And kiss... they kiss too. Back in the day their was a classic adventure game series called Space Quest; in the second game you can free an adult xenomorph, if she catches you she lands a huge red lip kiss on you... and then releases you... you can play a great deal into the game after this even until you are killed by a chest burster, I always loved this death, it's so cruel to players who save over their game files.
Hey everyone! I'm so sorry for the weird audio, my mic was acting up, but I've changed it now so it's all good for future movie reactions (one has already been filmed though!). Thank you for your consideration!
I want to challenge your assumption that these people were all stupid but Ripley. First, these are truckers in space, basically a small crew on a tugboat towing a giant refinery to Earth. They aren't scientists or military; just ordinary people. But they're all smart enough to manage and operate and fly and fix a spaceship so none of them are stupid. Ash was a robot programmed to screw everything up; he wasn't stupid, he was following his programming. Dallas, the captain, did what he had to do. Investigate the signal or lose 4 years of pay. Kane is Dallas' best friend. They have been on many missions together. When Kane got that thing on his face, Dallas knew the quarantine rules but wanted to save his best friend. You said "just kill him" which seems a little cold blooded. Maybe because he's a fictional character that you don't care about or like. But in real life, if that was your best friend, wouldn't you want to try? Ripley insisted on following quarantine but Ash screwed that up. Kane died, nobody's fault. Ash probably expected it but nobody else is a doctor or a scientist so they didn't expect it. Then they went looking for the critter that was smaller than a cat. Pretty harmless, except for the acid blood so they didn't try using guns or anything else that might make it bleed. But somehow it magically grew up to the size of a horse in just a few hours. Nobody, not even Ash, thought that was possible (it isn't possible except in Hollywood horror movies). It grabbed Brett and disappeared into the ventilation system. Dallas came up with a good plan, using flames to chase it into the airlock then blast it into space. No blood, no acid, easy enough. But Lambert, the blonde lady, panicked and didn't guide him well. Not really her fault; some humans panic in deadly situations - but she got Dallas killed. Then Ripley learned bout the company's plan, Ash tried to kill her, but they killed Ash. They decided to blow up the ship and leave on the shuttle, but the alien killed Parker and Lambert. Then it was down to just Ripley and she, obviously, found a way to win. Other than Lambert being panicky, nobody did anything stupid in this show. That's what makes the writing so good that people still love this movie 45 years later. Anybody can write a story about a monster killing a bunch of idiots. But writing a good story about a monster killing smart people making good decisions? That's much harder but when it's done right, this might be a generational classic that stands the test of time.
I don't care. She has a point. If people can say the characters in Prometheus or Covenant are stupid, I think it's fair to say the characters in the original Alien are equally stupid
@@LukeLovesRose Maybe. But I think you made my point, not yours. Prometheus and Covenant are widely considered to be very inferior to Alien, as is clearly seen in their much lower review scores on websites that do that sort of thing. Why? Inferior writing. Those humans do quite a few senseless things, take silly risks, and make bad decisions. In Alien, none of the humans do that, aside from one human being panicky and another human wanting to break the rules to save his friend's life. As I said, it's easy to write a story about a monster killing idiots and those are usually fairly forgettable. But if you can write a movie about a monster killing smart people, it has a good chance of being memorable forever.
@@blakewalker84120 I think you like so many other people completely misunderstood Prometheus and Covenant. To me, they are far better films than Alien 3. And I know all of the times that the No 57 pops up in Aliens and its significance
@@LukeLovesRose I don't think I even mentioned Alien 3. I am not a fan of that movie. Why? Bad writing and bad directing. Fight Club, Se7en, even The Game were better movies than Alien 3 so I know Fincher could pull it off, but he had a weak script and didn't manage to rise tot he occasion. As for Prometheus and Covenant, you have no idea what I understood or not. Frankly, neither do I because even though I've seen them both twice, I barely remember anything about them. They just weren't worth that level of investment. But I'm pretty sure they weren't hard to understand.
Alien takes place in the year 2122, not 2037. Interface 2037 is the command line option for the ship's AI called MUTHUR, which allows the senior officer to ask questions by typing on the keyboard.
39:40 "I'm confused." The plan was to escape in the shuttle. Ripley set the Self-Destruct with a 10 minute timer that could be canceled only in the first 5 minutes; after that, it could not be stopped. She tried to get to the only shuttle to escape but the alien was in her way, right outside the shuttle, so she couldn't get past it to escape. So then she tried to cancel the Self-Destruct because she doesn't want to die. Maybe she hoped she could hide for a while until the alien wandered off or fell asleep then try again. But she was just a little to late to cancel the Self-Destruct. So now she has 5 minutes to live - she must get to the shuttle or die.
At your local retro theater, they might screen a classic movie series and "Alien" and "Aliens" are often a double-feature. They are both incredible experiences on the big screen.
“It’s not original per se”? Coming out in 1979, this film changed horror and sci-fi cinema simultaneously. 75 percent of aliens portrayed in film, animation, and video games STILL are ripping this one off. You’re responding as someone who has been conditioned by many of those games and films.
I call that the Hitchcock/Beatles effect. Younger people see Hitchcock movies, or hear Beatles songs and think they're just normal and fine without the context of how far ahead they were of what everyone else was doing at the time.
I agree about her perspective. She is young, and so she sees movies that came out 40 years later as "original". It's up to us to teach respect for the correct sequence. All I can say is I was in my 20s when this came out, and there was nothing like it at the time (or even since). It makes it very original from my perspective. But, she doesn't live my lifetime; how can she? Vic: here is a friendly challenge: Try to find a movie made earlier that makes this movie "not original, per se". You will find shows like the (1968) Planet of the Apes (well worth watching the original for all it says about humanity), 2001: A Space Odyssey, the Start Trek TV series, and even Star wars (just 2 years earlier than this movie), plus a few other interesting tv shows. They are all original because none are like the others. Then you start to see how much modern content borrows from those old titles in terms of characters, story, artwork, mood, or ... And, you will learn about how original Alien was for its time.
Alien was stolen from two short stories by American SF author A. E. Van Vogt, "The Black Destroyer" and "Discord in Scarlet" which were 1950 incorporated in the novel "Expedition of the Space" Beagle". Van Vogt sued the production of Alien, the case was settled out of court and he even was credited. So, yes, it was not original. Scott learned from this and in Blade Runner gave proper credits to the original author. In contrary to Cameron, who stole the stories for T1, T2 and Avatar.
"She's the only smart person on the ship." Parker's also usually right. He and Ripley usually think along the same lines - if it wasn't for the tension between them on a personal level they'd make a good team.
I thought she said Sigourney Beaver there for a second 😆You can tell there's a bit of French here, leaving out certain letters. In English, we pronounce ALL letters :D
Couple things: Alien borrows heavily from the plot of It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958) in which an alien stows away on a spaceship and starts killing the crew. When Ripley finds Dallas and Brett, they're being mutated into new eggs. If you notice, you can see the edges of the top of an egg forming under Brett's face. Dallas begs Ripley to kill him and she torches the entire room, killing both of them. This was originally going to be the Alien's lifecycle: It starts as an egg, hatches a "face hugger" which attaches itself to a suitable host and implants the next stage, while keeping the host alive. The face hugger then falls off and dies, while the creature grows inside the person. It then rips its way out as a "chest burster", and quickly grows to an adult. The adult then incapacitates suitable hosts, cocoons them, and mutates them into new eggs, ready to continue the cycle. However, since this scene was cut, it isn't considered canon, and Jame Cameron went in a different direction for Aliens. The alien ignored the cat because it was too small to make a suitable host. When Brett enters the large room looking for the cat, you can see the alien hanging on a chain, motionless, just swaying back and forth. Similarly, if you look on the right, you can see the alien's head among the pipes when Ripley enters the shuttle. The theatrical version omits the fight outside the med bay where Lambert smacks Ripley, the shot of the alien on the chains, and Ripley finding Dallas and Brett. For what it's worth, while it looks like they enter the derelict alien ship at ground level, never travel upward and then find the "space jockey" in its chair, drawing and models of that ship place the space jockey at the top of the ship under a glass dome. If that's the case, then they were near the top of the ship, and the egg chamber could be below them, rather than in a cave. They addressed this in the novelization when one of them says it can't go down too deep or it would make the ship out of proportion, and another character asks, "In proportion to what?" And finally, I'm sure someone will tell you that the cast had no idea what was going to happen in the chest bursting scene. That's a myth. It would be impossible to shoot a scene like that without them knowing. They were just surprised by how much blood they used. Veronica Cartwright (Lambert) in particular didn't expect to get hit in the face with it. That's her real reaction in the film.
You're confused about what the company was trying to do. Basically some company ship picked up that signal and told the company there was a weird signal. They didn't know anything about what was there - just an alien signal. In this universe, humans are just starting to travel in space and have never met any other species of sentient alien; just a few bugs and tiny unintelligent animals on a few worlds. So this is really new; it's never happened before. Then the company sent THIS ship to tow back the refinery knowing that they would pass near this signal. They are not the military so couldn't send an army or anything so they just sent what they had, but they put an android on board to make sure the mission succeeded. Why did they want it? They didn't even know what was there. But they wanted to find out and see if they could use it for biology or technology or anything else that they could make a profit. Why was the crew expendable? 6 people, some insurance paid to their families, but if it works, they might make billions of dollars in researching and selling whatever they bring back. Yes, that's pretty evil and greedy, but that's what they decided to do.
Ah great movie… if you can find it, there’s a movie called Dark Star which I recommend watching, even if you don’t do it for a reaction. I mention it because it was written by the guy who wrote some of the early drafts of Alien. Dark Star is a really goofy movie and sort of cheesy, but it has some deep philosophical moments, but it’s also a neat way to peer into the writer’s headspace and also notice the genesis of some elements of Alien. There’s one scene of Dark Star that has an inkling of some odd the more terrifying moments of Alien, like Alien is the more scary serious and prolonged version of what the writer would have done with that scene in Dark Star if he had the budget that Alien had it. It’s also worth seeing because it’s John Carpenter’s first film, basically something he started while still at Uni. John Carpenter went on to be a master of horror films, and it’s awesome to see their early works, or at least it is to me, maybe for you too. But this is a huge tangent, I’ll make some more related comics to this movie in a other comment.
The sets and visual language was state of the art in 1979. Ridley Scott (Gladiator, Blade Runner, Legend....) is now considered one of the best directors of the past 25 years. Even his commercial flops always have stunning cinematography. ps, about the liquid dripping...cooling pipes for the engines and electrical equipment produce condensation (like the back of a window air conditioner). Leave no cat behind :)
10:05 "What is dry dock?" For ships on Earth's oceans, when there is damage below the water line but they don't sink, they bring the ship into a special dock, then drain all the water out of that dock so it's now dry and the workers can just walk around and fix the damage without having to swim. That's a dry-dock. In space, it means people need to go outside to fix the ship, outside where there is no air. To do that safely, they put the ship inside a big room, close the door, fill the room with air so workers can safely walk around and fix things. That's the space version of 'dry-dock'.
And they need to do that, because for some reason, the designers put 90% of the ship's components on the OUTSIDE, rather than put it all safely inside the hull.
@@lurkerrekrul for a very good reason. Trust me, if Earth's shipbuilders could do that for ocean-going ships, they would. Why? You put "components" on a solid weight-bearing structure. The "hull" of any kind of ship is a solid weight-bearing wall (except for the LEM which is really just a shuttlecraft). Ocean-going ships can put components on the inside of the hull but not the outside because that would create drag that would slow the ship and probably put undue stress on those components. For example, the engines on an ocean liner are inside the hull, taking up valuable interior area. Space has no such drag or wear on components, so things like engines can go outside the hull. This saves interior space and puts the heat outside rather than inside. It allows the ship to be smaller, cheaper, and lighter without sacrificing interior area.
@@blakewalker84120 It also makes them much harder to repair and renders them vulnerable to space debris, as well as heat from re-entry to planets with a thick atmosphere. You'll notice that actual Earth spacecraft don't have a ton of pipes, wires and electronic components on the OUTSIDE of the hull. And to use your analogy, while naval ships might have the odd shielded electrical cable or valve on the outside of the structures on top of the deck, they don't have entire outside walls covered with important components. You're not going to find all the wiring for the ship's electrical systems clamped to the outside of the bridge, nor all the water pipes running up the outside of the cabin area. You also won't find production cars that look like Doc's modified DeLorean from Back to the Future, with wires running along the side and exposed engine components. OK, they DO make some cars with exposed components, but those are specialty cars and it's done more for appearance than practicality.
A lot of maritime, naval reference. Dry-dock was like a garage for ships where water would be drained and the ship raised dry for repairs and maintenance. For the Nostromo, the Dry-dock would be an orbiting garage where the ship can be repaired. Having cats on board ships was an ancient tradition. They hunted vermins, keeping the crew safe from disease and infestation. Cats are considered good luck by sailors, and a little reminder of home. When you earlier said ‘octopus’, I knew it would come back to haunt you. Be grateful you couldn’t see anything. Imagine the most gruesome ways to be killed. In the novel Parker and Lambert met a horrific end! Vic, Ripley could have used you to watch her back on the Nostromo! As to the lack of character-building, I think it was intentional. When I saw this in theater it had the feeling of a documentary, like you were watching real-life people in a crisis. Never saw anything like this before. If you want answers to your questions, you need to go deeper into the darkness. Watch AlienS!
This movie is called "ALIEN", the sequel to this movie is called "ALIENS". Mother is what they call the A.I. computer, the name of the ship is The Nostromo.
this was one of the first and considered by many to be the magnum opus of scifi horror. it was very original when it came out and lots of films and games that came later have taken inspiration. you should definitely check out the sequel if you enjoyed this one. very different yet still entertaining.
I love love love love love LOVE cats, and I swear, when I first watched this movie, I was going to start a riot if Jonesy got killed. The movie got a lot of brownie points from me for making sure Jonesy made it. =P
ET is definitely not this movie heh, though funnily enough, ET is a family film and the movie execs wanted a sequel. Spielberg who made ET didn’t really want to do a sequel, so he wrote a sequel so contrary to the original family movie that was ET, that the execs passed on it which is what Spielberg wanted.
The way the computer displays behave is actually based on teletype printers - this was common in the late 70s and early 80s because of audience expectations (computer displays were relatively new, and people were still used to the idea of computers communicating via a printer. I saw this on release when I was 18. It was quite shocking. 'Griping' is complaining, especially about petty unimportant things. PS E.T. is a VERY different film. Also worth seeing.
I’ve always heard and echoed the sentiment that Alien is the best sci-fi “carnival haunted/fun house” movie and Aliens is the best action-adventure sci-fi movie.
The practical visual effects still hold up after all these years. The gritty realism of the ship and their crew is how I would imagine a working industrial craft in space would work. Ridley Scott makes such beautiful films
Next is Aliens. Its possibly the greatest sci-fi and the greatest sequel ever made. After that, there are no more movies about Ellen Ripley. But you have to see the Special Edition
8:40 "So this is the small ship." Nope. This is the only ship. The giant thing is the refinery they are towing. This little ship here is the Commercial Towing Vessel Nostromo, crew of 7.
Technically there are two ships if you include the Narcissus, the shuttle Ripley escaped in. Should have been another shuttle as well but it was damaged at their last port and removed for repair.
@@nodak81 I get your point, but "ship" has a definition, a specific definition, that neither the refinery nor the shuttle meet. If the "shuttle" were a "shep" it wouldn't be called a shuttle. Ships are meant for long term life support of a crew. Shuttles are meant to move a small number of people or cargo between two very nearby locations, like from a ship to the shore (on earth) or maybe between two ships sitting next to each other. I called the Nostromo a "tugboat" but technically it's a "tugship" - on earth, tugboat crews usually sleep in their own homes each night because they are not on a ship with facilities and life support for long voyages.
One of my favs ever! Also please watch movies like these in a darkened room on the biggest screen you have. This wil increase your enjoyment and you won't miss hard to see details. As the creators intended.
Some fun facts: when they wrote the screen play, there was no mention of male or female characters, they simply wrote names. The art style and look of the film was inspired by the works of artist HR Giger, his art is to say the least divisive… I don’t think I have ever heard any middle ground with it, that it’s just okay. It’s a love or hate thing I think. I have more, but you seem to be the type who enjoys behind the scenes stuff, especially with your recent fringe BTS reaction, so I’ll not spoil them all. I still need to finish watching that, but as a side note, awesome to see you reacting to that. Very few reactors watch such things, let alone reacting to it!
I see that when the computer outputs "INTERFACE 2037 READY FOR INQUIRY" 5:45 you immediately assume that 2037 is the year. Just for the record, folks, "interface" does *not* mean "year".
13:40 "Why do they have to go in? Since when is that a good idea? Well, they're on a nearly 4 year voyage where they get all their money at the end of the trip - if they don't go on they lose their entire payday. If your boss came to you tomorrow and said "Do this scary thing or you owe us all the money you've been paid for 4 years" would you feel like you had to do the scary thing?
Reminds me of the 18th century whaling ships. They went out for up to 5 years at a time and didn't see a dime until the end of the voyage. What was worse is that they only got a share of the profits, so if they didn't catch any whales they just wasted 5 years of their lives for free. Usually they ended up owing money because they were charged for things like replacement clothing. As a result the crew would do dangerous things to try and kill whales out of financial desperation.
It's liquid latex and it lubricates their joints and mechanical servos. It also helps give them a human-like feel and body shape. As though they're full of blood.
Hi Vic, I've just discovered your channel and I've subscribed. It's great you've seen this sci-fi classic, please react to it's incredible sequel Aliens soon
Mother didnt know how dangerous it was. Just that they found an organic lifeform and wanted to study it. Even if it had been it would have played the odds that the android wouldnt be a target and be able to pilot the ship, with the alien back to earth.
At the end you asked about the big alien on the ship. You probably noticed this when you were rewatching while editing, but that alien was also killed by one of the aliens from the eggs. That alien died just like Kane did at the dinner table, thats why his ribs were broken like he exploded from the inside. Dont skip the sequel Aliens (1986).
There were movies like Alien before it came out (Planet of the Vampires is a good example), but if you've seen a movie like it, a grand for a groat it was ripping it off.
I watched both Alien and The Thing when I was home by myself at night when I was only nine years old. My mom had to unexpectedly work 3rd shift and no one was available to babysit. First thing I did was turn on HBO and watch stuff I knew I shouldn't. It wasn't a big screen but it was certainly dark when I watched them. I still have issues with body horror to this day.
Uh-oh, this TH-cam viewer is confusing "Alien" (1979) with "Aliens" (1986). This gentle soul is boarding the "Nostromo." What will she make of this "old, long, slow-moving, character-centered, no-DFX" movie? 6:28 The Company is sending the equivalent of a freighter crew to "do science" on an unexplored planet! Note: it is NOT the year 2037 on the "Nostromo." 11:12 Savvy viewers saw Ash's "calisthenics" as suspect. 17:54 You're watching the Special Edition version, with scenes not seen in 1979.
I don't think it is justified to call Lambert a coward. She may be noisy in expressing her feelings but she still does quite the hard job most of us would never dream of doing and her reaction to this nightmarish challenge is actually pretty realistic.
Hi my favorite movie series. You need to watch the prequel to this PROMETHEUS then the sequel to it ALIENS. there are other movie in the series. see how it goes.
Love Alien and Aliens. not many sequals can stand toe to toe with the original. Another pair is Terminator 1 and Terminator 2 mother..... motherboard (is what i believe it is) the AI comp running the ship is on a motherboard, so i always figured it could be a short name, like borg in star trek could be short for cyborg due to them being part both organic and tech
Vic: Are the aliens friendly in this movie?
Me: Well ummm... they do like to hug.
And kiss... they kiss too.
Back in the day their was a classic adventure game series called Space Quest; in the second game you can free an adult xenomorph, if she catches you she lands a huge red lip kiss on you... and then releases you... you can play a great deal into the game after this even until you are killed by a chest burster, I always loved this death, it's so cruel to players who save over their game files.
Hey everyone! I'm so sorry for the weird audio, my mic was acting up, but I've changed it now so it's all good for future movie reactions (one has already been filmed though!). Thank you for your consideration!
I want to challenge your assumption that these people were all stupid but Ripley.
First, these are truckers in space, basically a small crew on a tugboat towing a giant refinery to Earth.
They aren't scientists or military; just ordinary people.
But they're all smart enough to manage and operate and fly and fix a spaceship so none of them are stupid.
Ash was a robot programmed to screw everything up; he wasn't stupid, he was following his programming.
Dallas, the captain, did what he had to do. Investigate the signal or lose 4 years of pay.
Kane is Dallas' best friend. They have been on many missions together.
When Kane got that thing on his face, Dallas knew the quarantine rules but wanted to save his best friend.
You said "just kill him" which seems a little cold blooded. Maybe because he's a fictional character that you don't care about or like. But in real life, if that was your best friend, wouldn't you want to try?
Ripley insisted on following quarantine but Ash screwed that up.
Kane died, nobody's fault. Ash probably expected it but nobody else is a doctor or a scientist so they didn't expect it.
Then they went looking for the critter that was smaller than a cat. Pretty harmless, except for the acid blood so they didn't try using guns or anything else that might make it bleed.
But somehow it magically grew up to the size of a horse in just a few hours.
Nobody, not even Ash, thought that was possible (it isn't possible except in Hollywood horror movies).
It grabbed Brett and disappeared into the ventilation system.
Dallas came up with a good plan, using flames to chase it into the airlock then blast it into space. No blood, no acid, easy enough.
But Lambert, the blonde lady, panicked and didn't guide him well.
Not really her fault; some humans panic in deadly situations - but she got Dallas killed.
Then Ripley learned bout the company's plan, Ash tried to kill her, but they killed Ash.
They decided to blow up the ship and leave on the shuttle, but the alien killed Parker and Lambert.
Then it was down to just Ripley and she, obviously, found a way to win.
Other than Lambert being panicky, nobody did anything stupid in this show.
That's what makes the writing so good that people still love this movie 45 years later.
Anybody can write a story about a monster killing a bunch of idiots.
But writing a good story about a monster killing smart people making good decisions?
That's much harder but when it's done right, this might be a generational classic that stands the test of time.
I don't care. She has a point. If people can say the characters in Prometheus or Covenant are stupid, I think it's fair to say the characters in the original Alien are equally stupid
She is correct, they made one stupid decision after another. That's what made the film obviously.
@@LukeLovesRose Maybe.
But I think you made my point, not yours.
Prometheus and Covenant are widely considered to be very inferior to Alien, as is clearly seen in their much lower review scores on websites that do that sort of thing.
Why?
Inferior writing.
Those humans do quite a few senseless things, take silly risks, and make bad decisions.
In Alien, none of the humans do that, aside from one human being panicky and another human wanting to break the rules to save his friend's life.
As I said, it's easy to write a story about a monster killing idiots and those are usually fairly forgettable.
But if you can write a movie about a monster killing smart people, it has a good chance of being memorable forever.
@@blakewalker84120 I think you like so many other people completely misunderstood Prometheus and Covenant. To me, they are far better films than Alien 3. And I know all of the times that the No 57 pops up in Aliens and its significance
@@LukeLovesRose I don't think I even mentioned Alien 3.
I am not a fan of that movie.
Why?
Bad writing and bad directing.
Fight Club, Se7en, even The Game were better movies than Alien 3 so I know Fincher could pull it off, but he had a weak script and didn't manage to rise tot he occasion.
As for Prometheus and Covenant, you have no idea what I understood or not.
Frankly, neither do I because even though I've seen them both twice, I barely remember anything about them.
They just weren't worth that level of investment.
But I'm pretty sure they weren't hard to understand.
Alien takes place in the year 2122, not 2037. Interface 2037 is the command line option for the ship's AI called MUTHUR, which allows the senior officer to ask questions by typing on the keyboard.
39:40 "I'm confused."
The plan was to escape in the shuttle.
Ripley set the Self-Destruct with a 10 minute timer that could be canceled only in the first 5 minutes; after that, it could not be stopped.
She tried to get to the only shuttle to escape but the alien was in her way, right outside the shuttle, so she couldn't get past it to escape.
So then she tried to cancel the Self-Destruct because she doesn't want to die.
Maybe she hoped she could hide for a while until the alien wandered off or fell asleep then try again.
But she was just a little to late to cancel the Self-Destruct.
So now she has 5 minutes to live - she must get to the shuttle or die.
Why bother. Shes too dumb.
At your local retro theater, they might screen a classic movie series and "Alien" and "Aliens" are often a double-feature. They are both incredible experiences on the big screen.
“It’s not original per se”? Coming out in 1979, this film changed horror and sci-fi cinema simultaneously. 75 percent of aliens portrayed in film, animation, and video games STILL are ripping this one off. You’re responding as someone who has been conditioned by many of those games and films.
I call that the Hitchcock/Beatles effect. Younger people see Hitchcock movies, or hear Beatles songs and think they're just normal and fine without the context of how far ahead they were of what everyone else was doing at the time.
I agree about her perspective. She is young, and so she sees movies that came out 40 years later as "original". It's up to us to teach respect for the correct sequence. All I can say is I was in my 20s when this came out, and there was nothing like it at the time (or even since). It makes it very original from my perspective. But, she doesn't live my lifetime; how can she?
Vic: here is a friendly challenge: Try to find a movie made earlier that makes this movie "not original, per se". You will find shows like the (1968) Planet of the Apes (well worth watching the original for all it says about humanity), 2001: A Space Odyssey, the Start Trek TV series, and even Star wars (just 2 years earlier than this movie), plus a few other interesting tv shows. They are all original because none are like the others.
Then you start to see how much modern content borrows from those old titles in terms of characters, story, artwork, mood, or ...
And, you will learn about how original Alien was for its time.
This and other comments made me realize I'm not watching this video, thanks for the warning
@@rexmundi2986 That's sometimes known as the "Seinfeld Is Unfunny" trope.
Alien was stolen from two short stories by American SF author A. E. Van Vogt, "The Black Destroyer" and "Discord in Scarlet" which were 1950 incorporated in the novel "Expedition of the Space" Beagle". Van Vogt sued the production of Alien, the case was settled out of court and he even was credited. So, yes, it was not original. Scott learned from this and in Blade Runner gave proper credits to the original author. In contrary to Cameron, who stole the stories for T1, T2 and Avatar.
"She's the only smart person on the ship."
Parker's also usually right. He and Ripley usually think along the same lines - if it wasn't for the tension between them on a personal level they'd make a good team.
I thought she said Sigourney Beaver there for a second 😆You can tell there's a bit of French here, leaving out certain letters. In English, we pronounce ALL letters :D
Couple things:
Alien borrows heavily from the plot of It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958) in which an alien stows away on a spaceship and starts killing the crew.
When Ripley finds Dallas and Brett, they're being mutated into new eggs. If you notice, you can see the edges of the top of an egg forming under Brett's face. Dallas begs Ripley to kill him and she torches the entire room, killing both of them. This was originally going to be the Alien's lifecycle: It starts as an egg, hatches a "face hugger" which attaches itself to a suitable host and implants the next stage, while keeping the host alive. The face hugger then falls off and dies, while the creature grows inside the person. It then rips its way out as a "chest burster", and quickly grows to an adult. The adult then incapacitates suitable hosts, cocoons them, and mutates them into new eggs, ready to continue the cycle. However, since this scene was cut, it isn't considered canon, and Jame Cameron went in a different direction for Aliens.
The alien ignored the cat because it was too small to make a suitable host.
When Brett enters the large room looking for the cat, you can see the alien hanging on a chain, motionless, just swaying back and forth. Similarly, if you look on the right, you can see the alien's head among the pipes when Ripley enters the shuttle.
The theatrical version omits the fight outside the med bay where Lambert smacks Ripley, the shot of the alien on the chains, and Ripley finding Dallas and Brett.
For what it's worth, while it looks like they enter the derelict alien ship at ground level, never travel upward and then find the "space jockey" in its chair, drawing and models of that ship place the space jockey at the top of the ship under a glass dome. If that's the case, then they were near the top of the ship, and the egg chamber could be below them, rather than in a cave. They addressed this in the novelization when one of them says it can't go down too deep or it would make the ship out of proportion, and another character asks, "In proportion to what?"
And finally, I'm sure someone will tell you that the cast had no idea what was going to happen in the chest bursting scene. That's a myth. It would be impossible to shoot a scene like that without them knowing. They were just surprised by how much blood they used. Veronica Cartwright (Lambert) in particular didn't expect to get hit in the face with it. That's her real reaction in the film.
Not gripping = grab hold, but griping = complaining.
The key grip is head of the grips who gripe about gripping lights.
(English is fun)
Did you recognize Ash, the science officer as Bilbo Baggins in Lord of the Rings? RIP Sir Ian Holm, the British actor with an illustrious career.
You're confused about what the company was trying to do.
Basically some company ship picked up that signal and told the company there was a weird signal.
They didn't know anything about what was there - just an alien signal.
In this universe, humans are just starting to travel in space and have never met any other species of sentient alien; just a few bugs and tiny unintelligent animals on a few worlds.
So this is really new; it's never happened before.
Then the company sent THIS ship to tow back the refinery knowing that they would pass near this signal.
They are not the military so couldn't send an army or anything so they just sent what they had, but they put an android on board to make sure the mission succeeded.
Why did they want it?
They didn't even know what was there.
But they wanted to find out and see if they could use it for biology or technology or anything else that they could make a profit.
Why was the crew expendable?
6 people, some insurance paid to their families, but if it works, they might make billions of dollars in researching and selling whatever they bring back.
Yes, that's pretty evil and greedy, but that's what they decided to do.
Who would've guessed Apple and Google would merge into one giant, evil mega-corporation?
@@nodak81 lol, too true.
And Amazon. Don't forget them...
Ah great movie… if you can find it, there’s a movie called Dark Star which I recommend watching, even if you don’t do it for a reaction. I mention it because it was written by the guy who wrote some of the early drafts of Alien. Dark Star is a really goofy movie and sort of cheesy, but it has some deep philosophical moments, but it’s also a neat way to peer into the writer’s headspace and also notice the genesis of some elements of Alien. There’s one scene of Dark Star that has an inkling of some odd the more terrifying moments of Alien, like Alien is the more scary serious and prolonged version of what the writer would have done with that scene in Dark Star if he had the budget that Alien had it.
It’s also worth seeing because it’s John Carpenter’s first film, basically something he started while still at Uni. John Carpenter went on to be a master of horror films, and it’s awesome to see their early works, or at least it is to me, maybe for you too. But this is a huge tangent, I’ll make some more related comics to this movie in a other comment.
*comments not comics :/
i thought you were talking about deep star six and i got so confused. haha
This movie takes place in 2122. The number 2032 refers to Mother’s interface #, not the year.
The sets and visual language was state of the art in 1979. Ridley Scott (Gladiator, Blade Runner, Legend....) is now considered one of the best directors of the past 25 years. Even his commercial flops always have stunning cinematography.
ps, about the liquid dripping...cooling pipes for the engines and electrical equipment produce condensation (like the back of a window air conditioner).
Leave no cat behind :)
10:05 "What is dry dock?"
For ships on Earth's oceans, when there is damage below the water line but they don't sink, they bring the ship into a special dock, then drain all the water out of that dock so it's now dry and the workers can just walk around and fix the damage without having to swim.
That's a dry-dock.
In space, it means people need to go outside to fix the ship, outside where there is no air.
To do that safely, they put the ship inside a big room, close the door, fill the room with air so workers can safely walk around and fix things.
That's the space version of 'dry-dock'.
And they need to do that, because for some reason, the designers put 90% of the ship's components on the OUTSIDE, rather than put it all safely inside the hull.
@@lurkerrekrul for a very good reason.
Trust me, if Earth's shipbuilders could do that for ocean-going ships, they would.
Why?
You put "components" on a solid weight-bearing structure.
The "hull" of any kind of ship is a solid weight-bearing wall (except for the LEM which is really just a shuttlecraft).
Ocean-going ships can put components on the inside of the hull but not the outside because that would create drag that would slow the ship and probably put undue stress on those components.
For example, the engines on an ocean liner are inside the hull, taking up valuable interior area.
Space has no such drag or wear on components, so things like engines can go outside the hull.
This saves interior space and puts the heat outside rather than inside.
It allows the ship to be smaller, cheaper, and lighter without sacrificing interior area.
@@blakewalker84120 It also makes them much harder to repair and renders them vulnerable to space debris, as well as heat from re-entry to planets with a thick atmosphere. You'll notice that actual Earth spacecraft don't have a ton of pipes, wires and electronic components on the OUTSIDE of the hull.
And to use your analogy, while naval ships might have the odd shielded electrical cable or valve on the outside of the structures on top of the deck, they don't have entire outside walls covered with important components. You're not going to find all the wiring for the ship's electrical systems clamped to the outside of the bridge, nor all the water pipes running up the outside of the cabin area.
You also won't find production cars that look like Doc's modified DeLorean from Back to the Future, with wires running along the side and exposed engine components. OK, they DO make some cars with exposed components, but those are specialty cars and it's done more for appearance than practicality.
A lot of maritime, naval reference. Dry-dock was like a garage for ships where water would be drained and the ship raised dry for repairs and maintenance. For the Nostromo, the Dry-dock would be an orbiting garage where the ship can be repaired. Having cats on board ships was an ancient tradition. They hunted vermins, keeping the crew safe from disease and infestation. Cats are considered good luck by sailors, and a little reminder of home. When you earlier said ‘octopus’, I knew it would come back to haunt you. Be grateful you couldn’t see anything. Imagine the most gruesome ways to be killed. In the novel Parker and Lambert met a horrific end! Vic, Ripley could have used you to watch her back on the Nostromo! As to the lack of character-building, I think it was intentional. When I saw this in theater it had the feeling of a documentary, like you were watching real-life people in a crisis. Never saw anything like this before. If you want answers to your questions, you need to go deeper into the darkness. Watch AlienS!
5:47 Yeah, uh "2037" was the computer interface program number. Not the year. ALIEN takes place in the year 2122
27:30 The ship is so big that the water vapor condenses and falls back like rain.
This movie is called "ALIEN", the sequel to this movie is called "ALIENS".
Mother is what they call the A.I. computer, the name of the ship is The Nostromo.
this was one of the first and considered by many to be the magnum opus of scifi horror. it was very original when it came out and lots of films and games that came later have taken inspiration. you should definitely check out the sequel if you enjoyed this one. very different yet still entertaining.
I've always felt that Alien was to horror what Star Wars was for sci-fi fantasy. It raised the bar so high that the genre had to fundamentally change.
18:57 i thought you were gonna flip over. 😆
I love love love love love LOVE cats, and I swear, when I first watched this movie, I was going to start a riot if Jonesy got killed. The movie got a lot of brownie points from me for making sure Jonesy made it. =P
Same!
23:38 in space, no one can hear Vic scream. 😮
2037 does not mean the year 2037, but rather the command code for inquiry with the AI, Mother.
3:26 Alien (1979)
Aliens (1986)
ET is definitely not this movie heh, though funnily enough, ET is a family film and the movie execs wanted a sequel. Spielberg who made ET didn’t really want to do a sequel, so he wrote a sequel so contrary to the original family movie that was ET, that the execs passed on it which is what Spielberg wanted.
The way the computer displays behave is actually based on teletype printers - this was common in the late 70s and early 80s because of audience expectations (computer displays were relatively new, and people were still used to the idea of computers communicating via a printer.
I saw this on release when I was 18. It was quite shocking.
'Griping' is complaining, especially about petty unimportant things.
PS E.T. is a VERY different film. Also worth seeing.
I saw it in theaters also, but I was 7 lol
I guess you could say it's a dumb terminal which is essentially a teletype but on a monitor.
great horror film. the sequel is up there as one of the best sequels ever made, though it's more of a scifi adventure than horror.
I’ve always heard and echoed the sentiment that Alien is the best sci-fi “carnival haunted/fun house” movie and Aliens is the best action-adventure sci-fi movie.
Other films to check out
Predator, Alien vs Predator, Terminator, Robocop From the 80s, Highlander and Big Trouble in Little China.
The practical visual effects still hold up after all these years. The gritty realism of the ship and their crew is how I would imagine a working industrial craft in space would work. Ridley Scott makes such beautiful films
Dying the way Vic leans back to get away lol
Alien is 1, then Aliens is 2. (The sequel)
Aliens’s is the third
Next is Aliens. Its possibly the greatest sci-fi and the greatest sequel ever made. After that, there are no more movies about Ellen Ripley. But you have to see the Special Edition
8:40 "So this is the small ship."
Nope.
This is the only ship.
The giant thing is the refinery they are towing.
This little ship here is the Commercial Towing Vessel Nostromo, crew of 7.
Technically there are two ships if you include the Narcissus, the shuttle Ripley escaped in. Should have been another shuttle as well but it was damaged at their last port and removed for repair.
@@nodak81 I get your point, but "ship" has a definition, a specific definition, that neither the refinery nor the shuttle meet.
If the "shuttle" were a "shep" it wouldn't be called a shuttle.
Ships are meant for long term life support of a crew.
Shuttles are meant to move a small number of people or cargo between two very nearby locations, like from a ship to the shore (on earth) or maybe between two ships sitting next to each other.
I called the Nostromo a "tugboat" but technically it's a "tugship" - on earth, tugboat crews usually sleep in their own homes each night because they are not on a ship with facilities and life support for long voyages.
That was delightful and fun...also, it's good to know that you're prone to a good jump scare, hehe lol
I was confused some of the time, too, because the ship was so poorly lit! How was the crew not bumping into stuff all the time?
Vic looks extra pretty in the thumbnail. Probably because she's out of her finals.
She's a cutie regardless. She nails that sexy librarian look.
One of my favs ever! Also please watch movies like these in a darkened room on the biggest screen you have. This wil increase your enjoyment and you won't miss hard to see details. As the creators intended.
This movie takes place in 2122 AD. Just for reference
Not quite ET, but in the end, yes, both aliens. I wonder why there is no crossover "Alien VS ET", like they did with Predator 😅
On to the sequels!
Some fun facts: when they wrote the screen play, there was no mention of male or female characters, they simply wrote names.
The art style and look of the film was inspired by the works of artist HR Giger, his art is to say the least divisive… I don’t think I have ever heard any middle ground with it, that it’s just okay. It’s a love or hate thing I think.
I have more, but you seem to be the type who enjoys behind the scenes stuff, especially with your recent fringe BTS reaction, so I’ll not spoil them all. I still need to finish watching that, but as a side note, awesome to see you reacting to that. Very few reactors watch such things, let alone reacting to it!
I see that when the computer outputs "INTERFACE 2037 READY FOR INQUIRY" 5:45 you immediately assume that 2037 is the year. Just for the record, folks, "interface" does *not* mean "year".
Great reaction!
As mentioned, 2037 is just a random computer code. The movie actually takes place in the year 2122.
13:40 "Why do they have to go in? Since when is that a good idea?
Well, they're on a nearly 4 year voyage where they get all their money at the end of the trip - if they don't go on they lose their entire payday.
If your boss came to you tomorrow and said "Do this scary thing or you owe us all the money you've been paid for 4 years" would you feel like you had to do the scary thing?
Reminds me of the 18th century whaling ships. They went out for up to 5 years at a time and didn't see a dime until the end of the voyage. What was worse is that they only got a share of the profits, so if they didn't catch any whales they just wasted 5 years of their lives for free. Usually they ended up owing money because they were charged for things like replacement clothing. As a result the crew would do dangerous things to try and kill whales out of financial desperation.
@@nodak81 Yes, a very similar situation indeed.
The more Canucks I see, The more I'm glad you guys are up there.
That white fluid coming from the android was probably hydraulic fluid that powers his movement and contributes to his strength.
It's liquid latex and it lubricates their joints and mechanical servos. It also helps give them a human-like feel and body shape. As though they're full of blood.
Hi Vic, I've just discovered your channel and I've subscribed. It's great you've seen this sci-fi classic, please react to it's incredible sequel Aliens soon
Good intelligent reaction. Thank you.
@20:20ish.... the ship is more than likely nuclear powered and this would explain the water dripping down. It's space, people! =;-D
30:10 👻
U will enjoy the second movie Aliens better then the 1st one
Ellen Ripley = Icon
Sigourney Weaver = Queen
Mother didnt know how dangerous it was. Just that they found an organic lifeform and wanted to study it. Even if it had been it would have played the odds that the android wouldnt be a target and be able to pilot the ship, with the alien back to earth.
Now, Aliens 👽👽
At the end you asked about the big alien on the ship. You probably noticed this when you were rewatching while editing, but that alien was also killed by one of the aliens from the eggs. That alien died just like Kane did at the dinner table, thats why his ribs were broken like he exploded from the inside. Dont skip the sequel Aliens (1986).
There were movies like Alien before it came out (Planet of the Vampires is a good example), but if you've seen a movie like it, a grand for a groat it was ripping it off.
Reminds me of a buffy episode 😂.. Alien was my 2nd fav .. Aliens ( the 2nd movie) was my favorite
Shows like this is why older generations don't like robotics
I hate to nitpick but this movie should be experienced on a big screen in the dark.
I watched both Alien and The Thing when I was home by myself at night when I was only nine years old. My mom had to unexpectedly work 3rd shift and no one was available to babysit. First thing I did was turn on HBO and watch stuff I knew I shouldn't. It wasn't a big screen but it was certainly dark when I watched them. I still have issues with body horror to this day.
If you like this you should check out Bladerunner.
Anyone spot the orb/ghost floating at 12:22 onwards..... ??????
See Aliens !!!!
Uh-oh, this TH-cam viewer is confusing "Alien" (1979) with "Aliens" (1986). This gentle soul is boarding the "Nostromo." What will she make of this "old, long, slow-moving, character-centered, no-DFX" movie? 6:28 The Company is sending the equivalent of a freighter crew to "do science" on an unexplored planet! Note: it is NOT the year 2037 on the "Nostromo." 11:12 Savvy viewers saw Ash's "calisthenics" as suspect. 17:54 You're watching the Special Edition version, with scenes not seen in 1979.
Please do more movie reactions.
"Am I that stupid?"
🤔
I don't think it is justified to call Lambert a coward. She may be noisy in expressing her feelings but she still does quite the hard job most of us would never dream of doing and her reaction to this nightmarish challenge is actually pretty realistic.
Hope you do Aliens.
thank you, that was quick! 😉
If you like fantasy adventure do Excalibur.
❤❤
I giving your channel a look..To see if I want to follow you.
So far so good..
Have a great day..
No way near Like E.T. the movie..That's cute you thought that..
"Griping" is "Complaining". Lambert likes complaining.
Nice reaction, although naive at times. Ask your patreons for a big cash bonus and then enjoy a nutritious meal of cornbread.
Hi my favorite movie series. You need to watch the prequel to this PROMETHEUS then the sequel to it ALIENS. there are other movie in the series. see how it goes.
Alien 3 does not exist as far as I'm concerned
@@LukeLovesRose I will noy disagree
Does your mom have a reaction channel?
Love Alien and Aliens. not many sequals can stand toe to toe with the original. Another pair is Terminator 1 and Terminator 2
mother..... motherboard (is what i believe it is) the AI comp running the ship is on a motherboard, so i always figured it could be a short name, like borg in star trek could be short for cyborg due to them being part both organic and tech
Already off to a bad start by getting the title wrong.
Not a horror fan, check out Godzilla minus one.
Couldnt make it past your intro. Yuk.
griping = complaining
gripping = grasping something
This movie and a handful of others is why Gen-X is so fucked in the head😅🤘🔥🤘alienS is even better 👍 Ripley..the original female badass.😊
Alien is original everything you have watched before this is a copy of Alien.