Back to 1979: Alien

My wife and I were sick yesterday, and it just a lot of fun to watch a scary movie with my wife. She gets so scared and jumpy that she adds to the movie itself.

So, I rented Alien. Not the silly modern-day Aliens with computer animation. No, the real thing. My wife had never seen Alien, not one of them. Thanks to DVDs, you can rent old movies and still get fresh images. I just hope our hardware will remain DVD-compatible for a long time because I want to be able to watch Alien with my son when he is old enough.

For some reason, I didn’t recall the cat. My wife noticed the cat right away, and it all came back to me that Alien was a cat-movie, after all. It’d be funny to do an analysis of the movie: I think the cat gets nearly as much face time as the alien…

Verdict? This movie is a true classic. Oh… you could redo it with computer animation, but I doubt you would gain much. This was a true work of art. It still feel fresh. Of course, the computer consoles remind me a bit too much of a VIC-20, but that’s alright.

To my surprise, my wife actually enjoyed the movie, so we are going to rent the whole gang.


  • Ridley Scott also directed Blade Runner (1982), Thelma & Louise (1991), and Hannibal (2001)
  • The original Alien screenplay was written by Dan O’Bannon and Ronald Shusett. They also wrote for Alien Vs. Predator (2005), Alien: Resurrection (1997), AlienÂ³ (1992), Total Recall (1990), Aliens (1986), Invaders from Mars (1986).
  • Sigourney Weaver also played in Ghost Busters (1984), Aliens (1986), AlienÂ³ (1992), Alien: Resurrection (1997), Galaxy Quest (1999). She was 30 years old when Alien was released, she is now 56 years old.
  • Not counting Alien Vs. Predator as an Alien movie (Sigourney Weaver doesn’t play in AVP), the first and the last Alien movie are 18 years apart. 4 movies were made: Alien (1979), Aliens (1986), AlienÂ³ (1992), Alien: Resurrection (1997). Roughly one Alien movie every 5 years.
  • No two Alien movies had the same director.
  • It is generally accepted that the first two movies in the series are the best.

Published by

Daniel Lemire


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