ALIEN3
Depressing and inconsistent, but still damn good
Here it is, the movie that had at least half of Hollywood slated to write or direct it at one time or another (imagine what it would've been like written by William Gibson and directed by Renny Harlin! Yikes!) (and I seem to remember one draft involving a planet made of wood). Eventually, the powers that be decided on a very poor story (by Vincent Ward) and a great director (David "Seven" Fincher, who was until then only known for directing music videos). The result is probably the most widely disliked movie in the series; and while I have no small amount of affection for it, I do admit that it's probably the shakiest of all the Alien movies.
Before I get to the movie itself, a note about some comic books. A couple of years before this movie's release, Dark Horse comics published its first series of Aliens comics, a six-issue series detailing the further alien-smashing adventures of Hicks and a now-grown Newt. That first series was great; every series after that got worse and worse though, and even the re-introduction of Ripley in the third one couldn't save them (although I did dig the Genocide series). Anyway, part of a lot of fans' disappointment with this movie is merely displeasure at it not nearly measuring up to that first comic series; although even this movie's enormous budget ($50M, which was bloody huge at the time and I remember rumors flying around that it was breaking records)(weird that they'd lavish that kind of budget on a first-time director) would not have paid for such a large-scale venture. Others were disappointed by the fact that this wouldn't be taking place on Earth, as some early advertising suggested. Me, I was less disappointed than others, and found the movie far more effective than not. My disappointment comes mostly in just what it's effective at doing.
Ripley's still alive - too bad everybody who survived Aliens failed to survive the destruction of the Sulaco, which was brought about by a little acid spilled by one little renegade facehugger. Never minding just how an egg was smuggled on board; sure, MAYBE the Queen was stowing one on her when she hopped on that dropship, but don't you think we'd have seen it? So never mind that - how does a lil' bit of acid like that crash a ship the size of...of...it's fucking huge! I don't care how many decks that acid could have burned through, you'd think a ship like that would be a little better built. Ah, well.
Anyway, the pod with the four survivors (well, three and a half) (maybe Newt counts as half, she's pretty small, so three, then) is ejected and crashes on a really, really unpleasant little shithole of a world called Fury 161. The good news for Ripley is that the pod is spotted and salvaged by the planet's only inhabitants. The bad news is that those inhabitants are all hardened criminals staying in a now-unsupervised (more or less) penal colony for double-y-chromosome bio-rejects. (they're almost all Brits and Scots - draw your own conclusions) But they're okay, because they've found religion. Uh-huh. For several of them, having found religion of course in no way compensates for not having been laid in...however long it is, it probably isn't as long as they think it is, the wimps.
And it gets worse for the poor lassie; not only are Hicks and Newt dead, and what's left of Bishop on the junkpile, but it turns out that their unwanted passenger gave her a lil' going-away present from the Queen. And this same unwanted passenger exhibits the previously unseen ability to impregnate TWO hosts, because an unlucky dog happens upon it, and soon enough we've got a "dogburster"! (this was apparently originally an "oxburster") (why this was changed, I don't know)
Sigourney Weaver returns as Ripley, apparently having decided that the crippling damage she'd done to her sex appeal in Aliens wasn't nearly enough, and here decides to annihilate it entirely - covered in dirt, head shaved, never once looking like she's had a shower in the last decade or so. She has to fight off a rape in one scene; I guess this explains why she doesn't have to fight off many more.
As is the tradition in this series, the aliens just get weirder with each film. This one suggests that the alien that results from an impregnation acquires some characteristics from its host; maybe not characteristics that the host actually displays, however. This beastie is clearly different, being able to scurry around on ceilings and walls, and in some scenes, scurrying around on all fours like a pooch. (swear to God, I didn't really register this 'til this viewing, which has to be at least my fifth) H.R. Giger returned to do some design work on this guy, by the way. Also returning is the notion of the alien as a rapist, and it's no longer just metaphorical - one scene shows the creature REALLY givin' it to one of his victims, pelvis thrusting like Elvis on amphetamines.
I dunno, guys; the movie looks awesome, and the actors all do an excellent job with their moderately well-written characters (Charles Dance puts in the single best performance in this series' history, and Daniel Webb is terrific as the sprightly, defiant convict Morse). But the plot stinks to high heaven, feeling like just a rehash of Alien with a whole lotta dumb thrown in. Fincher does his best most of the time - I mean, this is a GREAT-looking movie, amply hinting at the talents he'd later unleash with Seven - but even he screws up occasionally. For example, some guy claiming to be Bishop's designer - played by Lance Henriksen - shows up at the end. Soon after he's whacked with a big metal thing, and the wound he takes has his ear hanging off at an awkward angle, which scarcely bothers him, suggesting he's just another android, but he's bleeding red and not white, suggesting he's human. This same scene reveals him as a liar about one thing; was he lying about that too? Hell if I know. While a number of the scares are fabulously done, several others are amply telegraphed, and others just don't work (the death of the most interesting character comes about halfway through, with zero buildup and almost zero payoff). And in this post-Armageddon world, some of the flashy cuts he uses in some scenes will bring to mind the worst of the MTV brood that spawned him.
Weaver's performance is very good, but she seems resigned here; Ripley had lost everything she loved in Aliens, she came to love a little more, and now she's lost them too. She plays Ripley as a very tired woman with nothing left to lose, and when you're on a prison planet full of horny men who haven't even seen a woman in years, I guess that's the attitude to have. Still, it just reinforces the dreariness of it all, to see even our longtime hero succumbing to her dire surroundings.
The Oscar-nominated effects really aren't all that great - as an animatronic creature, this new alien is awesome, but it's more frequently seen built in miniature and rather unconvincing, comparatively primitive CGI. Even the spaceship shots look hokey. Still, the sets and cinematography more than make up for it. Nothing in the script makes up for its own flaws, though; for example, the nature of the inmates' religion isn't even hinted at, really, except that they're Christian, and they're all men, viewing the intrusion of women as a threat. (make your own "Book Of Genesis" comparisons)
Ultimately, while not without a sense of humor, Alien3 is more depressing than anything else; rarely have I encountered a movie so sure in its determination to make sure that everybody in the movie gets the complete opposite of what they want. I mean jeez, I even felt bad for the villainous Company when it didn't get what it wanted. It's definitely worth a look; like I said, it does have some great scares, excellent performances, and an incredibly oppressive, gloomy look that really has to be seen to be believed. But even Fincher has expressed serious dissatisfaction with how things turned out; Alien3 might be looked at a little more kindly today than after its initial release, but even its fans admit that it was a disappointment.
Test audiences apparently didn't like the original ending where an impregnated Ripley was captured by The Company (I always thought it would be amusing if the head of The Company turned out to be Darth Vader), and it was replaced with the one we see today. Im not sure which one I would have preferred. There were a whole bunch of unused scenes filmed - the IMDb lists quite a number of them. I don't think any of them could have brought the quality of this one up to the level of the first two, or even have substantially improved the film. I remember also seeing storyboards featuring Ripley dangling from underneath a walkway while the unaware alien tromps on by above.
Still, I'd recommend this one, since it's a fine example of a very well-crafted film, often quite frightening and intense. (and Fincher deserves some credit for reversing the expected in the ol' "birth, death - y'know, the circle of life" scene) Just don't go into this one expecting to enjoy the rest of your day.