prometheus

[Princess Luna]

I loved it and would easily put it in my top 30 favorite science fiction movies, so when I got back from seeing it and checked on the internet expecting glowing reviews I was surprised to see a lot of people were disappointed with it, what are your thoughts?

[bcbm]

haha weird i was totally just going to post about this movie. i thought it was good, i have spent most of the last hour reading theories online. some holes and clunkiness but whatever i'll take it

[Jimmie Higgins]

I saw it. Not that impressed unfortunately. I didn't buy anyone's motivations or any of the plot reveals. It was just kinda HP Lovecraft in moon-boots.

I enjoyed the mystery and production quality of the first 1/3rd and Fassbender's role was the most interesting thing in the whole movie - I wish they'd tightened things up a bit by focusing on him rather than a bunch of generic scientists.

Also I guess I shouldn't have watched Alien right before seeing this - a hard act to follow and in that sense the similarities made the weakness of this move more apparent than if it was just some random sci-fi movie. If that was the case, just a sci-fi space movie by Riddly Scott, then it would be an interesting and above average sci-fi movie that didn't quite work... Boyle's "Sunshine" comes to mind.

[brigadista]

full of plot holes - looks fantastic - i saw it in 3d-hoping the directors cut maybe better- its no alien

[Qavvik]

.

[Rafiq]

Good special effects....

Other then that, it's a piece of shit.

1. Same old bullshit scifi extra terrestrial ending: Fly into space to go back to mysterious home planet which you'll never see because fuck you (District 9, etc.)

2. "advanced, complex" alien species is like a big dumb gorilla who, like the hulk, just kills everyone for no reason (or if he did, he killed them in a dumb way). So predictable. And he fucking chased the girl at the end for no reason! What is he, frankenstein?

3. Not in depth enough.

4. Couldn't take the "It's because that's what I choose to believe" line seriously. Why do you fucking choose to believe?

5. Presupposions about humans having to have been created by some concious being. "Where did we come from?" probably a fucking meteor or something! Ever heard of Darwin?

6. Annoying girl. God I hated her. The space captian, the pilot and the robot were cool.. But the main girl and her boyfriend needed to die.

7. Very predictable.

8. Asshole director never said it was an alien prequel. He said it had nothing to do with alien!

9. Too much plot holes.

10. "You're just a robot, I'm a complex human being with a magical soul". How ironic.

There you have it.

Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk 2

[brigadista]

there could be a further film - unfortunately Damon Lindelof of Lost was involved in this...
will the next film see shaw and david meeting up with the dead crew members in a church in bright sunshine????

[Jimmie Higgins]

Ok my nit-picking:

So the biologist is too scared to look at a decapitated dead alien body, but then is fascinated and tries to handle a space snake for no apparent reason?

I found the characters to be way too cavalier about their first-contact all together. I could have bought it if that one guy took his helmet off and the rest were like "fuck that" but they all did for no reason.

And space safty people - I don't care if it looks like a tribble, if you run across an alien don't freaking handle it, don't even handle wild earth animals you find. Common freaking sense.

The rich guy did all this and presumably set the ball in motion for the company in the Aliens movies because he wanted to find a fountain of youth? How about a fountain of McGuffin. It was much better when the company wanted to just try and exploit the new possibilities of this species without caring about the consequences of to crew ("Expendable") or to all of earth. Profits over chests that don't explode from alien babies.

The ship characters on Alien all had relateable and realistic responses to what happened - even when their response was stupid, the script made note of it. So it was a conflict over taking the infected passenger on board, there was conflict over blowing up the ship or not. The ship tech/mech workers just wanted their contracts to be honored, the captain wanted things to run smoothly etc. In this one no one made any sense. There was a surley engineer for no apparent reason, a nerdy biologist for no apparent reason and the co-pilots of the ship agreed to kill themselves unnecessarily when the captain drove the ship into the alien ship just because a scientist told him to over the radio! If the crew had seen the woman self-operate. then maybe they'd be freaked out enough to crash into a ship rather than get parasites exploding from their heads.

In general it felt like people did things for the sake of plot, rather than there being an organic connection between plot and character.

I liked the Lawrence of Arabia aspects and wish they had done more with it - ideally dealt with the issues of colonialism and space. Aliens was about corporations in space, so introducing this element early on got me all excited for something a little more interesting and touching on myths about colonialism possibly.

[Jimmie Higgins]

there could be a further film - unfortunately Damon Lindelof of Lost was involved in this...
will the next film see shaw and david meeting up with the dead crew members in a church in bright sunshine????Oh don't you dare talk about Lost - mock the last season all you want, but that was a great show overall. It wrote the book on how to do mysterious sci-fi mystery wierdness: the first rule being only explain what is relevant to the characters about mysterious events. The problem with the last season was they broke from that and instead of being maybe spiritual maybe material, they told us it was all spiritual and they told us a bunch of things that fans complained that they needed answers to.

That being said, the writing was the weak link in this movie IMO. Bad-one Lost writer.

[brigadista]

fyi i loved lost and watched it all -just hated the end - in prometheus shaw's religious beliefs seemed a bit irrelevant tbh when i think they were supposed to be significant but the characters were so under developed that it was truly lost.....

[bcbm]

5. Presupposions about humans having to have been created by some concious being. "Where did we come from?" probably a fucking meteor or something! Ever heard of Darwin?

they mention this in the movie, though i think its glossed over too briefly. there were definitely a lot of problems with the movie overall but i went in with pretty low expectations and was pleased. i think the inevitable directors cut will probably be better, hopefully the pacing in the last third is better. anxious to see where the sequels will go too

[castlebravo]

i think the inevitable directors cut will probably be better, hopefully the pacing in the last third is better.

problem is, according to wikipedia, since it got an R rating, nothing was cut.
"On May 7, 2012, Fox confirmed that the film had received an R-rating and would be released without any cuts being made."

but who knows. also, noomi rapace is fun, liked her since the millenium trilogy.

[TheRedAnarchist23]

If Rafiq hated it I will probaly love it, downloading now!

If i end up hating it as well that will become my one similarity to Rafiq.

[Tim Cornelis]

2093 and still capitalism, yeah right.

I loved the movie but some things made no sense.

They fly 350,000,000,000,000,000,000 (something) km into space to a moon of some planet, spend a shitload of money on this trip, and they debrief the crew only at the arrival? Yeah right.

It's also completely bullshit that they will fly a shitload of kilometers for a shitload of money because that woman "chooses to believe" in something without ANY evidence. How realistic is that. (yet she was right, what are the odds right?).

Also, the head coming back to life made no sense. Also, why did the two get lost in the cave, it made no sense, there was only one way back, just follow that and you come to the entrance.


I loved it and would easily put it in my top 30 favorite science fiction movies,

Top 30 of science fiction movies... That's not really an accomplishment.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

I think I went into the film thinking it'd be shit and so was pleasantly surprised by it. Fassbender was very convincing but really he was the only decent and intriguing role in the entire film.

[Rafiq]

2093 and still capitalism, yeah right.


Jokes aside that's probably one of the first things I noticed, and I was equally puzzled.

[bcbm]

2093 and still capitalism, yeah right.

if space exploration takes off to the point it is in the movie i dont see why not


It's also completely bullshit that they will fly a shitload of kilometers for a shitload of money because that woman "chooses to believe" in something without ANY evidence. How realistic is that.

the old guy wanted to live forever and he had some cash to throw around and their theory wasn't like based on absolutely nothing.


Also, the head coming back to life made no sense.

it wasnt alive it was just getting an electric current enough to stimulate the poison or whatever



after rewatching alien i remembered one thing that always sucks about sci fi prequels (star wars did this big time) the technology in the 'past' is like leaps and bounds ahead of what they had... a century later?

[Sputnik_1]

it was awesome O_O

[#FF0000]

after rewatching alien i remembered one thing that always sucks about sci fi prequels (star wars did this big time) the technology in the 'past' is like leaps and bounds ahead of what they had... a century later?

Every single time.

But yeah I thought it was aight. Lots of characters doing things just because it was in the script, though, like Jimmie pointed out. It was, at least, visually stunning even in regular theaters. IMAX3D was apparently a real spectacle.

[Le Socialiste]

1. Same old bullshit scifi extra terrestrial ending: Fly into space to go back to mysterious home planet which you'll never see because fuck you (District 9, etc.)

There's supposed to be a sequel, which I trust will shed light on what happens after Shaw and David leave the planet. If there weren't any plans for a second movie I'd be kinda pissed too.

All in all though, I was pleased with it. No real complaints here. I'm generally not one for nitpicking.


Asshole director never said it was an alien prequel. He said it had nothing to do with alien!

Actually, it was said that the movie takes place in the same universe as the Alien series, years before the events that make up the first Alien.

[bcbm]

spoilers in this post...

yeah given the presence of the space jockeys, the xenomorph shrine or whatever, identical bridge and ship to the ship they find in alien and uh the giant face hugger and xenomorph at the end its p. obvious this is an alien prequel

[Ele'ill]

Someone at work spoiled this entire movie already but he said it lacked the horror/psychological aspect that Alien had. He also said the ending was open ended

[bcbm]

yeah i dont think it is meant to be a horror/psychological thriller though. more just an intellectual action movie, on which i would give it a b- on both accounts.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

One thing I never get is that according to Fassbender's robot character humans apparently feel more comfortable with robots looking like humans and you see such statements in other sci-fi films as well. I don't know about you but I think I'd be pretty uncomfortable treating someone that looks and acts human as my veritable slave.

[Yu Ming Zai]

Ok my nit-picking:
I liked the Lawrence of Arabia aspects and wish they had done more with it - ideally dealt with the issues of colonialism and space. Aliens was about corporations in space, so introducing this element early on got me all excited for something a little more interesting and touching on myths about colonialism possibly.

Same here, they presented us with so many ideas and themes but they never expanded on it and was only discussed briefly. Like Elizabeth Shaw's dreams, it was only briefly mentioned and it was difficult to understand her evolution as a character in relation to that. If there was any. Another was the idea of creation and what it means in the eyes of the creators and in the eyes of the created. The relationship was talked about briefly between the android David and Charlie Holloway but I wish they expanded this notion to not only the android's relationship with the humans but also the humans in relation to the Engineers. There were many other ideas and themes that were underdeveloped as well but these were the ones I cared about the most.

Though despite these short comings, I still think it was a good movie. It is obvious that its setting up for sequels and I hope if they do make them that it would explore these ideas and themes more thoroughly as well as answering the lingering questions on everybody's minds. Overall I think I will give this movie a 8 out of 10 and I recommend everyone to gave this movie a try, especially those interested in sci-fi.

[Rafiq]

There's supposed to be a sequel, which I trust will shed light on what happens after Shaw and David leave the planet. If there weren't any plans for a second movie I'd be kinda pissed too.

Wasn't the first one, where they're in front of that fucked up planet, the conclusion? I was told that Shaw was indeed the gal from Alien.


All in all though, I was pleased with it. No real complaints here. I'm generally not one for nitpicking.


Hey, it was entertaining and I don't regret watching it. I just disliked the story a lot, and wish it didn't take itself as serious as it did.


Actually, it was said that the movie takes place in the same universe as the Alien series, years before the events that make up the first Alien.


Early, the director said it didn't, and then later, before the movie came out, he contradicted himself and said it did.

[Rafiq]

yeah i dont think it is meant to be a horror/psychological thriller though. more just an intellectual action movie, on which i would give it a b- on both accounts.

Then in that regards it gets an E. Action wise, which I include special effects, all that good eye candy, I give an A-

[Brosa Luxemburg]

It was obviously a prequel to the Alien movies. In the first Alien the ship that they see where everyone is dead on board is called the Prometheus.

[bcbm]

It was obviously a prequel to the Alien movies. In the first Alien the ship that they see where everyone is dead on board is called the Prometheus.

no it isn't, in the first alien they find a space jockey ship not a human one and it is on a different planet than where prometheus landed

[Hit The North]

Jokes aside that's probably one of the first things I noticed, and I was equally puzzled.

Well, duh, if it's a prequel to the Alien films, capitalism has to exist as it exists later in the other films. It's the evil Weyland Corporation that stalks Ripley throughout the four films in their attempt to utilise the xenomorph as a weapon.

But, for me, that is the only continuity that works in the Prometheus film. Generally it lacked the integrity to sacrifice commercial motives for the benefit of a coherent story and universe. So, for instance, I was mildy irritated by the fact that the crew in Prometheus had more advanced technology than either of the crew in the first two movies (apart from the weaponry). It's obvious that the technicians and special-effects people owned this movie more than the writer did. The tech shit should have been scaled way down.

And then things got sloppy. After painstakingly and convincingly recreating the ship where the first alien was found, down to the giant alien sitting in the big gun-chair with his chest ripped out, they decided to fuck this continuity off and go for the chase and stand-off with the Ripley-lite character. Why? Not because it improved the story but because that finale has become a staple of the series: the girl has to be there to fight alone against the big bad alien. There were a lot of clumsy nods to the tropes of the series. So, the "invasive alien" = "pregnancy" trope had to be played out and appears in the guise of one of the most ridiculous scenes I've ever seen in any film, the self-administered cesarian section!

As for the boring metaphysics and idiot-scrawl about souls and shit, that is just so American. 2001, a film Prometheus has been compared to, and a much more European film, didn't need all that religious bullshit.

The thing I did like was the character of David, mainly because of his duplicity and the way he took pleasure in fucking around with the humans. He, a creation of humans, was doing to them, what the Engineers feared their creation would one day do to them? Summat like that.

But I actually thought that Iron Sky was more profound than this sub-Malick mush.

[Le Socialiste]

Wasn't the first one, where they're in front of that fucked up planet, the conclusion? I was told that Shaw was indeed the gal from Alien.

I'm not sure I understand what it is you're referring to here. Shaw's character isn't in any of the first four Alien films. I guess I'm just fuzzy on what you're asking. What "first one?" Which fucked up planet? Are we still talking about Prometheus, or another film entirely?


Hey, it was entertaining and I don't regret watching it. I just disliked the story a lot, and wish it didn't take itself as serious as it did.

I understand, I guess I just didn't really bother thinking about all the little details within the story as I watched it. I personally found it highly enjoyable for what it was. I was kind of glad it deviated significantly from the other Alien movies as well (seeing a facehugger launching itself from an egg onto the face of an unsuspecting character loses its shock-value after awhile). While it contained what RS termed "Alien DNA," it wasn't an exact replica and I appreciated that.


Early, the director said it didn't, and then later, before the movie came out, he contradicted himself and said it did.

I think he and everyone else wanted to throw people off by saying it wasn't another Alien film, while knowing full well that it more or less was. If you've read anything about the script before Lindelof rewrote it, it was filled with alien eggs, facehuggers, and xenomorphs - the whole deal. It wasn't until later that the idea was scrapped in favor of a different approach.

[x359594]

Concerning Alien (Ridley Scott, 1979) and its immediate sequel Aliens (James Cameron, 1986,) the 1979 film clearly had an anti-capitalist sub-text that was part of the post-Watergate zeitgeist, but Aliens was a Reagan-era apology.

The crucial difference is the altered plot point about the android Ash. In Alien Ash was deliberately programed by the Company to bring the alien life form back to the weapons division ("crew expendable",) but in Aliens Ash is said to have simply broken down, and the Company is absolved; it's merely a greedy executive who's responsible for the wrong doing in Aliens (like the Tower Commission Report on Contragate: "The system worked, it was only over-zealous functionaries who exceeded their authority and not part of a deliberate policy.")

[Hit The North]

Concerning Alien (Ridley Scott, 1979) and its immediate sequel Aliens (James Cameron, 1986,) the 1979 film clearly had an anti-capitalist sub-text that was part of the post-Watergate zeitgeist, but Aliens was a Reagan-era apology.

The crucial difference is the altered plot point about the android Ash. In Alien Ash was deliberately programed by the Company to bring the alien life form back to the weapons division ("crew expendable",) but in Aliens Ash is said to have simply broken down, and the Company is absolved; it's merely a greedy executive who's responsible for the wrong doing in Aliens (like the Tower Commission Report on Contragate: "The system worked, it was only over-zealous functionaries who exceeded their authority and not part of a deliberate policy.")

But, of course, it is the greedy executive who makes these excuses on behalf of the company and his later duplicity wipes out any sincerity he might have had. We're not supposed to believe that Ash was merely "broken".

[piet11111]

But, of course, it is the greedy executive who makes these excuses on behalf of the company and his later duplicity wipes out any sincerity he might have had. We're not supposed to believe that Ash was merely "broken".

True the wayland -yutani corporation used the "defective" android and the insanity of Ripley as the cover story for the loss of the Nostromo.

Ripley was more or less forced to go along with the marines in order to prove she's not insane and to regain her licenses to work on spaceships again instead of loading and unloading ships for the rest of her life.

[x359594]

...it is the greedy executive who makes these excuses on behalf of the company and his later duplicity wipes out any sincerity he might have had. We're not supposed to believe that Ash was merely "broken".

It was the android Bishop (Lance Henriksen) who explains to Ripley that the Ash model was a little "twitchy" and just went haywire, not the greedy executive Burke.

The social context of Aliens (released in 1986 during the Central America wars) argues for reading the movie as regressive. The Colonial Marines are sent to protect the humans who are on the planet to terraform it and bring it into the trans-galactic capitalist framework even if it means exterminating the native inhabitants, the murderous, disgusting alien creatures. In the end they nuke the planet to keep the monsters from spreading.

[Veovis]

I was watching Feminist Frequency a few weeks before seeing this movie, and while sitting in the theatre I was reminded of this:

0rhH_QGXtgQ

[Ele'ill]

Did anyone follow the graphic novels and some of the comic books that further detailed the Alien universe and timeline? Newt's Tale covered a lot and supposedly that first ship, the one that looks like a U that they explored and caused all the problems in the first Alien movie was the same ship that Newt's family and other colonists found later that began the movie Aliens.

http://images.wikia.com/avp/images/0/0d/Aliens_Newt's_Tale_1.jpg


Also the two comic books 'Alien Labyrinth' and 'Music of the Spears' (which was pretty weird) were kind of a lot like the Alien Resurrection movie which sucked.

[Yuppie Grinder]

I'm a huge fan of the original Alien, and think that Aliens is pretty cool. I'm not big on anything after that.
I don't normally see films in the theater because it's overpriced, but I might go see this. Is it actually scary at all, though?

[Hit The North]

It was the android Bishop (Lance Henriksen) who explains to Ripley that the Ash model was a little "twitchy" and just went haywire, not the greedy executive Burke.

The social context of Aliens (released in 1986 during the Central America wars) argues for reading the movie as regressive. The Colonial Marines are sent to protect the humans who are on the planet to terraform it and bring it into the trans-galactic capitalist framework even if it means exterminating the native inhabitants, the murderous, disgusting alien creatures. In the end they nuke the planet to keep the monsters from spreading.

Sure, Bishop concedes that the Ash model was twitchy, but he doesn't offer this as a full blown excuse for what happened. Meanwhile, whatever was the social context, your analysis doesn't explain the actions of the corporate exec, who purposely tries to infect both Ripley and Newt and screw over the entire mission. His motivation? To secure transport of the alien for the company's arms development wing. In other words, there is no difference in the interests being pursued by the Weyland Corp in either the first two movies. It is because the android can no longer be relied upon to prosecute this mission (given the safety protocols installed in the Bishop model) that a human agent is necessary. The nuking of the planet is opposed by the company man and is certainly not part of the company's original plan.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Sure, Bishop concedes that the Ash model was twitchy, but he doesn't offer this as a full blown excuse for what happened. Meanwhile, whatever was the social context, your analysis doesn't explain the actions of the corporate exec, who purposely tries to infect both Ripley and Newt and screw over the entire mission. His motivation? To secure transport of the alien for the company's arms development wing. In other words, there is no difference in the interests being pursued by the Weyland Corp in either the first two movies. It is because the android can no longer be relied upon to prosecute this mission (given the safety protocols installed in the Bishop model) that a human agent is necessary. The nuking of the planet is opposed by the company man and is certainly not part of the company's original plan.

Yeah, x(etc)'s reading of the sequel is interesting, but I always interpreted the movie as you do above. By switching from an android carrying out the company's mission at the expense of every human consideration to a human (a rather non-threatening seeming one at that), the movie seems to undermine the argument made in the movie that it was a "malfunction" of the first android.

Additionally I always saw the broader context of the movie to be a sort of reflection of the "Vietnam Syndrome" and maybe a kind of liberal poke at all the macho movies about bands of ex-military badasses-taking-on-whole-countries that were popular at the time. The way the Marines all get wiped out so suddenly, leaving everyone in a "quagmire" seems to suggest this "Vietnam syndrome" reading. But X's argument about Latin America is interesting and probably is a factor. The liberal response post-Vietnam to 80s US imperialism was than any new war with ground troops would end up as a quagmire.

A lot of Sci-Fi inherently has a colonialism connection and this movie could also be read as a take on the stock story of defending villagers from hostile natives which then has any number of analogues in real-life imperialism. The US generally says it's sending troops like a modern Calvary to help defend some small helpless group who are under siege by whomever the US wants to attack.

[Deicide]

Am I the only person on the planet who thinks the Alien films are 'meh' and masturbated over way too much?

[Jimmie Higgins]

Am I the only person on the planet who thinks the Alien films are 'meh' and masturbated over way too much?No not at all. 9 out of 10 ministers agree that masturbating over Aliens movies will make you go blind.

[Deicide]

Well, that made me giggle, thanks.

I may actually go see this. The last time I went to the cinema, I watched the Thor film, which was utter bollocks.

[piet11111]

Am I the only person on the planet who thinks the Alien films are 'meh' and masturbated over way too much?

Depends the first 2 where masterpieces everything after was a slide into mediocrity.

It surprises me how different the 2 movies are with the first being more survival horror and the other more of an action movie.

[Raúl Duke]

Here's a review I found interesting:

http://digitaldigging.net/prometheus-an-archaeological-perspective/

Also, a video about the inconsistencies of the movie

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-x1YuvUQFJ0

[La Comédie Noire]

Alright so.

Cons:

1. The faith subtext was stupid.

2. The Characters were one dimensional.

3. The story fell apart at the end.

Pros

1. Awesome Cinemaphotography and picture quality.

2. Lot's of references for the Alien/ Predator franchise fans.

3. Cool Ancient Aliens zeitgeist riff.

EDIT:

Oh and Hollywood just doesn't have a clue how DNA works.

[o well this is ok I guess]

I always figured that if we went into space we'd be pretty strict about our safety protocols.
I wouldn't even let these guys operate a forklift.