Raz’s Midnight Macabre Horror Review: Aliens (1986)

The planet from Alien has been colonized, but contact is lost. This time, the rescue team has impressive firepower, but will it be enough?

No one could predict the huge success of “Alien” and fans were left wanting more, they would have to wait 7 years but they finally got the sequel they’d been waiting for.

Sigourney Weaver had initially been very hesitant to reprise her role as Ripley, and had rejected numerous offers from Fox Studios to do any sequels, fearing that her character would be poorly written, and a sub-par sequel could hurt the legacy of “Alien”. However, she was so impressed by the high quality of James Cameron’s script that she finally agreed to do the film. Can you imagine if Weaver hadn’t returned? Would they have replaced her with a different actress or gone in a completely different direction?

To most people the choice of James Cameron as director was mystifying as “The Terminator” hadn’t even been released yet. The film’s assistant director continually questioned Cameron’s decisions and was openly critical towards him. Ultimately producer Gale Anne Hurd had no choice but to fire him and he briefly instigated a mass walk-out from the rest of the crew. Fortunately this was quickly resolved but casted some doubt as to whether the film would be finished. I find this funny because when “The Terminator” finally did get released I’m sure there were a few grinning faces.

An addition to the cast I loved was Bill Paxton. Every film he’s been in he’s always brought something special to it,  one story I love about the knife trick scene involving Paxton is that everyone on set knew about it, except Bill Paxton. You can see the true terror on his face when his hand gets pinned down, after hearing that story it always makes me laugh when I see it. Paxton also improvised much of his lines and many of them were kept in the film, the man just oozes talent.

Also Sigourney Weaver puts in another amazing performance, the story of her mother-daughter bond with Newt brought a-lot of depth to the what could’ve been a flat story, it added so much emotion that you get drawn in-to it and feel for them yourself. The scene where we finally meet the Queen Alien is one of my favourites, she’s more than we imagined she would be and you can tell a-lot of thought went into her design.

 “Aliens” is more of an action based film than the first but it carries the story on well, it’s one of the rare sequels that doesn’t dismiss it’s predecessor or disappoint the fans. James Cameron did a great job of continuing Ridley Scott’s vision but as much as I love it, I do wonder what it would’ve been like with Scott on board.

 

Miscellaneous facts about the film:

Hicks was originally played by James Remar, but Michael Biehn replaced him a few days after principal photography began, due to “artistic differences” between Remar and director James Cameron. However, Remar still appears in the finished film – but wearing the same armor, and shot from behind, it’s impossible to tell the difference between the two actors.

All of the cast who were to play the Marines (with the exception of Michael Biehn, who replaced James Remar one week into filming) were trained by the S.A.S. (Special Air Service, Britain’s elite special operations unit) for two weeks before filming.

Armourer Terry English made three sets of armour for each member of the cast who needed to wear armour. He was only given two weeks to complete the job and upon arriving back at his workshop a few hours drive away from the film set, he realized he had forgotten the scrap of cloth James Cameron had given him so that the camouflage on the armour could be matched correctly to the uniforms the marines would be wearing. Instead of going all the way back, English painted the completed sets of armor from memory. The result was a pattern and colour combination not too dissimilar to the British Army DPM pattern. Fortunately, Cameron liked the contrast between the armour and the BDUs (Battle Dress Uniforms) the marines wore beneath it, saying it make the armour more obvious to the eye.

According to the 1991 Special Widescreen Collector’s Edition Laserdisc release of the movie (presented on the Bonus Disc of the 2003 Alien Quadrilogy DVD Box Set), James Cameron turned in the first treatment for the film, called Alien II at the time, on September 21, 1983. Some of the differences between this initial treatment and the final film included the following: – The character of Carter Burke was absent, instead, his dialogue was given to someone named Dr. O’Niel, who did not join Ripley and the marines on their voyage to the colony planet. – Instead of being taken to the Gateway Station, Ripley was taken to Earth Station Beta. – The name of the colony planet was Acheron, taken from the script of Alien, instead of LV-426. – Ripley’s daughter was alive, and Ripley had a disheartening videophone conversation with her, where she blamed Ripley for abandoning her by going to space. – There were multiple atmospheric processors on the planet. – The initial discovery of the aliens on the colony planet is much longer, where it is shown how Newt’s father gets to the site of the eggs and is jumped by a facehugger. – An additional scene involves a rescue team going to the site of the alien eggs and being jumped by tens of facehuggers. – The aliens sting people to paralyze them before either killing or cocooning them. – At one point Ripley, Newt and Hicks get cocooned. – The aliens cocooning people are a different breed. They look like smaller, albino versions of the warrior aliens. – Bishop refuses to land on the planet and pick up Ripley, Hicks and Newt, indicating “the risk of contaminating other inhabited worlds is too great.” – Ripley ends up using the colonists’ shuttle to get back to the Sulaco. – Bishop tells her: “You were right about me all along.” The first draft script was turned in by Cameron on May 30, 1985. This draft was quite different from the treatment, but very close to the final film.

A scene on the colony before the alien outbreak was deleted from the final cut. Elements of that scene show up in later James Cameron projects. The line, ‘… and we always get the same answer: ‘Don’t ask’.’ was used in Terminator 2: Judgment Day. In fact the entire scene in Terminator 2 follows the same pacing and tone as the scene cut from the theatrical version of Aliens: – an employee flags down a supervisor and they walk together, talking about the behavior of their employer – Weyland-Yutani in Aliens, CyberDyne Systems in Terminator 2 – and ending in the line ‘…don’t ask.’. The character name ‘Lydecker’ was used in Dark Angel.

During the sequence in which Newt and Ripley are locked in MedLab, Ripley is attacked by one of the two facehuggers after setting off the sprinklers, resulting in the facehugger wrapping its tail around her neck after jumping off of a table leg. To film this, director James Cameron had the Special Effects crew design a facehugger fully capable of walking towards Ripley on its own, but to make it appear as if it jumps off of the table, and Cameron then used backwards-filming. He set up the facehugger on the table leg, then dragged it off and later edited the piece of film to play backward to make it appear to be moving forward towards Ripley. The crew thought that the fact that water was falling down during this whole scene would affect the sequence that was filmed backward (it would show the water moving up instead of down). In the end, the water was not visible enough to see the direction in which it was falling.

The “special edition” includes extra scenes: Newt’s parents discovering the abandoned alien ship on LV-426, scenes of Ripley discussing her daughter, Hudson bragging about his weaponry, robot sentry guns repelling first alien raid, and Hicks and Ripley exchanging first names. Also included is a scene on LV-426 where a child rides a low-slung tricycle similar to one ridden in The Terminator, also directed by James Cameron.

During Hudson’s (Bill Paxton) boasting monologue aboard the drop ship (special edition only) he talks about some of the weaponry of the Colonial Marines, mentioning a “phased plasma pulse rifle” – the pulse rifles the marines carry are ballistic, not “phased plasma”, but the line references The Terminator (also directed by James Cameron, and featuring Paxton in a minor role) in which the terminator asks a gun store clerk for a “phased plasma rifle”.

Lance Henriksen wanted to wear double-pupil contact lenses for a scene where Bishop is working in the lab on a microscope and gives a scary look at one of the Marines. He came to set with those lenses, but James Cameron decided he did not need to wear them because he was acting the character with just the right amount of creepiness already.

The initial cinematographer was Dick Bush. However, director James Cameron fired him a month into production because he wasn’t satisfied with the lighting, and the two men reportedly hated working with each other. Cameron then tried to hire Derek Vanlint, the DP on the previous film. Vanlint wasn’t interested, but recommended Adrian Biddle for the job.

The difficulties surrounding Sigourney Weaver’s contract negotiations were such that James Cameron and Gale Anne Hurd – recently married – announced that if the deal was not done by the time they got back from their honeymoon, they were out. When they returned, no progress had been made – so James Cameron, determined to make the film and wary of the deadline scenario he had created, devised a scheme: he telephoned Arnold Schwarzenegger’s agent for an informal chat and informed him that, thanks to his newfound standing in Hollywood following The Terminator, he had decided to make this film entirely his own by writing Ripley out; as Cameron anticipated, Schwarzenegger’s agent immediately relayed the information to his colleague representing Weaver at ICM, who in turn contacted 20th Century-Fox Head of Production Lawrence Gordon; both men, determined that under no circumstances whatsoever would Ripley be written out, wasted no time in sealing Weaver’s deal.

Having hired James Cameron to write the screenplay, 20th Century Fox then did the unthinkable when he left the production to direct The Terminator: they agreed to wait for Cameron to become available again and finish the screenplay. Cameron had only completed about 90 pages at that stage, but the studio had loved what he had written so far.

The Alien nest set was kept intact after filming. It was later used as the Axis Chemicals set for Batman. When the crew of Batman first entered the set, they found most of the Alien nest still intact.

Budget constraints meant that they could only afford to have six hypersleep capsules for the scenes set aboard the Sulaco. Clever placement of mirrors and camera angles made it look like there were 12. Each hypersleep chamber cost over $4,300 to build.

One of the perfect locations they found was a decommissioned coal-fired power plant in Acton, West London. The only trouble with it was that it was heavily riddled with asbestos. So, a team was sent in to clean up the plant, and atmosphere readings had to be taken constantly throughout filming in this location to make sure that the air was clear of contamination. Ironically, the Acton location turned out to have better atmospheric quality than Pinewood Studios.

The assault vehicle is a modified tow-truck that British Airways used for towing airplanes around at Heathrow. The only trouble was that the truck they purchased weighed 75 tons. By stripping out most of the lead used in its construction, they were able to remove about 30 tons.

Ripley’s miniature bathroom in her apartment is actually a British Airways toilet, purchased from the airline.

To bring the alien queen to life would take 16 operators.

Since production took place in England, the director and producers conveniently cast many American actors who were already living in England. This was particularly important for the actress playing Newt, who had to be a minor. Carrie Henn, who played Newt, was an American girl living with her family in England (actually, a bit of an English accent can be heard when she says, “Let’s go,” and, “There is a short-cut across the roof,” during the Alien attack at the end of the movie). Her movie brother Timmy (seen only in the extended version) is also her real-life brother Christopher Henn.

Although the first script draft turned in on 30 May 1985 was very close to the final film, some scenes in this version were dropped in the final film. Those include:

• A shower scene with Ripley in a futuristic shower environment Ripley going into more detail about the facehuggers while briefing the Marines, calling the facehugger “a walking sex organ” to which Hudson replies, “Sounds like you, Hicks.”

• There are thirty atmospheric processing units on the planet, as opposed to only one in the final film.

• Newt formally offering Ripley to be her daughter

• Bishop encountering an alien while crawling along the tunnel (this scene also appeared in the final script but neither in the theatrical release nor in the Special Edition)

• The second drop ship refueling itself before leaving the Sulaco under Bishop’s remote control.

• The first draft also included a scene with a cocooned Burke, which was shot but not included in any of the versions of the movie.

James Cameron had the actors (the Marines) personalize their own costumes (battle armour and fatigues) for added realism (much like soldiers in Vietnam wrote and drew things on their own helmets). Actress Cynthia Dale Scott, who plays Cpl. Dietrich has the words “BLUE ANGEL” written on the back of her helmet. Marlene Dietrich was of course the star of The Blue Angel or Blue Angel. Bill Paxton has “Louise” written on his armour. This is a dedication to his real-life wife, Louise Newbury.

The mechanism used to make the face-huggers thrash about in the stasis tubes in the science lab came from one of the “flying piranhas” in one of James Cameron’s earlier movies Piranha Part Two: The Spawning. It took nine people to make the face-hugger work: one person for each leg and one for the tail.

James Cameron had several designers come up with ideas for the drop ship that took the Marines from the Sulaco to the planet. Design after design, he finally gave up on them to come up with on he liked and constructed his own drop ship out of a model of an apache helicopter and other spare model pieces.

Like most films, the movie wasn’t shot in sequence. But for added realism, James Cameron filmed the scene where we first meet the Colonial Marines (one of the earliest scenes) last. This was so that the camaraderie of the Marines was realistic because the actors had spent months filming together.

There was talk of bringing H.R. Giger back for the second movie to do more design work, but James Cameron decided against it because there was only one major design to be done, that of the Alien Queen, which Cameron had already done some drawings of.

When filming the scene with Newt in the duct, Carrie Henn kept deliberately blowing her scene so she could slide down the vent, which she later called a slide three stories tall. James Cameron finally dissuaded her by saying that if she completed the shot, she could play on it as much as she wanted. She did, and he kept his promise.

A set design company offered to build James Cameron a complete and working APC vehicle from scratch, but the cost was far too high for the budget he had in mind.

Except for a very small reference in Alien, the special edition of this film is the first to reveal the name of ‘The Company’ as Weyland-Yutani. The name is clearly written on several pieces of equipment and walls in the colony during a pre-alien outbreak scene of the special edition.

Only six alien suits were used, and even then they were mostly just a handful of latex appliances on black leotards. The appearance of hundreds of aliens is simply clever editing and planning, and lighting plus slime helped make the “suits” more solid.

The body mounts for Vasquez’s and Drake’s smart guns are taken from Steadicam gear.

In both the standard and special edition versions, the fifteen minute countdown at the end of the film is indeed fifteen minutes.

During the scene when they have landed and deployed in the troop carrier, Apone tells the Marines they have 10 seconds until they arrive. If you count from here until the first Marine jumps out of the carrier and his boots hit the ground, it really is ten seconds.

There were two versions of the “Bug Stompers” logo designed for the movie, one wearing sneakers, and one wearing combat boots as seen on the drop ship.

A lightweight dummy model of Newt (Carrie Henn) was constructed for Sigourney Weaver to carry around during the scenes just before the Queen chase.

None of the models or the original designs of the Narcissus (the Nostromo’s shuttle) from Alien could be found, so set designers and model-makers had to reconstruct the model of the ship and the interior set from watching Alien.

During the scene inside the APV preparing for battle, “El riesgo siempre vive!” can be seen scrawled in white across Vasquez’s armor. Literally translated from Spanish this is: “Risk always lives!”; a variant of Cicero’s famous quote “Luck favours the bold.”

Al Matthews, who plays a Marine sergeant in this film, was in real life the first black Marine to be promoted to the rank of sergeant in the field during service in Vietnam.

When the set crews were looking around for floor grating to use on the Sulaco set design, they asked a local set design manufacturer/shop if they had anything of the sort. Indeed they did, an immense pile of old floor grating had been sitting out in the back of their shop for the last seven years. It was left there from when they tore down the set of Alien.

In the scene in the air shaft where Vasquez shoots the alien with a handgun, Jenette Goldstein could not handle the recoil of the gun properly. As a result, producer Gale Anne Hurd doubled for Vasquez in shots where the gun is fired. She was the only woman available who had experience firing handguns. Goldstein’s flinching at the firing of a gun is also masked during the operations room fight immediately preceding the air shaft scene, when Vasquez is seen firing two grenades at the aliens – for the first one, there’s a barely visible cut (Goldstein’s head changes position suddenly) and for the second shot there is a smash-cut away from her face at the moment of firing.

Three different types of smoke were used in the film, one of which has since become illegal to be used on movie sets.

One of the alien eggs used in the film is now exhibited in the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C.

The Alien Queen has transparent teeth, as opposed to the warrior aliens.

The colony on LV-426 is named Hadley’s Hope, with a population of 158. This is revealed in the special edition, and if you look carefully, the saying “Have A Nice Day” is painted on the sign.

Producers David Giler and Walter Hill were keen to work with James Cameron after having read his script for The Terminator. Cameron went in for a meeting with the two producers and pitched several ideas at them, none of which they were that receptive to. As he was leaving, however, they did mention that they were thinking of doing a sequel to Alien, and immediately Cameron’s interest was piqued. Cameron submitted a 40-50 page treatment of what he would do for an “Alien” sequel which contained a lot of ideas for an existing treatment he had done for a script called “Mother”. Giler and Hill loved Cameron’s treatment and commissioned him to write a screenplay. Cameron got the good news the same day he landed screenwriting duties for Rambo: First Blood Part II.

Michael Biehn got the call on a Friday night asking him to take over the role of Hicks and was in London to start filming on the following Monday.

James Horner’s schedule only allowed for him to work on the film for 6 weeks. He arrived in London to perform his duties, only to find that they were still shooting, much less editing. He sat around for 3 weeks before being able to get started.

In the scene where the crew is getting dressed after waking up from hypersleep, Hudson says, “Hey Vasquez, have you ever been mistaken for a man?” to which Vasquez answers, “No. Have you?” This is “borrowed” from Hollywood legend. Columnist Earl Wilson once asked Tallulah Bankhead, “Have you ever been mistaken for a man?” Bankhead responded, “No darling. Have you?”

The word “fuck” is used 25 times in the film, 18 of them are spoken by Hudson.

The rhyme that Hudson mutters as he’s searching for the colonists is from the AC/DC song “Shake a Leg”: “Stop your grinnin’ and drop your linen…”

At one time during filming, the APC had an actual roof. But, during the “Fire In the hole” scene, the actors were actually suffocating from the fire’s smoke. After a few tries, the roof of the APC was removed.

Aliens was never shown to test audiences because editing was not completed until the week before its theatrical release.

Several references to Robert A. Heinlein’s novel, “Starship Troopers”: the prominent use of the military; during the orientation when Hudson asks if this is a “bug hunt.”

Most of the movie was filmed under very bluish light to give it a strange and “alien” feel. The colours of the Marines’ camouflage BDUs and the Humbrol “Brown Bess” used on the Pulse Rifles were all chosen specifically to work with the blue set lighting. As a result, both look very different under natural light than they did on screen.

Four actors from this movie appear in various Terminator movies: Michael Biehn, Lance Henriksen and Bill Paxton in The Terminator, and Jenette Goldstein in Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

Stephen Lang auditioned for the role of Carter Burke.

According to Lance Henriksen, during the production of “Aliens”, the film Full Metal Jacket was also being shot at a nearby location. Because of this the crews of each movie would often gather together for parties.

James Cameron was not impressed by the way that Ray Lovejoy was editing the film, and was seriously considering firing him and having the film re-edited from scratch by Mark Goldblatt, Cameron’s editor on The Terminator, and Peter Boita, who had already been brought on-board to edit the more dialogue driven scenes. Upon hearing that his job was in danger, Lovejoy grabbed all the footage from the film’s final battle, locked himself in an editing suite over the weekend, and presented the fully edited version of the battle to Cameron the following week. Cameron was sufficiently impressed to let Lovejoy stay on-board and supervise what was intended to be the final edit.

Al Pacino often visited the set as he was filming Revolution in the studio next door.

In an interview with Moviefone, Sigourney Weaver said that each time one of the actors was to “die” she would give them a bouquet of flowers before filming began. When it was time for Paul Reiser to be killed she gave him a handful of dead blossoms.

Bishop’s line about him being incapable of hurting a person or letting anyone come to harm are a direct reference to Issac Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics, more specifically the First Law: “A robot may not injure a human being nor, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.” (the Second Law is “A robot must obey the orders given by a human being except where it would conflict with the First Law; the Third Law is, “A robot must protect its own existence except where it would conflict with the First or Second Laws.”). Asimov eventually introduced a “Zeroth” Law: “A robot may not injure humanity nor, through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm.”

Hudson says the word “man” a total of 35 times.

Sigourney Weaver’s Best Actress Academy Award nomination for this movie was the first ever for an actress in an action role in an action movie.

In the original script, when Ripley is rescuing Newt, she encounters a cocooned Burke (Paul Reiser) in the power plant. He claims he can feel the chestburster inside him and asks for help. Ripley gives him a live grenade and moves on.

 

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