Prometheus

It is tough to tell what, if anything anyone has heard about Prometheus going into it.  The biggest talking point of the movie though is that Prometheus is a prequel to Alien.  But I suggest you get that idea out from your head.  Any fan of the original will remember how beautiful and spine chilling that movie was.  Alien deserves to go down as one of the best science fiction movies of all time.  Prometheus really isn't anywhere near that level of excellence but it certainly stands on its own as a really good movie.  Ridley Scott make his return to science fiction in his latest movie Prometheus as one space crew attempts to go and meet its maker.

Of course there are nods and references to the original movie, but this truly is its own movie.  One of the biggest differences being the way the scares come at you.  In the original Alien, the movie was steeped in silence and that is where the terror came from, the feeling of isolation while fearing for your life.  Where the original movie thrived in the silence, Prometheus relies more on action. In this movie Scott has adapted to the times and includes monsters popping out of nowhere, grissley violence and true to the franchise one moment sickeningly similar to the original (and actually a better made sequence).  You can hardly blame Ridley Scott for the shift in tone from the original movie, a film like Alien probably would not be as successful as it was then because the audience demands certain level of pacing.  You need to hook an audience quickly or they could just as easily go to their phones and start trying to find out whats happening after the movie.  While it would be unfair to expect an outcome like Alien when the movie needed to be made to appeal to modern audiences, it does a wonderful job telling its own story.

Visually the movie is striking.  Scott uses 3-D well here and enhances his project and really makes his visuals pop.  He doesn't appear to be throwing it in there just to add to the weekend gross, he uses it effectively and seamlessly to  enhance his project.  In fact all of the technical aspect of the movie are stunning.  Nothing seems out of place and it is hard to think that even the wildest imagination could have crated a more fitting landscape to the movie.  And while some of the movie needs to be computer generated he films as much as he can using live action, and using this technique always allows the movie to come to life, even if it is taking place trillions of miles from Earth.

True to the franchise Scott gives us two strong female leads in Noomi Rapace, from the Swedish version of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo series, and Charlize Theron who will be competing against herself in Snow White and the Huntsman.  Rapace plays Elizabeth Shaw, one of the scientists who discover alien drawings and believe they will help answer man's greatest questions, where did we come from?  She does all that is asked of her and is a completely believable hero.  Backing her research is Meredith Vickers, played by Theron, who has her own agenda on this space trip.  She is cold and calculating in this movie, and leaves nothing to chance, and much like Snow White plays in intimidating force very well.  The other stand out character in the movie is David played by Michael Fassbender who reminded me more of HAL from 2001: A Space Odyssey  than anything else.  Another perfect piece of casting, despite his character having no emotion he is able to play every feeling perfectly from dry humor to the subtle threat.

Independent of anything else this is a really good movie.  In fact some of the weaker parts of the movie come towards the end when they try and tie the movie back to its 1979 counterpart. But had the movie not had the backing of the original I doubt there would be so much excitement surrounding this project.  Prometheus does a better job standing alone as an independent movie, than any prequel has done recently.  B+