It’s a funny thing I had never seen Aliens in its entirety until today. Somehow, I missed the first half hour of the movie and only came in when the main action was beginning. So finally, I have the correct basis on which to judge it.
I won’t synopsize the plot because it’s an Alien movie so the plot is for Sigourney Weaver to outlive the rest of her fellow humans battling the aliens before ultimately jettisoning a xenomorph into the vacuum of space.
As in the original “Alien” movie Sigourney Weaver is Ellen Ripley a commercial astronaut who works for the evil Weyland-Yutani Corporation. Fifty-seven years after the first Alien attack Ripley is discovered still in suspended animation in the shuttle craft that she used to escape the destruction of her ship the Nostromo.
The evil Weyland-Yutani Corporation was very unhappy about her blowing up their ship but when they find out that their terra-forming colony on the planet that the alien was found on has gone silent they send “space marines” and Ripley to fix things. They also send Paul Reiser playing smarmy corporate yes man, Carter Burke to provide the requisite “greedy corporation wants xenomorph for bioweapon” subplot. And finally, they throw in an android to show that despite what happened in the first movie, androids can be pretty swell people too.
And finally, to soften up Ripley’s Rambo impression, they throw in an orphaned little girl named Newt that Ripley rescues a few times over the course of the movie, proving that a modern woman truly can have it all.
So, the producers pull out all the stops. Aliens are popping up everywhere in the industrial complex that serves as the venue for this first-person shooter game. Bits of aliens and “molecular acid” are sprayed everywhere and one by one the marine platoon is picked off by the monsters. Until finally we’re down to Ripley, Newt, android and the pick of the Marine crew, Corporal Dwayne Hicks played by the ever-popular Michael Biehn. But during the final rescue of Newt on the planet Hicks is wounded by molecular acid and from then on, all the heavy lifting is done by Ripley. Which she performs with panache, culminating in the above mentioned obligatory spacing of the mother alien (of course there’s a mother alien).
So, what did I think? Well, I have some quibbles. The plot contrives it that the marines can’t use their heaviest weapons because the industrial plant is a “thermonuclear” power plant and if any of their explosive charges rupture a heat exchanger line the whole plant will detonate. Since it’s a cinch that all the colonists (except Newt) are already dead why are they bothering to throw away their lives in this death trap. As Ripley so astutely recommended, “I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.” Also, they overdid it with the strong female characters and weak male ones. Yeah, I know, I know. “There’s nothing wrong with that.” But honestly it is insulting and stupid.
But taken all in all the movie does provide an exciting action-adventure/science fiction/horror experience. I won’t claim it’s my favorite but it is a worthy representative of its genre. I will give it a recommended status.