‘I can’t lie to you about your chances. But you have my sympathies…’
One thing about the Alien franchise is that for better or worse, each film has its own distinctive style and vibe. The first four movies combine four different auteur filmmakers resulting in diminishing returns but a selection of films that always have something interesting to say. Now, I have thoroughly enjoyed Uruguayan director Fede Alvarez’s previous work, particularly Evil Dead and Don’t Breathe, but he demonstrates none of the style and flair that made those two movies so appealing. Instead, we are given a bland retread of the first movie with unforgivably egregious missteps along the way…
Rain (Cailee Spaeny), an orphaned miner, tags along with her ex-boyfriend Tyler (Archie Renaux) on an expedition to escape the colony planet on which they live by taking over a derelict ship floating in space. Rain and Tyler are joined by the former’s android companion Andy (David Jonsson) and several other forgettable and inconsequential characters.
Let’s start with the rotting elephant corpse in the room. Deceased actor Ian Holm is resurrected here through the use of animatronics and CGI and even putting aside the dubious morality of reviving dead actors, what’s more unforgivable is that whatever technique they used looks absolutely dogshit. I winced when he first appeared. The other issue is that Holm’s character Rook is both unrecognisable from the source material and also unnecessary to the plot. When he first opened his mouth and began to speak like some long-dead theme park attraction whirring back into life I had to suppress a laugh… or a scream. The fact that the decision to bring Holm back from the dead isn’t even the film’s nadir perhaps goes someway to putting across just how badly Alvarez has fumbled his shot at making the first great Alien movie since Aliens. What’s worse than the Holm debacle is having the android character (who is a highlight of the film elsewhere) utter the immortal words “Get away from her, you bitch!” while the camera self-consciously zooms in. It’s a truly terrible moment that had my eyes rolling so far back into my head that I thought I might require medical attention. Aside from those missteps, you also have the script (exposition heavy and dull) and the casting. Spaeny is a fine actor, she has illustrated as much in both Civil War and Priscilla, but she simply doesn’t have the presence or the aesthetic to lead an Alien movie. The whole cast is ten years too young and in the film’s worst moments I felt like I was watching a bad YA film.
What makes all of this even more frustrating is that despite all of that shit, there are some good moments. The film is visually impressive. The face huggers are wonderfully rendered. The ending, while derivative of Alien: Resurrection is at least interesting. But in the end, it’s not enough to save Alien: Romulus– not just one of the worst films in the franchise but one of the worst films of the year. A disaster.
