"Alien": In Basements, No One Can See You Watch
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Atmosphere is so important for a film.
When I say atmosphere, I don’t just mean what the filmmaker creates with the art department, cinematographers, gaffers and other key members of a crew when they get together to decide on the look of a film. I mean where the actual film is watched.
As a child, we moved from the inner city of my hometown to the suburbs, and this probably influenced how I would approach my love of films. In the suburbs, I met kids whose parents had the first cable movie programs (First Choice was quite popular). I saw that some of them had VCRs and the tapes to go with them. And I realized that I was closer to certain drive-ins and theatres out in the sticks than I had been in the city (an odd quirk that played out quite well). And yet, despite all of these new developments, it was the basement of our home that became my preferred movie theatre.
We had no cable or VCRs until I was a teenager, so I often relied on my parents or relatives to take me out to see movies. Friends would occasionally have sleepovers and we would get away with watching a lot of films that I was clearly too young to see or really understand. But always, when I could, I would go back to the dark of the basement on a Friday or Saturday night, and wait for the terror to turn on that small screen.
The movies you watch as a kid, much like the music you listen to then, will affect you in ways that you may never understand or appreciate until much later in life. There were television programs that still linger in my thoughts and songs from those years that are a perfect soundtrack to both good and bad memories. And then there are the movies that scared, amused, moved and pushed me to accept that the cinematic world was a lot bigger and more terrifying than I could imagine.
Ridley Scott’s “Alien” got me there.
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Think about it: you have a crew travelling through space after finding and hauling several tons of ore to be processed once they make it back to Earth. Then, there is the early wake-up call to discover not only did they not make it back home, but they have to handle a distress call, pick up an unwanted guest, and spend the rest of the film hunting it down and attempting to prevent the downfall of humanity.
No spoilers.
Seriously, this film was the first time I could look at a movie set in outer space and not think of Jedi, E.T., or black holes (Disney really wrecked me with that last one). And it was also the first scary movie to make me understand the appeal of scary movies. Recently, I had to defend my love of these films and I could only state that they were a way to escape the dullness of our own lives (well, at least mine). Remember: I was new to suburbia, being exposed to a new type of world that I had never thought of before: the world of movies on demand. And there I was with Ripley, Dallas, Kane, Brett, Parker, Lambert, Ash (yes, he counts), and Jonesy as they faced a situation where their entire ship, the Nostromo (I would soon become a Joseph Conrad fan), became what one critic would call “a gigantic flying haunted house”.
It is also one of those films where the elements seem to just belong together so well. The actors are perfectly matched up to the material, with Sigourney Weaver as the standout you never expect to survive to the end credits (again, no spoilers here; and you should have seen it already). The set design and the look of the creature owe their genius to Rob Cobb (also a fixture on the Star Wars movies) and H.R. Giger (both Rob and Hans Ruedi would pass away and be lauded for their cinematic contributions). It is almost as if the monster deserves to be there more than the “expendable” crew. And the next time you watch it, please try this trick: turn around and simply listen to the sounds that come from Jerry Goldsmith’s brilliant soundtrack, and the sound design of the film. It is all brought together to give you a sense of dread and foreboding that pays off in key moments (you know which ones I mean…)
Okay, it might seem like I have an obsession with this film after writing this article and the two earlier pieces written for Peliplat on Yaphet Kotto. Well, I do. As I said, what hits us in our youth can never be forgotten and “Alien” was proof that certain stories needed to be told that probed the darkness we fear in outer space and inner selves.
And now, you must forgive me. It is Hallowe’en, and I have to take my yearly excursion with the fair crew as they fight to survive a monster and a company that just did not care.
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