One of the top fireball-spewing, body-ripping, ultra-violent R-rated action flicks of the 1980s. Does anyone ever marathon-watch all of the Alien movies in one sitting? I almost don’t see how you could. This one is too exhausting, in the best way. It wallops you good and wears you out. Personally, I need some quiet time afterward.
What makes James Cameron’s sequel to the 1979 classic extra-impressive is that it really shouldn’t be this good.
A killer alien movie that goes on for two-and-a-half fucking hours? Cameron earns every minute with some truly terrific action filmmaking that knows exactly when to explode and when to simmer down. There’s no fat in this film’s heft; it’s all muscle. Cameron’s extended Director’s Cut is the best version.
The cute kid in the cast? She’s great. She provides a little saccharin and syrup here, but that always happens when you put children in movies. In any case, imagine how much worse that would be if Steven Spielberg directed.
The mother-daughter theme? That sorta thing can be like ten too many packets of Sweet ‘n’ Low in your tea in lesser creative hands, but this film knows what it’s doing. Cameron uses it to make the conflict extra-juicy as Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley begins to understand the queen alien’s maternal instincts (all related to the audience visually, with no intelligence-insulting explanation scene). The alien is NOT a mindless carnivore. She’s a mother, making and protecting babies. And now Ripley, who has some serious maternal issues (a major point in the Director’s Cut), has found an orphan who needs her protection and she will take a flamethrower to anything that’s a threat.
Weaver’s Ripley really is one of the great movie action heroes and this is her grand showcase. She’s your classic clear-headed survivor, but she’s not above being afraid. When Ripley fights, it’s for something that’s worth fighting for. It’s not a mere movie star vanity role. She’s a real character behind the firepower and Weaver is an actress who can handle that kind of heavy-lifting. She owns the part. May lightning strike any business school graduate Hollywood producer who dares to re-boot and recast her.
As with the ’79 Alien, this movie also teems with good character-actors in supporting roles. The late Bill Paxton is perfectly irritating as your regular tough-guy bigmouth who becomes a cowering weenie when the danger gets real. Lance Henriksen provides a little calm in the storm as a patient android. Michael Biehn is solid rock of the same ore as his character in Cameron’s The Terminator. Then there’s Paul Reiser, whose weird likable/unlikable quality is taken full advange of here.