This isn’t a belated review of Prometheus. There may be a few spoilers in this post, but I’m not sure yet because I haven’t gotten that far into writing it to know. So: potential spoiler alert!
BAKER STREET
Ridley Scott’s claustrophobic horror classic Alien spawned three sequels, a couple of crossover spinoffs, and now, with Scott’s highly anticipated Prometheus finally in theaters, a prequel.
This story is not about those films. It’s about 5 of their most trailer-trashing, banjo-picking cousins from cinema’s remote backwater, the Alien Rip-off film.
#5 – Alien Contamination (1980)
How it’s like Alien: Astronauts exploring a cave on another world find a bunch of bumpy, slimy alien eggs that glow from within. This leads to exploding chests and a large, drooling monster killing people.
How it’s better than Alien: Eight chestbursters, compared to a lousy one in Ridley Scott’s film.
How it’s worse than Alien: The entirety of the extraterrestrial landscape is a single bad painting. The other 99% of the film takes place in Perth Amboy, NJ, or somewhere that looks like it. And since revered British actors John Hurt and Ian Holm were not available, they hired Ian McCulloch, the unrevered British actor who starred in Dr. Butcher, M.D.
THE KILLOUGH CHRONICLES
by James Killough
If I had gone by the trailer alone, I would never have seen The Avengers, just as I never saw Thor or Captain America. These films aren’t made with me in mind, so why should I shell out sixteen bucks even for my favorite seat, C-22 in the middle of the handicapped section at the Arclight Hollywood? Much as I love movies, that would be the definition of dysfunctional behavior.
Michael Fassbender: Android perfection. Photo: Sebastian Kim
I was just going to let Eric Baker review The Avengers until it became clear almost two weeks ago that it was a juggernaut that was going to make film history, and that suddenly turned it from an ordinary early summer blockbuster into an event this blog had to cover.