Prometheus (2012) - Movie Review

[caption id="attachment_385" align="alignright" width="353"] Official Score = 2 Devils[/caption]

In history there has been few confirmed confusingly created movies… A couple of examples of this are as follows:

For many years there had been different attempts to create a great crossover movie between Jason Voorhees (of the, ‘Friday The 13th’ franchise fame) and Freddy Krueger (of the, ‘A Nightmare On Elm Street’ franchise fame), but it wasn't until New Line released, Freddy Vs. Jason (2003) that we saw the first and only studio sanctioned crossover of two of Hollywood’s greatest villains! (There has been some loose attempts to create Ash from, ‘The Evil Dead’ series as a crossover with both, ‘Jason’ & ‘Michael Myers’, as well as Leatherface mixing it up with some of these guys in print (as a matter of fact I have heard of a script that had been created to have Ash going to war against Jason, but nothing ever came to fruition on that.)

Another great example of this would be Indiana Jones part 4… Before George Lucas (Star Wars) and Steven Spielberg (Jaws) came out with, Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull (2008), there had been many different but unfortunately failed attempts since, Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade, came out in 1989.

And the next example I have for you is the movie, Prometheus (2012). Now before I go in to this movie let me give you a little background on the series as whole…

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="600"] Some of the crew of the, 'Prometheus' as they are investigating the history of humanity on one of the Aliens planets![/caption]

Prometheus is a prequel to Ridley Scott’s 1979 masterpiece, ‘Alien’. Now this movie (obviously of course with Ghostbusters as well) helped to catapult Sigourney Weaver (Ghostbusters) in to legendary status in the horror community (what with having done the first 4 Alien movies (as well as all of the currently released Ghostbuster movies…)

Then oddly enough, the producers or whomever decided to take the series in a whole different direction and had the movie more centralized around the Xenomorphs (the aliens from the, ‘Alien’ movie series) and the Predators from the movie, ‘Predator’ movie series and the war that they seemed to wage against each other in the, ‘Alien Vs. Predator’ movie series!

Fortunately though we were given the opportunity to go back to the classic original series (how the original series connects with the Alien Vs. Predator series… I don’t know, but some times you just have to take the good with the bad and admit that the Alien series is as good now as it was when it was first released over 30 years ago!

As for Prometheus though… This movie (which brought Ridley Scott back to the movie series) and which starred Noomi Rapace (The Girl With Dragon Tattoo), Michael Fassbender (X-Men: First Class), Logan Marshall-Green (Devil), Charlize Theron (Monster), Idris Elba (Janek), Guy Pierce (L.A. Confidential), does bring us back to the classic original series… But instead of starting where the original left off, Prometheus, attempts to explain how the story of how the, ‘Xenomorphs’ and humanity actually got in to contact initially with each other…

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="600"] The expedition team as they investigate the Alien outpost![/caption]

You see this movie posits the idea that mankind had been genetically engineered by a significantly more advanced race, and when evidence of where these Aliens might be, the Scientists who make the discovery ultimately decide to utilize the aide of Peter Weyland (Pierce) the ailing founder of the eventually dreaded, ‘Company’, ‘Weyland-Yutani Corporation’ (this company would play a major role in some ways for bringing Ripley (played by Sigourney Weaver) and the Xenomorphs together in the first 2 Alien movies)

Anyway, ultimately once the mission is under way and the crew have made it to the planet that may help to explain humanities origins, they discover a threat that is significantly worse than they could have ever imagined when they discover not only the origins of mankind, but the origins of the Alien species that would go on to make Ripley’s life a living hell centuries later!

Now I really enjoyed this movie (this is one of my favorite movie series), but the reality, is that chronologically you would have to do away with the Alien Vs. Predator movie series for this movie to make sense. Also… This movie does give insight in to where the Xenomorphs came from (just not why the face huggers are so big, and what happened to those little worm Aliens that were so popular in the original Alien series… Also there appears to be little to no correlation as to the Companies knowledge of the first mission (You would think with how the first mission turned out that they would have instructed the, ‘Nostromo’ crew a little better in how to capture the, ‘Xenomorph’ in Ripley’s time.

But I will admit that despite the plot holes in this movie, it is a fun one and if you are a fan of the series, then it is definitely worth owning, and if you are looking for a fun exciting Sci-fi movie to really sink your teeth in to, then this is certainly one of them!

http://youtu.be/sftuxbvGwiU

Aeon Flux (2005) - Movie Review

[caption id="attachment_325" align="alignright" width="263"] Official Score = 3 Devils[/caption]

I am not 100% certain of this, but I am fairly certain that with the subsequent success of, Johnny Mnemoic (1995) and the release and subsequent success of ‘The Matrix’ franchise, (both of which are great movies that starred Keanu Reeves), that the studios started working on big budget Science Fiction movies that had to do with a specific hero that has very unique powers that they had kind of been given to them at least to some extent…

Now there is something interesting that I thought that I would mention about these types of films. First off usually these types of movies tend to have big budget talent working on them, and they often are pretty well made, but oddly enough, don’t seem to do really good in the box office (or in some cases never made it on to the big screen!)

A few examples of course of these types of films being:

1. Equilibrium (2002), a fun movie that starred Christian Bale (The Dark Knight Rises) before he became the, ‘Batman’, and worked to take down a drugged out advanced society…

2. Another one is Ultraviolet (2006), a movie which starred, Milla Jovovich (The Fifth Element)… Now this movie was sort of a bland and extremely far-fetched attempt to show how a super soldier can take on her masters and win (some times going so far as to take out 100 guys at a time….)

And the last one that I thought that I would mention here is the movie, Aeon Flux (2005)… Now this movie which was written by Phil Hay (Clash Of The Titans), Matt Manfredi (The Tuxedo) and directed by Karyn Kusama (Girlfight), and which starred: Charlize Theron (Prometheus), Martin Csokas (xXx), Jonny Lee Miller (Hackers), Sophie Okonedo (Hotel Rwanada), Frances McDormand (Almost Famous), and Pete Postlethwaite (Inception) was great!

You see this movie told the story of how after a plague nearly wipes mankind off of the face of the planet, one man ends up curing the human race… The only problem is that there appears to be unforeseen consequences that he and his future generations will race against the clock to try and fix before the end of the world really comes!

Now of course no one knows about this, and everyone appears to have been relegated to one major city (The last major city on Earth)… and a rebel group by the name of, ‘The Monacans’ have decided to try and stop the reign of the governments tyranny against the population, and they are about to get their chance…

You see, The Monacans have gotten their opportunity to strike at Chancellor Goodchild (Csokas), and end up sending in their assassin, by the name of Aeon Flux (Theron) to assassinate him… but by the time she gets their she ends ups getting more then she bargained for and ultimately ends up fighting with the one man she has sworn to fight against!

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="630"] Some times she even surprises herself with just how good she is![/caption]

Now I thought this movie had a great concept (which, so that I don’t ruin it for you guys I won’t be saying.) I also thought that this movie was very well written and acted, and some fun action scenes that should keep you on the edge of your seat… In the end, the only thing that I really thought was dumb, was the special effects and the over use of the concept of genetic engineering to cure all ills (including some sort of weird tiny little light switch in the back of the Monacans that could be used as a telephone, and some sort of plant life that shot spikes like machine guns…

All in all though definitely a fun one, and one that you guys might like as well!

http://youtu.be/wQ2LSS2QA2c