‘I’ ON CULTURE
The new movie Alien: Romulus is another sequel in a year filled with them. Happily, for a change, it is a pretty good horror flick. Actually, it is not exactly a sequel, because although it is the seventh in the series, it takes place between the first and second movies. But we have new characters, although there are some references to the first film and a bit of CGI magic to bring back a character.
There are usually problems with sequels in that they become a sort of carbon copy of the original. Think of the seemingly infinite number of Halloween movies. Only the victims really change. Seen one, seen them all. And there are so many different ones now. A huge percentage of this year’s flicks are part of these franchises. But this film is different. The aliens are the same, but the people working to survive are so much more interesting.
The same uncaring corporation, Weyland-Yutani, has a nasty project at the Jackson’s Star colony. Rain Carradine (Cailee Spaeny), an orphan, works with her adoptive brother Andy (David Jonsson), an android, and is miserable, particularly after her contract is arbitrarily extended by the company, mainly because she has no resources to fight it. She decides to join Tyler (Archie Renaux), her ex-boyfriend, and head to a derelict spacecraft that has cryostasis chambers that will allow them to escape to a free planet, along with his pregnant sister Kay (Isabela Merced), cousin Bjorn (Spike Fearn) and his friend Navarro (Aileen Wu). Andy, who can interface with the ship’s computer, joins them. While on the ship, they accidentally revive “face hugger” aliens and shut down the computers, which shuts down Andy.
Rain gives Andy a computer chip from the damaged android Rook, who we saw in the first movie, and Andy stops trying to help because he is now under the control of the corporation. And then the face huggers, which wrap themselves around a person’s head and deposit eggs down their throats, attack and things get very wild.
There are plenty of the usual horror moments, the quick shocks and the occasional screams from other audience members. In a way, this is a typical, old-fashioned horror flick: a group of young people go into a deserted place and not only discover that the place is not deserted, but whatever is there is harmful. Here, of course, it is a space ship and aliens. But it is done so well.
Director Fede Álvarez, who co-wrote the movie with Rodo Sayagues, keeps things moving. There are many plot twists, but in general, they are interesting ones. The issues with androids is an excellent one that opened up a lot of possibilities. When the first film came out in 1979, the whole idea of artificial intelligence and robots was far-out science fiction. Today, many of us are terrified about how we’re going to be replaced. In the new movie, Rain does more to take care of Andy than the other way around, an interesting view.
Also, the young folk are looking for decent living conditions, desperate to escape what seems a situation not far from slavery. The nasty corporation seems to be true to its evil ways. Intelligence may shift, evil doesn’t.
I really liked the cast. To me, they were all newcomers, although they did a bit of movie magic with the face of the now-deceased Ian Holm. Spaeny was very good. In what I’ve always thought of as the Sigourney Weaver type of part, she seems more fragile but also very competent. She is not just tough but caring. Renaux and the others were good as well. A special cheer should go to Jonsson. His was a tricky part, in essence, playing three different roles. First he was himself, then the evil android, and finally a sadder but wiser version of the first. That is not easy and requires subtlety, and he really pulled it off.
I generally do not like these kinds of movies, being a sort of old flower child myself. But there have been two sequels of horror flicks this year that really work: this one and Quiet Place: Day One. The reasons: good acting, good scripts and very good direction. We need more of these attributes in all our films.
If you like space horror movies, you will like this. If you liked the original Alien, you might well love this one.