Director: Ridley Scott
Writers: Dan O’Bannon
(Story by Dan O’Bannon and Ronald Shusett)
An undisputed classic film, not just of the Science Fiction/Horror genres, just in general. The production design and atmosphere of the film is second to none. The building of tension is masterful. The dialogue and acting between crew members is both casual and realistic and moves the story forward, informing us while not shoving plot points down our throats.
The story itself is extremely straight forward. A mining ship responds to a distress beacon on a planet and lands to check it out. They discover something…alien…which gets on board. Much like a classic slasher there is a killer stalking the crew, in the dark, and picking them off one by one. But this isn’t a masked man with a knife.
Scott’s clear gift is a great visual sense. He may be on the downward end of his career now but this movie shows him at the peak of his story telling powers. Even over 30 years later the movie is still terrifying and entertaining as hell. Lots of people debate about whether this is better or Aliens is but for me there is no debate that Alien is a stone cold masterpiece. REQUIRED VIEWING.
