Review Detail
9.3 5 10
(Updated: July 17, 2012)
Enjoyment
8.0
Just finished watching this, so here’s my thoughts. First let me say, as a child I loved this movie for no other reason than to hear the all profanity. While we were allowed to watch R-rated action films as kids, none of them had nearly as many F-bombs being dropped as this movie. Thus my brother and I would get plenty of laughs from all the cursing. Even at a young age we already had a sense of humor from taking things out of context. I got older, and never re-visited it. This is the first time I’ve watched this film since I’m about 12-ish.
Ok, as a fan edit, this film succeeds in all aspects. The director’s cuts scenes splice into the theatrical scenes perfectly. It really feels like watching a completely different movie. More character development from the inmates, a completely new side-story (the one prisoners fascination with the alien), and the overall tone of the film doesn’t feel as “rushed” or “diced” as the theatrical version. So for all that, the editor here has done a fabulous job. I was nervous that the cuts would suffer toward the end with Ripley and Bishop’s dialogue, but thankfully the edits are as smooth as possible. My only MINOR quip is when Ripley is in the basement looking for the alien, and when she thinks she found it she says “You’ve been in my life so long, I can’t remember anything else”. Since this edit disregards Aliens, the line seems somewhat out of place since she’s only encountered one alien before this. However, it’s probably my favorite line in the movie so I’m glad it was kept in.
In the end though, out of the 3 in the trilogy (only saw Resurrection once and will never watch it again. It doesn’t exist to me) this film is still the weakest. Some things can’t be helped. The film was plagued by so many changes that it seems like this story was the one they all settled on simply because they had wasted enough time and money. For me the only life-line the movie has to keep the audience engaged is Ripley. Weaver still gives it her all here. While most actors who return to a character that audiences have familiarized them with would normally phone it in by the 3rd outing, Weaver genuinely seems to put in as much as she always did. But anyway, I’m rating the edit here.
I rated it an 8 out of 10 and voted for it in the monthly contest.
Ok, as a fan edit, this film succeeds in all aspects. The director’s cuts scenes splice into the theatrical scenes perfectly. It really feels like watching a completely different movie. More character development from the inmates, a completely new side-story (the one prisoners fascination with the alien), and the overall tone of the film doesn’t feel as “rushed” or “diced” as the theatrical version. So for all that, the editor here has done a fabulous job. I was nervous that the cuts would suffer toward the end with Ripley and Bishop’s dialogue, but thankfully the edits are as smooth as possible. My only MINOR quip is when Ripley is in the basement looking for the alien, and when she thinks she found it she says “You’ve been in my life so long, I can’t remember anything else”. Since this edit disregards Aliens, the line seems somewhat out of place since she’s only encountered one alien before this. However, it’s probably my favorite line in the movie so I’m glad it was kept in.
In the end though, out of the 3 in the trilogy (only saw Resurrection once and will never watch it again. It doesn’t exist to me) this film is still the weakest. Some things can’t be helped. The film was plagued by so many changes that it seems like this story was the one they all settled on simply because they had wasted enough time and money. For me the only life-line the movie has to keep the audience engaged is Ripley. Weaver still gives it her all here. While most actors who return to a character that audiences have familiarized them with would normally phone it in by the 3rd outing, Weaver genuinely seems to put in as much as she always did. But anyway, I’m rating the edit here.
I rated it an 8 out of 10 and voted for it in the monthly contest.
T