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Alien³

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''This article is about a film, for the video game of the same name see Alien 3 (video game).
Alien³ is a science fiction/horror movie that opened May 22, 1992. It was the feature film debut of director David Fincher. The third installment in the Alien franchise, it is preceded by Ridley Scott's Alien and James Cameron's Aliens and is followed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet's .

[Spoiler warningSpoiler warning]: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Contents

Story

[Spoiler warningSpoiler warning]: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Having escaped from LV-426 after the disastrous Marine rescue mission, Ellen Ripley crashes on Fiorina 'Fury' 161, a maximum security work correctional penal colony inhabited only by men whose "double-Y" chromosome patterns mark them as extremely violent and dangerous offenders. In order to rehabilitate — though there is really no hope of their release — the prisoners have embraced a fanatical apocalyptic, millenarian brand of religion. As Morse, one of the inmates points out, sexual relations (with either gender) are prohibited by this faith; Ripley's presence therefore has a disturbing effect on many of the prisoners.

In a plot twist that severely alienated fans of the previous films, both Newt, the little girl Ripley bonded with as a surrogate daughter and rescued in Aliens, and Cpl. Hicks to whom a closeness was also formed, have been killed (off-screen) in the crash landing. Only Ripley survives, with Bishop irreparably damaged, offline and discarded in a scrap pile. Ripley soon befriends and shares a mutual attraction with the penal colony's doctor Clemens, a former inmate. Shortly after Dillon, the leading prisoner (and 'priest' of sorts), protects Ripley from a rape attempt while she is salvaging the damaged Bishop. The broken android informs her of the circumstances surrounding the crash and Weyland-Yutani's knowledge of these events, before receiving a mercy 'killing'. She also meets the warden of the prison, Andrews, who is skeptical of her tale and intimidated by her. She also meets his assistant, Aaron, nicknamed "85" for his low I.Q.

During Ripley's rescue, a dog gets implanted by an Xenomorph facehugger (In the extended version it is not a dog getting implanted by an alien facehugger, it's an ox. The dog is totally cut from the extended version, and is only used in the theatrical version of Alien³). Soon, the dog gives birth to the alien, which then proceeds to go on a killing rampage through the colony, slaying Clemens and Andrews, amongst others. It soon becomes a fight to stay alive before a ship can arrive, supposedly to rescue the humans. Ripley discovers that she too has an alien queen embryo growing inside of her, the true reason why a 'rescue' team is on its way.

Attempts to kill the alien by forcing into molten lead eventually succeed when Dillon traps the alien in the lead mold by sacrificing himself, giving Morse and Ripley time to pour the hot lead onto the beast. When the drenched alien subsequently leaps out of the crucible, the fire sprinklers spray water over its burning form, shattering it just before the Weyland-Yutani team arrives.

The leader of the rescue team is 'Bishop II' - who claims he is the creater of the android, attempts to persuade Ripley to undergo surgery to remove the queen-embryo. The Bishop doppelganger smoothly tempts Ripley with the promise of a viable life and children; she refuses and steps onto the leadworks platform. Despite being shot in the leg by a Company soldier, Morse manages to steer Ripley over to a fiery pit of molten lead. An infuriated Aaron, convinced that this tempter is in fact an android, smashes Bishop II across the ear with a spanner and is promptly gunned down. In the extended version of the Movie it is clear to see that Bishop's wound is bleeding, which suggests that he is infact human.

With the wounded Bishop II begging her to reconsider, Ripley sacrifices herself for the future of humanity. She is seen plunging into a fiery death, her arms outstretched in a cruciform fashion, just as the creature bursts from her chest (in the DVD extended version, the creature was edited out). Thus the film is seen as a religious allegory, with Ripley the Christ-figure.

Although the Fury-161 facility is shut down and the sole survivor Morse reassigned, the struggle against the Xenomorphs would resume two centuries later when Ripley and the embryo were cloned (see Alien Resurrection).

According to the Alien Resurrection novelization, and the original sequel Original Sin, Morse wrote a book (later banned) detailing his experiences on Fury 161; it was this work which motivated Annalee Call in her efforts to kill the resurrected Ripley.

Reception

The film was poorly received upon its initial release by critics and fans of the preceding two films in the franchise. It was considered not to have advanced the story in any meaningful way, instead merely rehashing the first film's formula of a monster lurking in dark corridors killing off people one by one. This stood in stark contrast to Aliens, which presented itself as an action movie, establishing its own identity rather than trying to imitate what made Alien so successful.

Other unfavorable comparisons to Aliens were made, especially in the way Alien³’s large supporting cast of prisoners lacked any individuality, being perceived as little more than stock characters whose sole purpose was to be killed by the Alien. In Aliens, while many of the Colonial Marines could be considered stereotypes, director James Cameron still took pains to make most of them defined characters.

In later years, some fans of the franchise became more sympathetic to Alien³ as the story of its troubled production came to light. David Fincher was brought into the project very late in its development, after a proposed version by Vincent Ward (What Dreams May Come) at the helm fell through. Fincher had little time to prepare, and the experience making the film proved almost agonizing for him, as he had to endure incessant creative interference from the studio.

However, the film is still seen as a disappointment to some fans of the series as even the original script (with Ripley landing on a spherical space station inhabited by low-tech colonial farmers) still killed off Newt, Bishop and Hicks and would have still killed off Ripley (as Sigourney Weaver had grown tired of the franchise). Furthermore, a number of cast and crew associated with the series, including Michael Biehn and James Cameron have expressed their frustration and disappointment with the film's story. Cameron, in particular, has called the decision to arbitrarily kill off Bishop, Newt, and Hicks "a slap in the face" to fans of the previous film and the characters. Biehn, upon learning of his character's demise, demanded and received as much money for the use of his likeness in one scene as he had been paid for the entire film Aliens.

Fans still dispute the overwhelming amount of plot holes in the movie. On IMDb, fans of Aliens argue to this day that the movie could not have possibly happened with the amount of plot holes, and the whole movie should be discredited as canon. Particular among these plot holes are the fact that in Aliens, Bishop was never close to any Alien eggs, and could not have smuggled them on board. Likewise, the Queen clearly detached herself from the Egg sack, preventing anything other than still born eggs to be born. How these eggs got onto the Sulaco is never explained except in fan-theories mostly involving Bishop double-crossing Ripley and bringing Eggs back, which then hatch and cause the events of Alien 3. Fans also point out even if Eggs were on the Sulaco, all the members of the ship were either frozen or deactivated, and Alien eggs do not hatch over time, only when detecting movement. Fans of Alien 3 argue if the Sulaco made it to Earth and turned the movie into a huge war, fanboys would probably ignore these plot holes.

Many fans had read the Dark Horse comic book version of the franchise and were expecting the third film to feature a battle on Earth, a theme that was strongly hinted upon in the film's first preview trailer shown in theatres a full year before the film's opening :"...on Earth, everyone can hear you scream." Ironically, none of the proposed scripts actually took place on Earth.

Some fans consider Alien³ to be the the most underrated of the saga, noting its powerful messiah theme and praising Fincher for ending the storyline in a mythic, heroic way. Sigourney Weaver herself praises the film, and points out that while it was not well-received in the US, European audiences made it a huge hit overseas.

Special Edition DVD

The original 145 minute (ntsc)/138 minute (PAL) work print edit by David Fincher was finally made available on the nine-disc 2003 Alien Quadrilogy DVD box set. Many fans and critics judge this version to be vastly superior to the original and is generally regarded to be the "definitive" version of the film. Many have even come to consider it the best installment of the series. Yet, Fincher himself, although giving 20th Century Fox his blessing in releasing this work print to DVD, was the one director from the entire franchise who declined to participate in the DVD set, even to record a commentary, as he is still reportedly deeply bitter about the experience. This work print edit contains many new scenes including:
[Spoiler warningSpoiler warning]: Plot and/or ending details follow.
The bonus disc for Alien³ in the 2003 set includes an interesting documentary on the film's rough production, but again, lacks Fincher's participation. The website [The Digital Bits] posted a harsh criticism of this disc, pointing out that the studio had cut the documentary to delete a handful of behind-the-scenes clips in which Fincher openly expresses his anger and frustration with the studio.

Prequel

2004: Alien vs. Predator, considered a stand-alone by director Paul W.S. Anderson

Alien Quadrilogy

  1. 1979: Alien, directed by Ridley Scott
  2. 1986: Aliens, directed by James Cameron
  3. 1992: Alien³, directed by David Fincher
  4. 1997: , directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet

Cast

Director

Writers

A very early script treatment was written by noted science fiction author William Gibson. At the time of his involvement, Sigourney Weaver "seemed doggedly unwilling to participate," so the main narrative focus became Hicks and Bishop. It is considered by many to be a superior script. The version available on the Internet is, according to Gibson, "about thirty pages shorter than the version I turned in. It became the first of some thirty drafts, by a great many screenwriters, and none of mine was used (except for the idea, perhaps, of a bar-code tattoo)." [link]

Other notable screenwriters to work on the project were Eric Red, David Twohy, John Fasano and Rex Pickett. The proposed scripts from all these writers can be found on the Internet.

Producers

Other crew

Visual effects

The movie contains two CGI shots of the alien's head cracking apart and a brief scene of sunset shortly after Ripley is rescued. Other alien effects were created with suits, animatronics and rod puppets composited optically.


Alien movie series
Alien | Aliens | Alien³ |
Predator movie series
Predator | Predator 2
Movie cross-overs
AVP: Alien vs. Predator | AVP: Alien vs. Predator 2
Cross-overs
Alien vs. Predator | Aliens vs. Predator vs. The Terminator | Batman vs. Predator | Alien Loves Predator
Relating to the Alien universe
Bishop | Ellen Ripley | LV-426 | Nostromo | Space Jockey | The Derelict | United States Colonial Marines | Weyland-Yutani | Xenomorph | Yautja | | M56 Smart Gun

External links

 

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