Alien
The original 1979 theatrical poster
Directed by	Ridley Scott
Produced by	Gordon Carroll David Giler Walter Hill
Written by	Story: Dan O'Bannon Ronald Shusett Screenplay: Dan O'Bannon David Giler (uncredited) Walter Hill (uncredited)
Starring	Sigourney Weaver Tom Skerritt Bolaji Badejo John Hurt Veronica Cartwright Harry Dean Stanton Ian Holm Yaphet Kotto
Music by	Jerry Goldsmith Howard Hanson (Symphony No. Sir Ridley Scott (born November 30 1937 in South Shields, Tyne and Wear) is a British Academy Award Nominated and Golden Globe Emmy Award and BAFTA Award winning Dan O'Bannon (born Daniel Thomas O'Bannon on September 30, 1946 in St Ronald Shusett is a Motion picture Screenwriter and producer, usually in the Science fiction genre Dan O'Bannon (born Daniel Thomas O'Bannon on September 30, 1946 in St Sigourney Weaver (born October 8, 1949) is an Academy Award -nominated American actress, best known for her roles as Lt Thomas Roy "Tom" Skerritt (born August 25, 1933) is an Emmy Award -winning American Actor who has appeared in over 40 films John Vincent Hurt, CBE (born 22 January 1940 is an English Actor. Veronica A Cartwright (born April 20, 1949) is an Emmy Award-nominated English/American Actress. Harry Dean Stanton (born July 14, 1926) is an American Actor. Sir Ian Holm CBE (born 12 September, 1931) is an English award-winning Actor known for his stage work and for many film roles Prince Yaphet Frederick Kotto (born November 15, 1937) is an American Actor, known for numerous film roles and his starring role in the Jerrald King "Jerry" Goldsmith ( February 10, 1929 – July 21, 2004) was an American Film score Composer Howard Harold Hanson ( October 28, 1896 &ndash February 26, 1981) was an American Composer, conductor, educator 2)
Cinematography	Derek Vanlint
Editing by	Terry Rawlings
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date(s)	Theatrical Cut: May 25, 1979 Director's Cut: October 29, 2003
Running time	Theatrical Cut: 117 min. Terry Rawlings (born 1933 in London England) is a Film editor and Sound editor with several BAFTA nominations and one Academy Events 1085 - Alfonso VI of Castile takes Toledo Spain back from the Moors. Year 1979 ( MCMLXXIX) was a Common year starting on Monday (link displays the 1979 Gregorian calendar) Events 437 - Valentinian III, Western Roman Emperor, marries Licinia Eudoxia, daughter of his cousin Theodosius II Year 2003 ( MMIII) was a Common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. Director's Cut: 116 min.
Country	United Kingdom United States
Language	English
Budget	$11,000,000
Followed by	Aliens
Allmovie profile
IMDb profile

Alien is a culturally influential 1979 science-fiction horror film, directed by Ridley Scott and starring Sigourney Weaver (see 1979 in film). The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located The United States of America —commonly referred to as the English is a West Germanic language originating in England and is the First language for most people in the United Kingdom, the United States This article is about the film for the video games see Aliens (Square computer game and Aliens (arcade game. Year 1979 ( MCMLXXIX) was a Common year starting on Monday (link displays the 1979 Gregorian calendar) Science fiction Film is a Film genre that uses speculative, Science -based depictions of imaginary phenomena such as extra-terrestrial Horror films are Movies that strive to elicit Fear, Horror and terror responses from viewers Sir Ridley Scott (born November 30 1937 in South Shields, Tyne and Wear) is a British Academy Award Nominated and Golden Globe Emmy Award and BAFTA Award winning Sigourney Weaver (born October 8, 1949) is an Academy Award -nominated American actress, best known for her roles as Lt The year 1979 in film involved some significant events Events March 5 - Production begins on Star Wars Episode The film's title refers to the main antagonist: a highly aggressive, unfamiliar extraterrestrial life-form. Extraterrestrial life is Life originating outside of the Earth.

Alien garnered both critical acclaim and box-office success, spawning a Hollywood media franchise of literature, video games, merchandise, and three official sequels. A box office is a place where tickets are sold to the public for Admission to a venue A media franchise is an Intellectual property involving the characters, setting, and Trademarks of an original work of media (usually A sequel is a work in Literature, Film, or other media that portrays events following those of a previous work The film effectively launched actress Sigourney Weaver's career. Sigourney Weaver (born October 8, 1949) is an Academy Award -nominated American actress, best known for her roles as Lt By featuring a strong heroine, Alien also proved unconventional (by Hollywood standards) for the action genre. A hero (from Greek grc ἥρως hērōs) in Greek mythology and Folklore, was originally a Demigod, the offspring of a mortal and While the Alien itself emerged as a popular aspect of the film, the story of Ellen Ripley became the thematic thread that ran through the series. Lieutenant Ellen Ripley is a Science fiction heroine played by Sigourney Weaver. Together with the films of David Cronenberg from the 1970s^[1], Alien emerged as a central work in the development of the body-horror subgenre. David Paul Cronenberg OC, FRSC (born March 15, 1943) is a Canadian Film director and occasional Actor. Body horror, or biological horror, is Horror fiction in which the horror is principally derived from a sense of physical "wrongness" with the body ^[2] Publicity for the film involved a tagline that became widely known: "In space no one can hear you scream. A tagline is a variant of a branding slogan typically used in Marketing materials and Advertising. " Barbara Gips wrote the tagline and graphic designer Phil Gips designed the poster for the film.

Sequels to the film include: Aliens (1986), Alien³ (1992) and Alien: Resurrection (1997). This article is about the film for the video games see Aliens (Square computer game and Aliens (arcade game. Events April 12 - Actor Morgan Mason marries The Go-Go's Belinda Carlisle Actor Arnold Schwarzenegger marries Alien 3, styled as Alien³, is a 1992 Science fiction / Horror film (see 1992 in film) The year 1992 in film involved many significant films (For more about films in foreign languages check sources in those languages Alien Resurrection is a science fiction released in 1997 by 20th Century Fox. The year 1997 in film involved some significant events Events Summer - Production begins on Star Wars Episode I The Phantom Menace The 21st century saw a possible end of the Alien franchise in favor of a crossover with the Predator series Alien vs. Predator (2004) and its sequel Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (2007). A fictional crossover is the placement of two or more otherwise discrete Fictional characters, settings or universes into the context of a single The Predator film series is a science fiction horror film franchise, focusing on a human superior (who changes in each film and their Alien vs Predator (also known as AVP) is a Science fiction film released in 2004 by 20th Century Fox. The year 2004 in film involved some significant events Major releases of sequels took place Aliens vs Predator Requiem (also known as AVPR) is the 2007 Science fiction film sequel to 2004 's Alien vs 2007 saw major releases such as The Simpsons Movie, National Treasure Book of Secrets, ^[3]

Plot

In the year 2122, the Nostromo, an interstellar commercial towing-vehicle with a crew of seven, has set out from Thedus to Earth, hauling a refinery and twenty million tons of mineral ore. The 22nd century of the Common Era will span the years 2101&ndash2200 of the Gregorian calendar. An ore is a volume of rock containing components or Minerals in a mode of occurrence that renders it valuable for mining At the start of the film, the ship's computer MU-TH-R 182, simply called "Mother" by the crew, receives an apparently unidentifiable signal from a moon orbiting a nearby planet,^[4] while monitoring the ship's operations. A computer is a Machine that manipulates data according to a list of instructions. LV-426 is a fictitious planetoid appearing in the films Alien (1979 and Aliens (1986 A planet, as defined by the International Astronomical Union (IAU is a celestial body Orbiting a Star or stellar remnant that is "Mother" wakes the crew from stasis, so they can investigate the signal's origin. Stasis (ˈsteɪsɪs or hypersleep, is a Science fiction concept akin to Suspended animation. With the ore and refining facilities left in orbit, the tug portion of the Nostromo lands on the moon, suffering damage during the rough landing.

Most of the cast together in the ship's bridge, with Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) in the center. Sigourney Weaver (born October 8, 1949) is an Academy Award -nominated American actress, best known for her roles as Lt

Captain Dallas (Tom Skerritt), Kane (John Hurt) and Lambert (Veronica Cartwright) leave the ship to investigate the signal's point of origin. Thomas Roy "Tom" Skerritt (born August 25, 1933) is an Emmy Award -winning American Actor who has appeared in over 40 films John Vincent Hurt, CBE (born 22 January 1940 is an English Actor. Veronica A Cartwright (born April 20, 1949) is an Emmy Award-nominated English/American Actress. They soon discover that the signal originates from a derelict spacecraft of unknown origin. The group enters the craft, finding the pilot's fossilized remains. " Space Jockey " (or "The Pilot" is the nickname given to a type of extraterrestrial from the ''Alien'' series of movies and games first appearing Kane descends into a chamber beneath the pilot, discovering thousands of leathery eggs. One of the eggs opens, a facehugger inside leaps out, burns through the visor of Kane's spacesuit and attaches itself to his face. The alien, also called the xenomorph, or a thing and by Ellen Ripley in a deleted scene from Alien³. Dallas and Lambert carry the unconscious Kane back to the Nostromo. Lieutenant Ripley (Sigourney Weaver), the commanding officer in the absence of Dallas and Kane, refuses to let them back on board, citing quarantine protocol. Sigourney Weaver (born October 8, 1949) is an Academy Award -nominated American actress, best known for her roles as Lt For other uses see Quarantine (disambiguation Quarantine is voluntary or compulsory isolation typically to contain the spread of something However, Science Officer Ash (Ian Holm) disregards Ripley's decision and lets them in. Sir Ian Holm CBE (born 12 September, 1931) is an English award-winning Actor known for his stage work and for many film roles In the ship's infirmary Dallas and Ash attempt to remove the creature from Kane's face, but they discover they cannot remove it by force without harming Kane. When they try to cut off one of its digits, the alien's highly acidic blood sprays on the floor and burns its way through several decks of the spaceship. In Computer science, ACID ( Atomicity Consistency Isolation Durability) is a set of properties that guarantee that Database transactions are Due to this lethal defense mechanism, the crew refrains from further attempts at removal. Eventually the creature detaches from Kane's face on its own, and the crew find it dead. Kane wakes up, seemingly unharmed.

With the ship repaired, the crew leave the moon and have one last meal before re-entering hypersleep. Stasis (ˈsteɪsɪs or hypersleep, is a Science fiction concept akin to Suspended animation. During the meal Kane begins to choke and convulse until an alien chestburster bursts from his chest, killing him and scurrying quickly out of the room. The alien, also called the xenomorph, or a thing and by Ellen Ripley in a deleted scene from Alien³. After ejecting Kane's body into space, the crew splits up into two teams to capture the alien. Ash rigs together a tracking-device, while Brett (Harry Dean Stanton) assembles a weapon similar to a cattle-prod. Harry Dean Stanton (born July 14, 1926) is an American Actor. A cattle prod, also called a stock prod, is a handheld device commonly used to make cattle or other Livestock move by striking or poking them or in the case of a Picking up a signal, Parker (Yaphet Kotto), Brett, and Ripley think they have the creature cornered, only to discover Jones, the crew's cat. Prince Yaphet Frederick Kotto (born November 15, 1937) is an American Actor, known for numerous film roles and his starring role in the WikipediaManual of Style (spelling, articles should conform to one overall spelling style of English typically the one most linked to the article topic (if it is geographic Realizing they might pick up the cat on the tracker again later, Parker sends Brett to catch Jones. During his search Brett encounters the alien, now fully grown and enormous. The creature attacks him and hauls him into an air-shaft.

The crew realizes that the alien has used the air-shafts to move through the ship. Dallas enters the network of air-shafts with a flamethrower, intending to drive the alien into an airlock in order to blow it out into space. A flamethrower is a mechanical device designed to project a long controllable stream of Fire. Using the tracker, Lambert picks up the alien's signal moving toward Dallas. As Dallas attempts to escape, the creature ambushes him, and he disappears. Ripley asks Mother for advice on destroying the alien, and in the process discovers that "The Company"^[5] had already detected the alien transmission, and wanted one of the alien lifeforms brought back — possibly for its weapons division — even at the expense of the crew. Weyland-Yutani is a fictional corporation in the motion picture Alien and its sequels often referred to simply as " The Company " Ash, the Company's agent on board, attacks Ripley after she learns of "Special Order 937", but Parker and Lambert arrive before he can kill her. Parker dislodges Ash's head with a fire-extinguisher, revealing Ash as an android, programmed to protect the alien and to ensure its return to Earth. An android is a Robot designed to resemble a human usually both in appearance and behavior

The three remaining crew members decide to destroy the Nostromo and escape in the shuttle Narcissus. While Ripley preps the Narcissus for launch, Parker and Lambert go to gather coolant for the shuttle's life-support system. A coolant is a fluid which flows through a device in order to prevent its overheating transferring the heat produced by the device to other devices that utilize or dissipate it Ripley hears Jones over the ship's communication system and runs off to the Bridge to collect him. While there, she hears the screams of Parker and Lambert and runs to help them. She arrives too late, discovering the alien has killed them. Ripley activates the ship's self-destruct sequence and races to the shuttle, but sees the alien blocking her way into the shuttle. A self-destruct is a mechanism which causes a device to destroy itself under a predefined set of circumstances After an unsuccessful attempt at aborting the self-destruct sequence, Ripley rushes back to the shuttle and finds the alien gone. Ripley and Jones take off in the Narcissus, and the Nostromo explodes. While preparing for hypersleep Ripley discovers that the alien has hidden itself inside the shuttle. Ripley manages to slip on a space-suit and arm herself with a grappling-gun. A space suit is a complex system of Garments equipment and environmental systems designed to keep a person alive and comfortable in the harsh environment of outer space As the alien moves toward her, about to attack, she hits a button opening the hatch door. Explosive decompression blasts the alien outwards, but it grabs the sides of the hatch opening and starts to crawl back into the shuttle. Ripley then shoots the alien with the grappling-gun, which gets pulled out of her hand but caught by the closing hatch door. When the Alien (still tethered to the grappling hook and the gun inside) climbs into one of the shuttle's engine nacelles, Ripley activates the engine and blasts it into space. The film ends as Ripley and the cat enter hypersleep. ^[6]

Cast

• Sigourney Weaver as Ellen Ripley. Sigourney Weaver (born October 8, 1949) is an Academy Award -nominated American actress, best known for her roles as Lt Lieutenant Ellen Ripley is a Science fiction heroine played by Sigourney Weaver. Ripley serves as the Warrant Officer onboard the Nostromo and as the chief protagonist of the film. A Warrant Officer ( WO) is a member of a military organization holding one of a specific group of ranks. The Protagonist or main character is the central figure of a story. The part of Ripley provided Weaver's first leading role in a motion picture.
• Tom Skerritt as Dallas. Thomas Roy "Tom" Skerritt (born August 25, 1933) is an Emmy Award -winning American Actor who has appeared in over 40 films This article lists characters and actors in the ''Alien'' series of Science fiction films Dallas, the Captain of the Nostromo, leads the landing-party to investigate the distress signal on LV-426 and subsequently leads the crew in dealing with the hostile Alien on board the Nostromo.
• John Hurt as Kane, the Nostromo's Executive Officer. John Vincent Hurt, CBE (born 22 January 1940 is an English Actor. This article lists characters and actors in the ''Alien'' series of Science fiction films While executive officer literally refers to a person responsible for the performance of duties involved in running an Organization, the exact meaning of the role is variable He becomes the first of the crew to encounter the alien lifeform on LV-426, and serves as host for the Alien — which then stalks the crew.
• Veronica Cartwright as Lambert. Veronica A Cartwright (born April 20, 1949) is an Emmy Award-nominated English/American Actress. This article lists characters and actors in the ''Alien'' series of Science fiction films Lambert, the Nostromo's navigator, proves the most emotionally vulnerable member of the crew and the first to lose her cool when the Alien attacks them.
• Ian Holm as Ash, the Nostromo's Science Officer. Sir Ian Holm CBE (born 12 September, 1931) is an English award-winning Actor known for his stage work and for many film roles This article lists characters and actors in the ''Alien'' series of Science fiction films He performs tests on the alien lifeform which attached itself to Kane and communicates his findings to the Weyland-Yutani Corporation. Weyland-Yutani is a fictional corporation in the motion picture Alien and its sequels often referred to simply as " The Company " Ripley later reveals him as an android acting under orders from the company to return the Alien to their laboratories, even at the expense of the crew. An android is a Robot designed to resemble a human usually both in appearance and behavior
• Harry Dean Stanton as Brett. Harry Dean Stanton (born July 14, 1926) is an American Actor. This article lists characters and actors in the ''Alien'' series of Science fiction films Brett, the Nostromo's Engineering Technician, cares for Jones, the ship's cat. He and Parker view themselves as the "grunts" of the crew and argue with the others for larger shares of the crew's profits.
• Yaphet Kotto as Parker, the Nostromo's Chief Engineer. Prince Yaphet Frederick Kotto (born November 15, 1937) is an American Actor, known for numerous film roles and his starring role in the This article lists characters and actors in the ''Alien'' series of Science fiction films He shares the closest relationship with Brett and works with him to repair damage to the ship. The two characters argue with the other crew members over their shares in the ship's profits.
• Bolaji Badejo as the Alien, the antagonist of the film. The alien, also called the xenomorph, or a thing and by Ellen Ripley in a deleted scene from Alien³. It stalks the Nostromo's crew members. Percy Edwards provided the creature's vocalizations while Eddie Powell stood in for Badejo for performing stuntwork. Percy Edwards ( June 1 1908, Ipswich, Suffolk - June 7 1996, Hintlesham, Suffolk was an English Eddie Powell ( 9 March 1927 - 11 August 2000) was a British stuntman.

Kane examines an egg, unaware of the coming danger

Actor Jon Finch originally played the role of Kane, but as principal photography on Alien commenced, the crew soon noticed that he looked ill and rushed him to hospital, where doctors diagnosed a severe case of diabetes. Jon Finch (born 2 March 1941) is an English Actor noted for many Shakespearean roles Diabetes mellitus (ˌdaɪəˈbiːtiːz or /ˌdaɪəˈbiːtəs/ /məˈlaɪtəs/ or /ˈmɛlətəs/ often referred to simply as diabetes ( Ancient Greek: grc John Hurt, in London and available at that time, subsequently replaced Finch. John Vincent Hurt, CBE (born 22 January 1940 is an English Actor.

Inspirations

Some reviewers have noted that the basic plot of Alien, the pitting of a small group of humans against a relentless alien creature in a remote location, derives from earlier science-fiction horror films. ^[7][8][9] Dan O'Bannon has over the years expressed clear views on the exact sources. ^[10] He has even gone as far as saying: "A lot of people speculated as to where I stole it from. The truth is I stole it from everywhere. "^[11]

Admitted inspirations include:

• The works of Joseph Conrad
• The Thing from Another World (1951), featuring the hunting of professional men (soldiers in this case) through closely confined areas. Joseph Conrad (born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski, 3 December 1857 – 3 August 1924 was a Polish-born English novelist The Thing from Another World, often referred to as The Thing before 1982 is a 1951 Science fiction film which tells the story of The year 1951 in film involved some significant events Events Sweden - May Britt is scouted by Italian
• Forbidden Planet (1956) in which a ship lands despite warnings and an invisible creature hunts them down one by one. Forbidden Planet is a 1956 Science fiction film directed by Fred M The year 1956 in film involved some significant events Events August 4 - The last film serial Blazing the Overland
• It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958) where a spaceship crew bring a murderous alien onboard who then hunts them down. It! The Terror from Beyond Space is a 1958 Black and white Science fiction film directed by Edward L The year 1958 in film involved some significant events Events February 16- " In the Money " by William Ivor Powell, the associate producer, has also highlighted the influences. Representatives of It! sued the makers of Alien, claiming that its storyline plagiarized that of It!.
• Planet of the Vampires (1965), in which humans discover the remains of a large alien sitting at the controls of its spaceship. Planet of the Vampires ( Italian title Terrore nello spazio) is a 1965 Italian science fiction / Horror film The year 1965 in film involved some significant events Events Top grossing films (U
• "Junkyard", a short-story by Clifford D. Simak: humans find deserted spaceships on an asteroid and the crew stumble across an egg-chamber. Clifford Donald Simak ( August 3, 1904 - April 25, 1988) was a major American Science fiction writer
• Strange Relations by Philip José Farmer which deals with extraterrestrial reproduction. Philip José Farmer (born January 26 1918) is an American Author, principally known for his Science fiction and fantasy
• Various stories from Weird Tales in which monsters eat people from the inside. Weird Tales is an American Fantasy and Horror fiction Pulp magazine first published in March 1923.
• 2001: A Space Odyssey which inspired some scenes in Aliens. 2001 A Space Odyssey is a 1968 Science fiction film directed by Stanley Kubrick, written by Kubrick and Arthur C Note the similarities between HAL 9000 "HAL" and MU-TH-R 182 "MOTHER" as the ships' central computers that make the decisions for humans when they languish in cryo-sleep; the computers also hide ulterior motives not known to the crew. Cryonics is the low-temperature Preservation of Humans and other Animals that can no longer be sustained by contemporary Medicine until
• Star Wars, which embraced the concept of a used future, where everything looks aged and rusty. Star Wars is an epic Space opera franchise initially conceived by George Lucas during the 1970s and significantly expanded Used future is a literary concept of modern Science fiction. It represents a future wherein the environment and materials look old and used as opposed to everything being shiny Ridley Scott commented: "Within the context of that fantasy he (George Lucas) said people still have to wash behind their ears at night. That was another wonderful touch. It influenced me when I did “Alien”. I thought I better push it a bit further and make them truck drivers. "^[12]

O'Bannon denies influence on the part of The Voyage of the Space Beagle, which features aliens laying eggs in people which then hatch and eat their way out. The Voyage of the Space Beagle ( 1950, Canada is a classic novel of Science fiction by A However, a lawsuit brought by A. E. van Vogt ended with a settlement out of court. Alfred Elton van Vogt (April 26 1912 – January 26 2000 was a Canadian -born Science fiction author who was one of the most prolific ^[13] Philip French suggests another non-science-fiction parallel: Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None. And Then There Were None is a work of Detective fiction by Agatha Christie first published in the United Kingdom by the Collins Crime Club ^[14]

Production

History and early versions

According to the book "The Book of Alien" (Titan Books © 1979), a very early draft of the script envisaged the eggs housed in a completely separate architectural structure, shaped in the form of a massive pyramid. The British illustrator and science-fiction artist Chris Foss drew these illustrations of the discarded sequence. For the vector -based drawing program by Adobe Systems, see Adobe Illustrator. Christopher Foss (born 1946 is a British Illustrator and science fiction artist best known for his Science fiction book covers and the illustrations for the original

After completing Dark Star (1974), Dan O'Bannon wanted to take some of the ideas (such as where an alien and a crew hunt each other through a ship) and make them into a science-fiction horror film, at that time provisionally called Memory. Dark Star is a 1974 Sci-fi Tongue-in-cheek comedy Motion picture directed by John Carpenter and co-written with Dan O'Bannon Dan O'Bannon (born Daniel Thomas O'Bannon on September 30, 1946 in St He also worked on a script entitled Gremlins (not the unrelated 1984 film of the same name), about gremlins getting loose aboard a World War II bomber and wreaking havoc with the crew (the B-17 segment of the film Heavy Metal (1981) used a significantly altered version of this original story). A gremlin is a folkloric creature commonly depicted as mischievous and mechanically oriented with a specific interest in Aircraft. World War II, or the Second World War, (often abbreviated WWII) was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including A bomber is a Military aircraft designed to attack ground and sea targets primarily by dropping Bombs on them Heavy Metal is a 1981 Canadian Animated film from executive producer Leonard Mogel who was also the publisher of Heavy Metal Screenwriter Ronald Shusett contacted O'Bannon about collaborating on projects. Ronald Shusett is a Motion picture Screenwriter and producer, usually in the Science fiction genre Although Shusett wanted input on a script that would later become Total Recall, they decided to focus on the lower-budget Memory. Total Recall is a 1990 Academy Award -winning American Science fiction film. However, O'Bannon got drafted in to work on Alejandro Jodorowsky's adaptation of Frank Herbert's Dune. Alejandro Jodorowsky (ɑːlɛˈxɑːndrɒ jɒdɒˈrɒvskiː (born February 7 1929 in Tocopilla, Chile, of a Jewish Russian (Ukranian immigrant family Franklin Patrick Herbert Jr ( October 8 1920 &ndash February 11 1986) was a critically acclaimed and commercially successful American Dune is a Science fiction novel written by Frank Herbert and published in 1965. Although this came to nothing, he did meet H.R. Giger, Chris Foss and Moebius on set and a lot of their work together led to later developments when production of Alien started in earnest. Hans Ruedi Giger (ˈɡi ɡɚ (born at Chur, Grisons Canton, February 5, 1940) is an Academy Award -winning Swiss Christopher Foss (born 1946 is a British Illustrator and science fiction artist best known for his Science fiction book covers and the illustrations for the original Jean Henri Gaston Giraud (born May 8, 1938) is a French comics artist. ^[10] For Giger's well-recognized influence see below. Foss' spaceship designs remained unused (some later appeared in some of his books) but Mœbius's designs for the Nostromo spacesuits made it into the final film. ^[10]

When O'Bannon returned to America, broke, after the Dune film-project collapsed, he ended up sharing a flat with Shusett. Shusett suggested mixing in elements of Gremlins and how the alien got on board. He said: "It screws one of the crew. Something jumps up at his face, grabs hold of him and shoves its seed down his throat, then later it bursts out. " Ron Cobb had worked on the designs for Dark Star (and would later provide the bulk of the designs for Alien); he offered the idea of the creature's acid blood stopping the crew from using "conventional" weapons (like guns) against it. Ron Cobb (born 1937 is an American cartoonist artist writer film designer and film director These various ideas came together in the O'Bannon and Shusett script Star Beast. ^[10] At this stage the title loomed as the main problem. Casting around for a better name, O'Bannon noticed the number of times the word "alien" occurred in the script, and so he adopted this for the film's title. ^[10]

The original script bears many resemblances to the film as actually produced, yet with significant differences. The spaceship — designed with a low-budget production in mind — originated as a small craft, initially a galactic coastguard-like ship and then a commercial vessel, called the Snark. ^[10] In the original script, the ship has an all-male crew, including the Ripley character (though the script's "Cast of Characters" section explicitly states that "The crew is unisex and all parts are interchangeable for men or women"). ^[10] Actor Tom Skerritt originally won the role of Ripley, but later, in the course of developing the script, character re-casting made Ripley a woman, because producer Alan Ladd, Jr., and script-doctors Walter Hill and David Giler had heard rumors of Fox working on other titles with strong female leads. Thomas Roy "Tom" Skerritt (born August 25, 1933) is an Emmy Award -winning American Actor who has appeared in over 40 films Alan Ladd Jr (born October 22 1937 in Los Angeles California, USA) is an American film industry executive and producer A script doctor is a skilled Screenwriter called in to assist a Film project by rewriting parts of the Screenplay to improve dialogue pacing and other ^[10]

The script recounted how, after responding to the intercepted alien message, the crew discover the derelict alien craft and its dead pilot. Ominously, the pilot in its death-throes had scratched a triangle on its control-console. The crew members go outside and see the remains of an ancient pyramid. A pyramid is a Building where the upper surfaces are triangular and converge on one point They lower Kane into the structure, where he finds a chamber with a breathable atmosphere. An altar-like structure houses the alien embryo-eggs, and a hieroglyph depicts the alien's life-cycle. An altar is any structure upon which Sacrifices or other offerings are made for religious purposes or some other sacred place where ceremonies take place ^[10] This concept survived for a long time, and preliminary H. R. Giger pyramid-drawings intended for Alien exist, but eventually the producers went with the idea of combining the wrecked derelict ship with the egg-chamber (also designed by Giger), although the ideas of the pyramid, the altar and the hieroglyphs re-surfaced in the Aliens vs. Predator computer game and in the 2004 film Alien vs. Predator. Aliens versus Predator is a Science fiction First-person shooter Computer game developed by Rebellion Developments and published by The year 2004 in film involved some significant events Major releases of sequels took place Alien vs Predator (also known as AVP) is a Science fiction film released in 2004 by 20th Century Fox.

Apart from the disappearance of the pyramid, the final script changed the story's pacing. The impregnation occurred around the mid-point in the film, with a long, slow build up of tension reminiscent of the atmosphere generated in At the Mountains of Madness. At the Mountains of Madness is a Novella by horror writer H P It also ended with an Alien egg seen clinging to the bottom of the escaping shuttle, a detail that survived various drafts and disappeared only in the final version dated June 1978. ^[10]

The original cut of the film also included a scene where, after the attacks on all her fellow crew-members, Ripley heads towards the shuttle, then stumbles across a room where she finds Dallas — barely alive — and Brett (Dallas and Brett, the first two crew-members to fall victim to the Alien, had disappeared). Dallas ends up immobilized in a cocoon and Brett appears part-way through a process of mutating into an Alien egg. Dallas begs Ripley to kill him, and she does so by using her flamethrower device. (The egg-mutation process comprises the only form of reproduction shown by the Alien until the later films' depiction of an Alien Queen as a source for the eggs. )

Pre-production

O'Bannon and Shusett almost completed the sale of the film to Roger Corman. Roger William Corman (born April 5 1926) sometimes nicknamed "King of the Bs" for his output of B-movies (though he himself rejects this as inaccurate However, at the last minute, their friend Michael Haggerty said he could get them a better deal; and thus they sold the script to the Brandywine company of David Giler, Gordon Carroll, and Walter Hill, who had a production-deal with Twentieth Century Fox with Hill attached to direct. Walter Hill may refer to Walter Hill (director (born 1942 American film director Walter Barnard Hill (1851&ndash1905 chancellor ^[10] A single tagline promoted the script to studio executives: "Jaws in space". A tagline is a variant of a branding slogan typically used in Marketing materials and Advertising. A movie studio (aka film studio) is in the established sense of the term a company that distributes films. Jaws is a 1975 thriller / horror Film directed by Steven Spielberg and based on Peter Benchley 's best-selling ^[15]

Hill and Giler re-wrote the script, making it more action-oriented, adding the character of Ash, and rewriting much of the dialogue. They also introduced a motherhood theme, though the detail of Ripley going back for the cat originated in the period of the male Ripley-character. ^[10] These changes caused tension between O'Bannon and the other production members that lasted through the making of the film. Parts of O'Bannon's scripts appear on various DVD releases, with the full early version presented on the Alien Quadrilogy. The Alien Quadrilogy is a four-movie nine- DVD box set of Alien, Aliens, Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection

At this stage, a hiatus occurred in the production, as the studio expressed alarm at the prospect of committing to a new science-fiction film in the pre-Star Wars era when such films remained a rarity. ^[16]

When Star Wars became a box-office hit, Fox gave the film the go-ahead with an $8 million budget — double the $4 million the studio originally planned for the project. The increase came largely as the result of the impact on Fox executives of the well-crafted storyboards Ridley Scott made for the film. During the production hiatus, Ridley Scott replaced and revised many of the pre-existing design-elements to conform to his storyboards before principal photography started at Shepperton Studios in England. Shepperton Studios, located in Shepperton, Surrey, England is a film studio with a long history of film making England is a Country which is part of the United Kingdom. Its inhabitants account for more than 83% of the total UK population whilst its mainland Giger, brought in from Zürich (Switzerland), set up at the studios along with Ron Cobb as a type of artist-in-residence and O'Bannon as consultant. The Canton of Zürich (German Kanton) has a population of about 1 Artist-in-residence programs and other residency opportunities allow visiting artists to stay and work 'for art's sake' (Giger kept a diary through the production which became the basis for his book Giger's Alien). ^[17]

The alien

For more details on this character, see Alien (Alien). The alien, also called the xenomorph, or a thing and by Ellen Ripley in a deleted scene from Alien³.

H. R. Giger's original design for the Alien, based on his earlier work, Necronom IV

Swiss painter and sculptor H. R. Giger designed the alien creature's adult form and the alien architecture. Hans Ruedi Giger (ˈɡi ɡɚ (born at Chur, Grisons Canton, February 5, 1940) is an Academy Award -winning Swiss The designs feature the use of bones in the architecture. [1] Giger received an Academy Award nomination for best art direction for his work on this film. "The Oscar" redirects here for the film see The Oscar (film. The design of the creature with strong Freudian sexual undertones and multiple phallic symbols, while simultaneously presenting an overall feminine figure, provided a compelling androgynous image, conforming to archetypal mappings and imageries in horror films that often redraw gender lines. ^[18]

The adult alien appears predominantly black in color, similar in cast to heavily tarnished silver. In keeping with Giger's blending of biological and mechanical life-forms, some shots reveal a metallic patina. It has an elongated shiny head with no eyes. (Some production stills reveal a human skull used in the sculpture beneath its translucent anterior shell). Below, the jaw holds the razor-sharp metal teeth. The mouth houses a tongue-like body part with a second mouth on the end. On the alien's back stand four curved black pipes (Giger designed these for the purpose of breaking up the back). Apart from this, the alien has an anthropomorphic form, with two legs and two arms, its hands each armed with six long, black, razor-sharp claws.

Set-design and construction

Michael Seymour worked as the film's production designer. John Mollo supervised the costumes, including the distinctive spacesuits, and Carlo Rambaldi produced the crucial mechanical effects for the title-alien's head. Carlo Rambaldi (born 1925 in Vigarano Mainarda, Italy) is an Italian -born special effects artist who is most famous for designing the title character of The team of Brian Johnson and Nick Allder — who had worked on 2001: A Space Odyssey and Space 1999 — headed up special effects. 2001 A Space Odyssey is a 1968 Science fiction film directed by Stanley Kubrick, written by Kubrick and Arthur C Space 1999 ( ITC Entertainment and RAI, 1975-77 is a British science-fiction television series The illusions used in the Film, Television, Theater, or Entertainment industries to simulate the imagined events in a story are traditionally called Scott turned to a computer-animation pioneer, Bernard Lodge, from his old college — the Royal College of Art in London — to produce the film's green-line computer displays. Bernard Lodge (born 1933 is a British designer who was best known for his work on the BBC television series Doctor Who. The Royal College of Art ( RCA) is a University in London, England. London ( ˈlʌndən is the capital and largest urban area in the United Kingdom. The thin layer of mist that "notified the eggs" came from smoke and a pulsating laser, which the film crew borrowed from the band The Who. The Who are an English rock band formed in 1964. The primary lineup consisted of guitarist Pete Townshend

According to the behind-the-scenes documentary The Beast Within: The Making of "Alien", the film crew built the Nostromo spaceship set in one piece. To move around the set, actors had to navigate through the hallways of the ship. Toward the end of the shoot, many members of the cast and crew recalled walking inside the set alone as a very unnerving experience. Some maintain that such emotions come across on the screen.

Some shots on the planet's surface outside the Nostromo and on the "Space Jockey's" dais used children in spacesuits (specifically Ridley Scott's and the cameraman's children) as stand-ins in order to make the spaceship's landing-legs seem larger. " Space Jockey " (or "The Pilot" is the nickname given to a type of extraterrestrial from the ''Alien'' series of movies and games first appearing Ridley Scott said in the director's commentary on the DVD, "This shot here, actually is three children made in miniature spacesuits. . . who were my two sons and the cameraman's son. . . . I had small costumes made for them so the landing legs looked bigger. . . "^[19]

Ridley Scott also mentions in the DVD commentary that the graphics used on computer screens featured on the Nostromo looked basic by design; Scott describing them as "raw" and adding to the gritty nature of the film.

Ridley Scott re-used the Nostromo's and the shuttle's computer-graphics, specifically the PURGE-screen, for the computer-screens inside the Spinner hover-cars in his film Blade Runner. Spinner is the generic term for a flying car in Blade Runner that can drive as a ground car take off vertically hover and cruise using jet propulsion Blade Runner is a 1982 American Science fiction Film, directed by Ridley Scott.

Other filming has re-used the set. In particular, the BBC One series of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy re-used some of the Nostromo hallways, as well as other parts of the set. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, was a BBC television adaptation of Douglas Adams 's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy broadcast in January These appear most prominently in the scenes set onboard the Vogon Constructor Fleet. This is a list of races fauna and flora (as well as creatures without category featured in various incarnations of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy ^[10] When the BBC science-fiction sitcom Red Dwarf moved production to Shepperton Studios it used some surviving Nostromo hallway sets from Alien in Series 4, most notably in the episode "DNA" (as revealed on the DVD commentary). According to the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram, a red dwarf star is a small and relatively cool Star, of the Main sequence, either late K

Music

Main article: Alien (score)

Ridley Scott's vision of the film came under the influence of Isao Tomita's synthesizer-arrangement of Holst's The Planets, especially of the movement "Mars: Bringer of War", and at one point in pre-production Tomita appeared a serious candidate to write the original score for the film. The iconic avante garde score to the film Alien was composed by Jerry Goldsmith, it is considered one of his best most visceral scores is a renowned Japanese Electronic music composer Biography Tomita was born in Tokyo and spent his early childhood with his father in China Gustav Theodore Holst (21 September 1874 – 25 May 1934was an English Composer and was a music teacher for nearly 20 years The Planets Op 32 is a seven- movement Orchestral suite by the British composer Gustav Holst, written between 1914 ^[20] With the dropping of these plans, however, Jerry Goldsmith came to compose the film music. Jerrald King "Jerry" Goldsmith ( February 10, 1929 – July 21, 2004) was an American Film score Composer Instead of aiming at a typical 1970s science-fiction score utilizing synthesizers,^[21] the composer's music reflects the film's underlying horror-film genre with its use of bleak orchestrations, most notably in the higher woodwinds, oscillating string-textures and bizarre, sometimes savage sounds, especially from the brass-section, which his orchestrator Arthur Morton built from the orchestral palette with various modern compositional techniques. Horror films are Movies that strive to elicit Fear, Horror and terror responses from viewers Goldsmith also composed a main theme in the romantic style that barely appears in the finished film. A short passage from Eine kleine Nachtmusik by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart also plays as "source music" during the scene in which Dallas spends some time alone relaxing in the shuttle Narcissus. The Serenade No 13 for strings in G major, K 525 more commonly known as Eine kleine Nachtmusik ("a small serenade" -- rendered more literally

Director Ridley Scott and editor Terry Rawlings became quite attached to several of the pre-existing cues that they had used for the temporary score while editing the film. A theatrical cue is the trigger for an action to be carried out at a specific time As a result Scott and music editor Robert Hathaway moved around much of Goldsmith's score, re-edited cues and re-scored several sequences. In some parts of the film the temp score remained in place:^[22] segments of four monaural cues from Goldsmith's 1962 score for Freud – The Secret Passion appear in the film,^[23] and the final minutes of the first movement of Howard Hanson's Symphony No. Monaural (often shortened to mono) sound reproduction is single-channel Freud the Secret Passion also known as Freud ( 1962) is a American Biographical film Drama based on the life Howard Harold Hanson ( October 28, 1896 &ndash February 26, 1981) was an American Composer, conductor, educator 2 "Romantic" replaced Goldsmith's music for the concluding moments of the film's showdown, as well as the complete music for the end credits. As a result, Goldsmith's original soundtrack LP represented more the original score he wrote than what ended up appearing in the film.

As an additional feature the initial 20th Anniversary Edition DVD of Alien included both an isolated music-only soundtrack that restored the cue-order originally envisioned by the composer, resynchronizing the cues to their appropriate places, as well as a second isolated film-music soundtrack with the re-scored and re-arranged cues from the official 20th Century Fox release of the film, while the full production soundtrack played between music cues. DVD (also known as " Digital Versatile Disc " or " Digital Video Disc " - see Etymology)is In the final DVD release most of the scenes showing the Nostromo exterior and all of the sequences from Howard Hanson's second symphony ("Romantic"), some of which went along with them, have disappeared for reasons unknown. Howard Harold Hanson ( October 28, 1896 &ndash February 26, 1981) was an American Composer, conductor, educator

The original film score by Jerry Goldsmith played under the conductor's baton of Lionel Newman, who also received main-title credits, a practice that had become unusual by the time of the film's release. Lionel Newman ( January 4, 1916 - February 3, 1989) was an American conductor, Pianist, and film and television The National Philharmonic Orchestra played the music. The National Philharmonic Orchestra is a British Orchestra created exclusively for recording purposes The soundtrack CD of Alien has now gone out-of-print. A Compact Disc (also known as a CD) is an Optical disc used to store digital data, originally developed for storing digital audio Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. Over the years several bootlegged copies of Goldsmith's score appeared on the market, among them a Spanish two-CD release with all used and unused cues, including the retained temp score, and an archive bootleg that also included alternate takes from the recording sessions.

On November 15, 2007, Intrada Records released the complete score to the film with additional alternate score tracks and the original LP-program in a 2-CD set. Events 655 - Battle of Winwaed: Penda of Mercia is defeated by Oswiu of Northumbria. Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. This release first published Jerry Goldsmith's complete score remixed and remastered from the original 1" master tapes.

In 1980 Jerry Goldsmith's film music for Alien received nominations for the Golden Globe Award (Best Original Film Score), the Grammy Awards (Best Album of Original Score Written for a Motion Picture or Television Special) and the Anthony Asquith Award for Film Music. The Golden Globe Awards are American awards for motion pictures and Television programs given out each year during a formal dinner The Grammy Awards (originally called the Gramophone Awards)—or Grammys —are presented annually by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences

Official soundtrack releases

1. Original soundtrack (Fox Music, 1979; LP; 10 tracks)
2. Re-issue of the original soundtrack (Silva Screen Records, 1987; CD; 10 tracks)
3. The Alien Trilogy (Colosseum, 1996; CD; 13 tracks, incl. 7 tracks from the original Alien soundtrack)
4. 20th Anniversary Edition DVD containing two isolated music tracks: a) the original score and b) the alternate music track (Fox Home Entertainment, 2000)
5. Alien Complete Score 2-CD set, released on Intrada Records, November 15, 2007 with complete score with several alternate tracks and the original LP program. Events 655 - Battle of Winwaed: Penda of Mercia is defeated by Oswiu of Northumbria.

In addition several compilation re-issues and re-recordings of some of Goldsmith's music for Alien have appeared. ^[24]

Bootleg releases

1. "Limited library archival pressing" (Soundtrack Library, 1999; CD-R; 32 tracks; allegedly including alternate takes from the recording sessions)
2. Alien: First Release of the Complete Score from the Stereo Master Tapes (Total Sound, 2000; CD-R; 21 tracks; assembled from the production of the 20th Anniversary Edition DVD)
3. Alien: Banda Sonora Original del Film y Temas Rechazados (Memory Records, 2001; 2-CD release; 25 + 21 tracks; including rejected cues, temp score cues and bonus material)
4. "Director's Cut bootleg" (Nostromo Enterprises, 2006; 2-CD release; 30 + 25 tracks; in most parts a re-assembly of preceding bootlegs and official releases and compilations, including re-masters from the production of the Alien special edition DVD and the soundtrack for Iwerk's Aliens: Ride at the Speed of Fright by composer Richard Band)

Influence

Roger Ebert called Alien (and John Carpenter's Halloween) "the most influential of modern action pictures". Richard Howard Band is a composer of film music He has scored more than 70 films including From Beyond, which won the award for Best Original Soundtrack at the Catalonian Roger Joseph Ebert (iːbɝt born June 18, 1942) is an American film critic and Screenwriter. Halloween is a 1978 American independent Horror film set in the fictional midwestern town of Haddonfield, He went on to say that many of "the films it influenced studied its thrills but not its thinking", including the re-make of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. ^[9] Andrew O'Hehir wrote, "almost every horror film since Alien has ripped it off in some way, but most of the imitations have focused on details. "^[25]

Analysts have examined the film's gender-politics and its influence on the subsequent development of the leading heroine in Hollywood film,^[26] also noting that the film's narrative broke with the prominent custom of repressing female roles in science-fiction films, since the woman, representing nature, biology and sexuality, normally functioned as an antagonistic, ridiculing signifier of science and technology. ^[27] Some critics see the non-traditional re-interpretation of the female lead in Alien as a necessity, since only a female, (i. e. "natural") entity can successfully fight the anti-technological, biologically reproducing and overly sexualized xenomorph in a science-fiction environment.

The film received some academic attention and commentators linked it to wider cultural idioms, especially those popular in the 1970s and 1980s such as abjection. The term Abjection literally means "the state of being cast off ^[28] James Kavanaugh criticized the film's "internally overdetermined and contradictory construction" in disguising humanist ideologies as feminism. ^[29] Film-critic Kathleen Murphy called Kavanaugh's analysis an assaulting, "academically approved gobbledygook". ^[30] Several academic theses on the film, which matured over the following years, appeared in print in the book Alien Zone: Cultural Theory and Contemporary Science Fiction Cinema. ^[31]

Alien became the first R-rated film to have a merchandising line aimed at children. The children's products released included various toys and models based on the creature and on its egg, jigsaw puzzles, a board game, a Viewmaster-style movie reel, and a storybook. For The Rolling Stones song see " Jigsaw Puzzle " A jigsaw puzzle is a tiling Puzzle that requires the A board game is a Game in which counters or pieces that are placed on removed from or moved across a "board" (a premarked surface usually specific to that game View-Master ® is a trademark for a device for viewing seven 3-D images (also known as stereo images on a paper disk Kenner Products released an 18-inch Alien figure with articulated parts including the retractable jaw and glow-in-the-dark cranium. This article is about the toy company For the city see Kenner Louisiana. However, the toy did not sell well. ^[32]

Awards and accolades

Alien won the 1979 Academy Award for Best Visual Effects and also received a nomination for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration. "The Oscar" redirects here for the film see The Oscar (film. The Academy Award for Visual Effects is an Oscar given to one film each year that shows highest achievement in Visual effects The Academy Awards are the oldest awards ceremony for achievements in motion pictures. ^[33] The film also won the 1979 BAFTA awards for Sound and Production Design and for Music Score (Jerry Goldsmith), and earned nominations for best Supporting Actor (John Hurt), for Editing, for Costume Design and for Best Newcomer to a Leading Role (Sigourney Weaver). The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA is a British charity that hosts annual awards shows for film television television craft video games and forms of animation

The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films, USA named Alien its best science-fiction film of 1979, Ridley Scott best director, and Veronica Cartwright best supporting actress. The Saturn Award is an award presented annually by the Academy of Science Fiction Fantasy & Horror Films to honor the top works in Science fiction, Fantasy The following are a list of Saturn Award winners for Best Science Fiction Film: See also Science fiction film The following is a list of Saturn Award winners for Best Direction: The following are a list of Saturn Award winners for Best Supporting Actress (in a film Alien also won the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation. The Hugo Awards are given annually by members of the World Science Fiction Convention for the best science fiction or fantasy works ^[34]

In 2002, the United States National Film Registry deemed the film "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant" and inducted it into its collection. The year 2002 in film involved some significant events The first significant releases of sequels took place between Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, The National Film Registry is the registry of Films selected by the United States National Film Preservation Board for preservation in the Library of ^[35]

In 2007 Empire Magazine named the "chestburster" scene in Alien the greatest 18-rated movie moment ever as part of its 18th birthday issue. Empire is a British Film Magazine published Monthly by Bauer Consumer Media. ^[36]

Special Edition (2003)

October 29, 2003 saw the re-release of Alien in cinemas as a Ridley Scott Director's Cut. Events 437 - Valentinian III, Western Roman Emperor, marries Licinia Eudoxia, daughter of his cousin Theodosius II Year 2003 ( MMIII) was a Common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. This release restored many but not all of the deleted scenes, which had already appeared as bonus materials on previous VHS, laserdisc and DVD releases of the film, and made unobtrusive deletions to the original. The Laserdisc (LD is an obsolete Home video disc format and was the first commercial Optical disc storage medium DVD (also known as " Digital Versatile Disc " or " Digital Video Disc " - see Etymology)is The new release also added some minor visual effects to the film: a shot of the sunrise on the moon, lights on the helmets of Dallas, Lambert and Kane moving under a natural arc on the alien moon as well as a field of stars in the background, when the Nostromo synchronizes its orbit around the moon.

Ridley Scott stated that Alien didn't require this tweaking and drew attention to the use of the term "Director's Cut" for marketing reasons only (and inconsistently as well). In the Alien Quadrilogy DVD materials, he goes out of his way to state his preference for the original: "Rest easy, the original 1979 theatrical version isn't going anywhere. " He re-edited the film himself, but only after viewing the studio's attempt to do so. He has characterized the studio's initial version as "too long" and felt that it ruined the film's pacing.

The Alien Quadrilogy boxed set released on December 2, 2003 includes both the Special Edition and the original theatrical version. Events 1409 - The University of Leipzig opens 1755 - The second Eddystone Lighthouse is destroyed by fire Year 2003 ( MMIII) was a Common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. Because the new version slightly shortened many of the scenes and shots from the original release and edited them with discreet acceleration to pander to modern film-audiences' viewing habits,^[37] the Special Edition actually runs forty seconds shorter than the original 1979 theatrical release,^[38] despite the addition of almost six minutes of new material. ^[39]

Spin-offs

The novelization by Alan Dean Foster appeared in 1979. A novelization is a Novel that is written based on some other media story form rather than as an original work Alan Dean Foster (born November 18 1946) is a prolific American writer of Science fiction and Fantasy Novels and movie It includes dramatizations of most scenes, also the scenes found in the Special Edition (but notably excluding the "Space Jockey" scene) as well as scenes scripted but never filmed, or filmed but never included in any release version of the film. Notably, the novelization includes the discovery of the radio-transmitter aboard the derelict, a moment when the surviving crew-members contemplate taking suicide pills and the detection of the alien as it searches for food in one of the Nostromo's storage-chambers. A suicide pill (also known as an L-pill or lethal pill) is a pill capsule Ampoule or Tablet containing a fatally poisonous One of the most infamous episodes however, and one which the crew only partially filmed, involved a failed attempt to blow the alien out of an airlock, which does not succeed because — as Foster implies — the character Ash intervenes by sounding the ship's alarm to scare the alien away from the airlock. In addition, the characters Ripley and Dallas become suspicious of Ash's intentions after this incident. For many years Foster's novelization provided fans and others with the only known source for the "missing cocoon scene from Alien" (see also above).

Subsequent spin-offs include comics, novels, and computer games. A spin-off (or spinoff) is a new Organization or Entity formed by a split from a larger one such as a Television series based on a pre-existing A comic book (often shortened to simply comic and sometimes called a comic paper or comic magazine) is a Magazine or Book of narrative A novel (from Italian novella, Spanish novela, French nouvelle for "new" "news" or "short story A personal computer Game (also known as a computer game or simply PC game) is a Video game played on a Personal computer, rather Alien itself received a comic-book adaptation by writer Archie Goodwin and artist Walter Simonson called Alien: The Illustrated Story, published by the Heavy Metal magazine, promptly followed by Alien: The Movie Novel, a photographic film-novel as well as a miscellaneous behind-the-scenes book called The Book of Alien. Archie Goodwin may refer to Archie Goodwin (fictional detective, created by Rex Stout Archie Goodwin (comics (1937-1998 comic book Walter "Walt" Simonson (born September 2 1946) is an American Comic book writer and artist Heavy Metal is an American Science fiction and fantasy Comics Magazine, known primarily for its blend of dark fantasy/science However, the franchise failed to soar before the release of Cameron's sequel and the subsequent adaptations by Dark Horse Comics in the late 1980s. Dark Horse Comics is one of the largest independent American Comic book publishers behind dominant publishers Marvel Comics and DC Comics The Aliens have since also appeared in numerous comic-book crossovers featuring Predators, Superman, Batman, WildC.A.T.s, Green Lantern, Judge Dredd and others. In Comic books, an intercompany crossover (also called cross-company or company crossover) is a comic or series of comics where characters published by Superman is a fictional Comic book Superhero widely considered to be one of the most recognized of such characters and an American Cultural icon Batman (originally referred to as the Bat-Man and still referred to at times as the Batman) is a fictional Comic book Superhero co-created Wildcats, sometimes rendered WildCats or WildCATs, is the name of multiple incarnations of a Superhero team created by the American Comic For the 1995 film see Judge Dredd (film. For the Reggae / Ska performer see Judge Dread.

References

Bibliography

• Annette Kuhn (ed. ), Alien Zone: Cultural Theory and Contemporary Science Fiction Cinema, New York / London 1990, ISBN 0-860919-93-5
• Annette Kuhn (ed. ), Alien Zone 2: The Spaces of Science-Fiction Cinema, London 1999, ISBN 1-859847-46-3
• David A. McIntee, Beautiful Monsters: The Unofficial and Unauthorised Guide to the Alien and Predator Films, Telos Publishing, 2005, ISBN 1-903889-94-4
• Paul Scanlon & Michael Gross, The Book of "Alien", Titan Books, 1979/2003, ISBN 1-852864-83-4

External links

• Alien at the Internet Movie Database
• Alien at Allmovie
• Alien at Rotten Tomatoes
• Alien at Box Office Mojo
• Alien at Filmsite.org