Classic Trailers: ALIEN

     

     Wednesday's Classic Film Trailers presents one of the greatest horror/sci-fi/action/thriller films ever made in Ridley Scott's Alien (1979). A film that is absolutely an excellent piece of filmmaking and showed the world how talented Scott was as a director. A film that expressed the view that fear is an unbelievable and mandatory selling point in making a scary thriller. A space movie that is full of action, suspense and horror. Alien is a prime example of filmmaking with prosthetics, ghastly makeup and special effects that included building real scale figures, like that of the alien, and having someone also act in a costume. Thankfully, computer technology was still young and Scott could not create an alien with graphics cause the film would not have worked as well, see Prometheus. I absolutely love seeing real stuff, real actors, real costumes and makeup, and real electronics at work. Fantastic! Oh yeah, the film had one hell of a cast, making Sigourney Weaver a megastar and also including John Hurt, Tom Skerritt, Veronica Cartwright, Ian Holm, Yaphet Kotto and the inimitable Harry Dean Stanton.
    You know the story. The space vessel Nostromo checks on a distress call from another planet and they find a spaceship carrying an unknown, organic alien life. One of the crew, Kane (John Hurt), is attacked by an unusual creature and brings it on board there ship. A threat that will carry terrifying results. Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) is a badass and goes head-to-head with the alien. The film made her a huge star and the cynical comedic performances from Kotto and Stanton are priceless. The film really shows how precise a director Scott is (was), especially when it comes to pacing and editing. Always tense, slow reveals, absolutely chilling music and scary as hell. Alien is, and will always be, a must see film.

Photo credits by ropeofsilicon.com and trailer by YouTube.