Deadlines? What Deadlines?

"Unobtainium" is cool. I'm sure it's hit urban dictionary by now, but at the time it was still an inside joke among engineers and designers. It's basically a shorthand for, "This isn't going to work". If you have to build your widget out of an alloy so exotic that it doesn't even exist, yo need to go back to the drawing board. It's a bullshit science-fiction-y sounding name that's very obviously a bullshit science-fiction-y sounding name. Narratively it's a proxy for oil, or gold, or whatever commodity people are willing to make other people suffer for. Case in point.

Did no one "buzz the tower"? Oh, next you're going to tell me no one loves mom and apple pie. Actually, considering what's happened in the interval, it's a virtual certainty that several of those aviators are actually gay.

This man's fury can only be quenched with butts. He demands them. He must have them.

Spin the middle side, top-wise. Top-wise!

Ah, the '80's "Target of opportunity" more like. Inspired so-and-so's running to join the military after this film hit likely preceded the active recruitment program related to it. Still, compared to other '80's war cinema, TG wasn't nearly as insidious as most of the Vietnam war stuff that came out; which reframed the war to make America the victim and/or trucked in the POW conspiracy idiocy. This was obvious bullshit and was ultimately proven false, but that didn't stop the belief the evil VC were holding Americans in prison camps 10 years after the was was over because why not. You know it.

I was thinking about his scores for Blade Runner and Chariots of Fire. Chariots of Fire was a substantial critical and commercial hit and won 3 oscars that year, including best picture. The Chariots of Fire score was probably one of the most recognizable of the 1980's; second only to Star Wars and, maybe, Superman. He won an academy award for that. But, aside from the score, Chariots of Fire has largely fallen down the memory hole. On the other hand, Blade Runner failed at the box office, received very mixed reviews from critics and very little awards recognition. He never received an Oscar nomination for the score. But today (thanks to home video and subsequent restorations) the film is acknowledged as an important influential work of science fiction and the score is instantly recognizable and amazing. He was ahead of his time. For me, there was a trend in the late '70's early '80's of synth scores in popular movies. Personally, I hated them. They always sounded thin and uninspiring to me. The exception is Blade Runner, which is brilliant. Best Score that year went to John Williams for ET. Off the top of my head I couldn't tell you what it sounds like.

Loved it. Excellent finale. John's journey... I really hope this series doesn't die because uptight gaming nerds get offended that an adapted work decides to, you know, "be creative" and invent its own lore. You'd have better luck adapting the Bible the way some of these people react.

Oof. Thats harsh.

Maybe his folks were massive Deep Purple fans, dude. I just checked and holy shit he was born the same year; eight months after the release of that album.

"Ridley Scott" and "alien prequel" probably had a lot to do with that. If I recall correctly, part of the BTS marketing for the film was "Scott returning to Sci Fi after all these years". And no doubt, the craft was outstanding. It probably has one of the coolest trailers I've ever seen.

73% on the tomato-meter BTW...

When you put it that way it sounds amazing. But I'm sorry, the "chariots of the gods", ancient aliens stuff is just played out to me. and it was when the film came out. OTOH, there are some good performances. Elba and Theron earn their moneys and Fassbender stands out as David. Everyone else is still pretty good when they aren't talking nonsense mouth words.

But that egg was so wet. Not stupid exactly, just out of their depth. Not to mention that the situation was being manipulated by the science officer; who they no reason not to trust. But yeah, the characters had an incredible depth given the lack of exposition and they behaved more or less how one would expect. Their personalities had a sense to authenticity. Many real-world industrial incidents involve an. "oh, it'll be fine" attitude that, in hindsight, seems totally insane. Check out some of the USCSB safety videos on youtube. Kane was always the most adventurous of the group and his curiosity got the best of him. Nothing in his experience would have prepared him for a hideous space crab that could instantly melt through his helmet. Not just stupid but out of character. Weiland's TED talk does not sound like a TED talk (that should have been the first clue). Shaw's presentation to the group does not sound like a scientist talking to other scientists. Why does the geologist behave like a super badass assassin? Why does Holloway, an archeologist, have no interest in this alien world? Because he doesn't get to talk to one of these hypothetical engineers? He just made one of the most important discoveries in the history of science. His ancient aliens malarkey was just proven to be true! The Engineer's structure alone would be worth a lifetime of research. He's on an alien world full of wonders waiting to be discovered and he just doesn't care.

The directors cut features her in several scenes that fill in her backstory on Pandora.

Not gonna lie; I actually liked Salvation. It wasn't great but it wasn't nearly as terrible as some of the reactions would have you think. I think after the Bale freakout leaked it kind of set the thing up to fail. There are movies that come along that critics seem to treat with kid gloves *cough* WW84 *cough* and others that they seem to chomp at the bit to tear down. Terminator Salvation was the latter I think. And as much as I hate to say it, I think the Alien franchise is creatively tapped out as well. "The Passion of Elen Ripley" trilogy is great, albeit with a flawed 3rd film. Everything that's come afterward hasn't come close. We'll see how the new series does. That's not saying much. Talk about a film being treated with kid gloves... I counted the days from the moment that film was announced until the premiere. I saw it opening weekend. I was so disappointed I couldn't even process how disappointed I was. The film didn't exactly suck, it just didn't come close to my expectations for it. And it isn't even on the same planet as the first two films. Demystifying the engineers was a bad idea IMO. The characterizations were terrible (something Scott nailed in Alien).

Alien Resurrection was worse. Way too much slime on the aliens and everything was brown. The eggs looked like giant turds. The previous aliens also had cool hands. The hands in Resurrection were crap.

Y'know, I've been thinking about this and I'm not so sure. The reason: China. And to a lesser extent, India. When Avatar came out, the market for American films in China was still developing. It did $200 million there on its initial release. That was pretty impressive at the time but barely keeps it in the top 10 today. The current leader in terms of foreign films in China is Avengers endgame with $629 million. If Avatar 2 can approach that, and not lose too much domestically, I think it could exceed the first film. That's not even considering ticket price inflation since 2009. It's also worth noting that Avatar was re-released in China in 2021, during the Pandemic, and it did $58 million. I don't know how broad the release was or how much it was promoted. I'm calling it now: Avatar 2 will cross $3.0 billion at the box office.

This was Fincher's first feature film and I'm sure it took years off his life. He has since disowned it, refusing to have anything to do with the extended cut or even talking about it in interviews. I'm pretty sure he never worked with those producers again and only rarely worked with 20th Century Fox. It was actually supposed to be an orbiting monistary made of wood! which would have been cool but I liked the prison setting. It was an interesting bit of world building to fill out this universe that's controlled by "The Company". But yeah the shooting script was definitely choppy.

I was referring to a classmate and I'm pretty sure that's not what he meant. Who says they wanted the characters to have a happy ending?

His parents named him "Burn"?

I've never heard anyone have a problem with this or that it makes for a plot hole. There's an interesting parallel in that Skynet had to send the Terminator had to go back in time in order to have Sarah Connor destroy it in that place in order for Cyberdyne Systems to get its bits in order for Skynet and eventually Terminators to exist. John Connor has to send Kyle Reese after it in order for John Connor to be born in order to send him after it. Fate, blah, blah. No future but what we make, blah, blah. ETA: if the Terminator was successful in killing Sarah Connor, would Skynet be erasing itself from the future? Wrap you brain around that.

I remember some pretty visceral reactions to Alien 3 when it came out. I still have a vivid memory of a classmate of mine ranting that, after everything they went through to save Newt in Aliens, the next film kills her off-screen at the beginning of the first act. Yeah, he was pissed. It was certainly jarring for me, but I don't see it as a problem depending on what one thinks the alien trilogy is about.

Opening weekend, son. I went into the garage and threw something (a milk crate I think) when I couldn't see it on opening night. It was my favorite movie for like, a decade. James Cameron made me cry.

It's an amazing scene.