*** Alien: Covenant ***

Am sure I will like this as have liked ALL the Alien, Predator and even the AvP films to some extent simply because of the err Aliens and Predators. Only one I didn't was Prometheus as it was just plot holes galore. But I never thought Covenant would be a masterpiece, Scott had great original ideas back in 70's/80's but there are simply too many films that have come out since that cover most bases on what he could do with this.
One review I read mentioned a great scene involving the Alien/Aliens running around in cornfields not knowing where they are etc but when reading it, it immediately sounded like one of the best scenes from Jurassic Park: The Lost World re the raptors 'Don't go into the long grass!'
but i'm glad Danny McBride is getting praise for his role as I do think he is an underrated actor.
 
Well......unfortunately it's a bit of a crushing disappointment I'm sorry to say.
It's no Alien film, and rather surprisingly, not really a Prometheus one either.
Competently made, and strikingly beautiful at times, it makes a whole lot of poor decisions with both the pacing and its predictability, and, more criminally, trying to put a mark on the overarching story it's trying to tell - or at least the one that's been forming in the mind of the most optimistic Alien fan for donkeys years.

It was best described by a person I was with as 'it would be a good film if it was a completely standalone sci-fi horror and the other films didn't exist.
Can't put it better than that really.

Probably a 5.5/10.....not complete rubbish, but a very poor relation to Alien 1-3
 
I'm just back from seeing this in the cinema tonight. I won't spoil too much but in my opinion it is much better than Prometheus and tied up the story from that fairly well, the pre-release clip of David releasing the weapon on the engineers features in the film and is part of the storyline. Fassbender was excellent and plays a creepy droid well. The beginning and end were good but it seemed to get bogged down a bit in the middle. There were a few glaringly bad decisions on the crews behalf and the odd plot hole but all in all a relatively decent Alien film, no where near up there with the first two but better than some of the other trash in the series.

Edit: Thinking about it, Life was a better Alien film than this one!
 
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Richeh said:
Am sure I will like this as have liked ALL the Alien, Predator and even the AvP films to some extent simply because of the err Aliens and Predators. Only one I didn't was Prometheus as it was just plot holes galore.
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I don't know that I can take anyone seriously that likes the AvP films but doesn't like Prometheus because of 'plot holes' :p

You can pick huge gaping holes in *every* sci-fi movie, they all sacrifice common sense and physics for storytelling. Prometheus was no worse than any others. I think what threw most people was that it wasn't Alien (sci-fi survival horror), and it wasn't Aliens (pulp scifi action), it was something quite different (primarily telling stories about people and the backstory of the xenos).

Covenant isn't out here til next week :'(
 
I was quite disappointed.

There is only one scene in the film that fits and feels like "Alien". Other than that the attempts at horror are poorly executed, and the story feels like they had a death scene quota that had to be met regardless of how elegantly they could work with the story.

Felt like a tick box exercise. Very pretty though, and CGI is very well done, but it's just not scary when you can see every detail of the monster.
 
mid_gen said:
I don't know that I can take anyone seriously that likes the AvP films but doesn't like Prometheus because of 'plot holes' :p

You can pick huge gaping holes in *every* sci-fi movie, they all sacrifice common sense and physics for storytelling. Prometheus was no worse than any others. I think what threw most people was that it wasn't Alien (sci-fi survival horror), and it wasn't Aliens (pulp scifi action), it was something quite different (primarily telling stories about people and the backstory of the xenos).

Covenant isn't out here til next week :'(
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For Prometheus, What threw people is that for the most part, the paper thin characters had none of the charm of earlier incarnations and some of their actions seemed impossibly unlikely, the two most fearful characters randomly start playing with creepy living alien slime and then inevitably die!
 
That bit was daft no doubt (especially as that guy was the exo-biologist)...and the guy with the mapping drones getting lost. Apart from that I don't have any real issues with the film. It was good but not great. David, Shaw, Holloway, Janek, Weyland were decent enough characters. It just didn't live up to the hype that's all.

Same as Alien 3 which I still stay stands up as very good film. I'd be happy if we got a modern sci-fi film half as good!
 
I really liked it but i'm going to be slightly biased, few people on these forums will be a bigger Alien fan than myself. ;)

It felt more Alienesque than Prometheus did, looked amazing, Scott knows how to make a good looking film, the soundtrack was perfect with a score very reminiscent of the original Alien.

Some slightly annoying CGI on the Alien but can't be avoided really with the action set pieces. David/Walter were brilliant, shocked to say that Danny McBride was an absolute standout, nice to see him dial his performance in, he was my biggest worry going into this.

Some questions i'm left with...

What actually happened to Shaw?
How did the 2nd full grown Xeno gestate, no way it was on the chiefs face long enough to implant, I assume David did something back onboard the ship.
Where was the advanced engineer tech, considering this was supposed to be their home.
Why did David just let them kill the full grown Xeno at the end, he could have easily ensured they died in the terraforming bay

And finally...without giving much away, did everyone elses performance crack up at the "fingering" part? :D
 
I seen a preview screening at 20:30 then IMAX at midnight.. and.. in contrast to the opinions above I absolutely loved it.

Remembering that the entire premise of the 4 planned films is to tell the story leading up to the original Alien film I think this film goes some way to completing that story arc.

I'll go more into my thoughts below:

For me Prometheus is about discovery and development of the David character, which ultimately leads to his actions in this movie. After watching Prometheus recently after watching numerous trailers and clips of Covenant I was far more aware that the film was more focused on the development of David than the actual discovery of the engineers, the manipulation of pretty much all scenarios by David is far more evident.

This film was again very David focused and in my opinion is more about the creation of his perfect organisms. This film was more about the origins of the Xenomorph than anything else.. and this film told far more story than I was expecting.. but I loved that.. I wanted to see where these creatures cane from, how they were created, who created them etc.

I'm not saying the film was perfect, far from it. The beginning third of the film was very slow and seemed mainly focused on crew character development. I also found that gestation and physical development times of the alien creatures to be far quicker than previous movies.

Other than that tho I thoroughly enjoyed it.

I feel the principal of this film is to explain the origins and that it goes some way to doing that.

I'd happily give this an 8/10, it's not horror, more terror at times.
 
SixTwoSix said:
I really liked it but i'm going to be slightly biased, few people on these forums will be a bigger Alien fan than myself. ;)

It felt more Alienesque than Prometheus did, looked amazing, Scott knows how to make a good looking film, the soundtrack was perfect with a score very reminiscent of the original Alien.

Some slightly annoying CGI on the Alien but can't be avoided really with the action set pieces. David/Walter were brilliant, shocked to say that Danny McBride was an absolute standout, nice to see him dial his performance in, he was my biggest worry going into this.

Some questions i'm left with...

What actually happened to Shaw?
How did the 2nd full grown Xeno gestate, no way it was on the chiefs face long enough to implant, I assume David did something back onboard the ship.
Where was the advanced engineer tech, considering this was supposed to be their home.
Why did David just let them kill the full grown Xeno at the end, he could have easily ensured they died in the terraforming bay

And finally...without giving much away, did everyone elses performance crack up at the "fingering" part? :D
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The entire auditorium I was in were creased. Unsure how they left that line in..
 
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