Cailee Spaeny stars in the latest installment in the ongoing Alien saga.
If someone in an Alien movie is grabbing their stomach or showing signs of digestive problems, be on your guard because something bad is about to happen.
There’s a lot of weird stuff going on in Alien: Romulus, director Fede Álvarez’s full-throttle, full-throttle entry in the Alien franchise. It pays tribute to the earlier chapters in the series (this is the seventh Alien film, not counting the Alien vs. Predator films, which are best avoided), but is also satisfying in its own right.
An Alien film has to evoke feelings of claustrophobia, it has to make the audience feel uneasy, and it has to be cold, dark, and mean. Romulus ticks all of these boxes, plus it has a cast that is more youthful than typical Alien films. Romulus feels like a Scream film filtered through an Alien lens.
Set in the year 2142, between the events of Alien and Aliens, Romulus begins on a deserted mining planet where Rain Carradine (“Priscilla” and Cailee Spaeny from Civil War) faces a life of hard work with no chance of improvement. Her parents are both dead and she must take care of her android brother Andy (“David Jonsson from Rye Lane”), whose main job is to look after Rain. They only have each other.
Opportunity presents itself in the form of a plan to hijack space cargo from a decommissioned ship and use the ship’s abandoned sleep pods to travel to the faraway planet Yvaga, where life is presumably much, much better. A group of ruffians – including Tyler (Archie Renaux), Bjorn (Spike Fearn), Kay (Isabela Merced), and Navarro (Aileen Wu) – offer Rain the chance to get in on the action, mainly because they need Andy’s circuits to override the ship’s security systems once they’re on board.
This may shock you, but things don’t go quite according to plan. And when the group enters the spaceship, they find that they are not alone. There are some facehuggers (actually more like facesuckers, but that’s another story) and xenomorphs waiting patiently to make their acquaintance.
But it takes a while before we get to know them. Álvarez, the Uruguayan director who gave us the relentless “Evil Dead” update in 2013 and the rollicking “Don’t Breathe” in 2016, takes his time establishing the group, the dynamics between them, and the setting aboard the ship before getting into the acid-soaked, heartbreaking “Alien” story. He also introduces a character, a direct lift from “Alien,” who uses a deceased actor from the film, which is sure to spark conversations about the use of AI in terms of actors’ likeness after their deaths. (It’s a disturbing proposition, to say the least, and we’re only just beginning to understand its possibilities and unravel the morals involved; in this case, it’s put to good use, but not entirely necessary.)
Álvarez effectively builds to a thrilling conclusion by keeping up the methodical pace for a rousing final act that includes a scene of floating digital blood that’s as close to a video game as you can get without putting an actual controller in the audience’s hands. (That’s meant as a compliment.)
And the creature elements are familiar and refreshing, with Álvarez ramping up the sense of disgust and tension that comes from coming face-to-face (or face-to-face) with disturbing creatures in enclosed, cramped spaces while hurtling through the vast emptiness of space. The sound design is pretty haunting, too.
Spaeny and Jonsson do a great job giving viewers a reason to care about and connect with their characters, even if the script isn’t as convincing in those areas. Jonsson is particularly compelling, and the synthetic qualities of his character allow the actor to portray a range of emotions, from simple and sympathetic to direct and commanding, and he’s convincing in all modes. He’s a talent to keep an eye on.
The Alien films endure because they are canvases on which filmmakers can put their stamp on the trappings and conventions of the form that Ridley Scott pioneered nearly 50 years ago. Álvarez isn’t necessarily an intellectual type, but he straps viewers into the front seat of a roller coaster and lets them rip, and the results are gripping. Hold on tight — both to your seat and your stomach.
“Alien: Romulus”
Grade: B+
Age rating: R: due to bloody, violent content and language
Running time: 119 minutes
In cinemas
