligan) and her kid. But when Mulligan’s husband comes out of prison and is targeted by vicious gangsters, Gosling offers to help him by driving for a job that will clear the father’s debts. Of course it all goes horribly wrong, putting Gosling, the mother and her kid in terrible danger. Cue lots of car chases, blood, death and tears. Drive is an odd film. But a brilliant film. Its oddball director Nicolas Winding-Refyn has described it as an existential, noir action thriller. I’m not sure I know what that means. To me, Drive is basically a western. Gosling’s character has no name, being referred to simply as the Driver. He’s a gifted troubled loner who, like in Shane etc. steps in to help save a family from dastardly outlaws. The story is simple, brutal, touching and utterly compelling. And the car chases are realistic and brilliantly shot. The film also looks fantastic with a sleek, dark, gritty look. And the performances are also excellent, especially the always wonderful and luminous Mulligan and a genuinely nasty turn by Albert Brooks. Winding-Refyn previously made the bonkers Bronson and the boring as hell Valhalla Rising. Drive is not bonkers and is far from boring. See it.

2. Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Let’s face it, this had the potential to be utter crap…just like Tim Burton’s 2001 Apes remake. Wisely though, Fox opted for a prequel/reboot, hired some good writers, a strong, visionary director and somehow allowed him get on and make the film he wanted to make. Oh yeah, they also hired Weta to do the FX (big thumbs up) and Andy Serkis to play lead chimp Caesar (bigger thumbs up). The end result is Brit director Rupert Wyatt, in only his second feature, knocking it out of the park. ROTPOTA is brilliant! It’s an intelligent scifi thriller, a cautionary tale about what we do to our environment and to other species. It’s also just a damn good, old fashioned, revolt/underdog strikes back adventure ala Spartacus and numerous prison escape films. Caesar is simply a great character as played by Serkis. Following his life and his rise to power is mesmerising and thrilling. And not once do Wyatt and co. drop the ball. The build up has been so strong that the eventual Apes vs. humans showdown is stunning, reaching a skin tingling pinnacle in Caesar’s spoken roar of protest. A great movie then, and a more than worthy addition to one of the greatest scifi franchises of all time. Go Ape!

1. X-Men: First Class

How the hell did this happen? How did Fox, a studio well known for big budget summer cockups, make my two favourite films of the year? The world has gone mad. Anyway, it happened, so there. Just so you know, I bloody love this movie. I love the X-Men anyway, especially Bryan Singer’s two movies. Forgetting that naff Brett Ratner effort and the risible Wolverine thing, X-Men First Class proves to be the right and proper successor to Singer’s X-Men and X2. In fact, Mr Singer came back and was producer here. Thank God! Mathew (Kick-Ass) Vaughn is now the director for this utterly brilliant 1960’s set prequel to Singer’s fantastic X-Men and X2. James McAvoy is a young Prof. X who meets up with Michael Fassbender’s Nazi hunting Magneto and together they must try to stop evil ex-Nazi Kevin Bacon from starting World War 3. Rich in story and character, X-Men: First Class is a slick and exciting superhero action adventure with genuine heart and soul as well as some pulse quickening action and mighty fine spectacle. The entire cast is great but the never better Fassbender is the real star. The A list awaits him. So, forget the barely adequate X-Men: The Last Stand and the godawful X-Men origins: Wolverine, this one’s the real X deal.

The best of the rest (in no particular order):

Thor - Marvel-ous God of Thunder
Hanna - Fairytale teen assassin goes a killin’
True Grit - Jeff Bridges does grizzled in the Cohen Bros. fantastic remake.
M:I-4 - See Tom run, see Tom hang from tall buildings.
Attack the Block – Heroic hoodies vs. nasty alien beasties.
Super – scary psycho vigilante and his even scarier sidekick bash in skulls.
The King’s Speech – Royal stuttering becomes feel good drama.
Tucker and Dale vs. Evil – two misunderstood rednecks try to survive a bunch of lunatic college kids.
A Lonely Place to Die – Melissa George tries to save a child from kidnappers in the Scottish mountains.
Stakeland – Grim survival in a post-apocalyptic vampire filled USA.

The top three new-to-me films I saw in 2011 which weren't released in 2011 (And yes, it's a Ghibli fest)

3. My Neighbour Totoro

Hayao Miyazaki’s utterly captivating and charming story of childhood innocence, freedom and imagination. If you don’t watch this with a big ‘ol smile on your face then you have a heart of stone. It’s fun, it’s imaginative, and it’s immensely sweet in a totally unsentimental way. There’s no bad guys, no violence, just a whole bucket load of kindness towards, and admiration for, the free and innocent spirit of young children. A joyful family classic from Studio Ghibli.

2. Grave of the Fireflies

In total contrast to Totoro we have this utterly devastating animated film (animated but not produced by Ghibli) telling the story of a young orphan boy and his little sister struggling to survive in devastated WW2 Japan. Grave of the Fireflies is powerful, affecting filmmaking that delivers more than one emotional gut punch to its audience. It sits up their alongside the likes of Schindler’s List as one of THE most effective attacks on the horrors of war being inflicted upon the most innocent. A hard watch. A great film.

1. Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind

Hayao Miyazaki’s awesome 1984 scifi/Eco adventure tells of a far future Earth and a young princess in a hidden valley having to save her people from ever encroaching poisonous jungles, huge vicious beasts, and warring tribes of humans in mechanised flying fortresses. James Cameron obviously nicked loads of this for Avatar and has admitted to being a big fan. Miyazaki’s film is the superior one though. The story here is more complex, more layered, richer in theme and character than Cameron’s film. It also looks amazing.

THE FIVE FILMS I HATED MOST IN 2011:

5. The Chronicles of Narnia: the Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Boy, Michael Apted sure knows how to make a dull movie. Not content with sending Bond fans in to boredom induced comas with the rubbish (except for the ace pre-credit sequence) The World is Not Enough, he then went and did the same to kiddie winkies the world over with this flat, dull, episodic, horrifically blatant Christian propaganda trash. There’s no proper story, just some random arsing about on the water before that bloody lion turns up again at the end. Somebody please kill this franchise.

4. Shark Night 3D

A boring, bloodless, boobless, pointless exploitation movie with no sodding exploitation. What a waste of 80 mins. A bunch of sharks are let loose in a salt-water lake to munch on a bunch of bland, annoying teens. Utter rubbish. If you want some quality fishy exploitation fun then see Piranha 3D instead. Now THAT’S how you do it.

3. Season of the Witch

Yay! The bottom five wouldn’t seem right without Nicolas Cage. And this putrid turd fits the bill nicely. I can’t even remember why I hated it so much, only that I did. I recall vague flashes of anger at the way the film depicted the witch of the title and how bloody dumb and annoying the story and characters were. Anyway, it sucked.

2. The Howling Reborn

Some bright spark decided to reboot the long dead Howling franchise by turning it in to a quasi-Twilight effort set in a swanky American private school. DOH! So here we get an annoying teenage boy moping around the place, giving uber-pretentious voiceovers of absurd irony-free self-analytical dialogue you wouldn’t even hear in the worst episode of Dawson’s Creek. This is all because said bland and mopey teen boy feels like an outsider and has a yearning love thang going on for an equally bland and mopey teen girl. Soon though, mopey boy and girl get together and get caught up in some shit about a long lost werewolf mommy coming back to reclaim her kid. Yikes! This is Howling PG-13 for the kids. The werewolf FX are actually ok (when we finally see them) but blood and gore is almost non-existent, as are any scares, tension, or genuine depth to the shitty story. The really annoying thing is that this obviously had some sort of budget to it. It actually looks pretty good with good locations, glossy/gritty photography, nice helicopter shots of cityscapes, a decent score, and some pretty decent FX. It’s just a shame the script is terrible and the director utterly clueless. Bad wolf!

1. My Soul To Take

I always new Wes Craven could be a shit moviemaker but this was ridiculous. Over his entire career Wes has made two great movies and two very good movies. The great ones are A Nightmare on Elm Street and Wes Craven’s A New Nightmare. The very good ones are Scream and the original The Hills Have Eyes. Everything else ranges from okay (Scream 2, 3, 4/The People Under the Stairs) to the utter shite (Shocker/Last House on the Left/Vampire in Brooklyn). But Wes reached a new nadir with this one. He wrote this himself, you know. It’s some nonsensical crap about teens in a small town who share the same birthday as some long dead local killer, getting themselves killed off one by one in the most boring, workmanlike ways possible. Is lead teen possessed by the long dead killer? Who the fuck cares? I was bored rigid for the entire running time. As the barely adequate Scream 4 shows us, Craven has long passed his sell by date. Let the old codger retire. He gave us Freddy Krueger. His good work is done.

The rest of the worst: Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Your Highness, Insidious, Fast Five.

MY FIVE MOST LOOKED FORWARD TO FILMS OF 2012:

5. Skyfall – Daniel Craig is back as Bond. Javier Bardem and Ralph Fiennes co-star with Sam Mendes directing.

4. The Avengers – God…I mean Joss Whedon writes and directs Marvel’s superhero team up. Major Yayness!


3. Prometheus – Noomi Rapace and Michael Fassbender star in Ridley Scott’s scifi thriller set in the Alien universe about the origins of human life.


2. The Hobbit Part 1 – Peter Jackson returns to Middle Earth for more Tolkien. What’s not to love?


1. The Dark Knight Rises – Christopher Nolan finishes off his Batman trilogy in what is sure to be grim yet stunning style.