Alien Anthology Blu-Ray Review

• 3rd Nov 2010

I remember when the Alien boxset first arrived on DVD with all four films. There was an impressive first disc for Alien, followed by a so-so Aliens disc that included a decent interview with James Cameron. Then Alien 3 and Alien: Resurrection barely had much to show for them.

Thankfully, Fox pulled their act together and released the bizarrely title Alien Quadrilogy boxset. Nine discs of pure heaven. Two versions of every film, a commentary track for each and a bonus disc each; full of the start, middle and ends of the production and release process. It still probably is the best DVD box set out there and is going for a ridiculously low price in shops now.

Now comes the inevitable, the Blu-Ray release. The satisfactory news is that we get everything pulled over from the nine disc release, but wait… there is more! Oh so much more. The bonus material has been clumped together on a disc (which saves swapping discs if you are interested in spending a day or two looking at the ‘making of’ materials only). The documentaries have been extended to include so much more. In fact, each film’s supplementary material on disc 5 has about an hour of additional footage that you can watch alone.

Let’s have a look at this a disc at a time shall we?

DISC 1 – ALIEN
Blu-Ray goons will lose their sanity when they see how lush this picture looks (this will indeed go for the remaining films too. All were shot to look beautiful and beautiful they look). Ridley Scott still pretty much owns this franchise and worked a fairly loose script in the same way that he went onto work on Blade Runner. It’s all about creating a world from top to bottom, exploring moods through characters as they inhabit the world created.

Despite there actually being a couple of “cat scares” in the film, the threat of the beast still works very well. There really isn’t much more to say about it except watching it again makes the forthcoming prequel seem quite a tantalising project. There are also two commentaries here, both pulled over from the previous release, as well as additional scenes.

DISC 2 ALIENS
The same commentary is pulled over from the previous release which is very decent. BUT! If I’m honest it is a cut and paste of several groups of people talking about the film as they watch it. It would have been nice if we had full chat tracks from each (or at least those that put in the effort to talk over the whole film.) Cameron must have had more to say, as I’m sure the actors did too and all of them are never boring. Still, it is a decent track (we just want more, don’t we?)

The debate continues as to which version fans prefer. The director’s cut does add some worthy meat to the character of Ripley, but much of the added scenes I could give or take without feeling too bad either way about it. The only real scene worth dropping is an OTT performance from Bill Paxton when he is bragging about the hardware they have brought with them to Ripley. This aside, the other scenes are really dependant on which version you want to watch and how much time you have on your hands.

DISC 3 ALIEN3
The troubled production of the lot and still with a sorely absent David Fincher (if he removed himself this much from the film then why did he not remove his name?) It’s a bitter pill to swallow knowing that the guy has a very important opinion on the film and it has yet to be heard fully, but it seems that he has his head in other places.

The film itself isn’t a disaster by any stretch and it has an alternate version here that does take the film in very different directions. It is almost 30 minutes longer than the theatrical version (also available here) but it is a worthy excursion and could well be the preferred cut that people go to.
There is also the cut and paste chat track here which is worth at least one listen for some stories from the crew.

DISC 4 ALIEN RESURRECTION
The least liked of the four films, Alien Resurrection at least starts with a very intriguing premise and does explore it well for its first 40 minutes or so. It is only when all hell breaks loose that it loses its footing; succumbing to some very bizarre humour and OTT action. The less said about the “newborn” creature at the end the better, but Alien Resurrection is still worth a second look.

The fact that they dispose of most of their interesting cast at the midway point doesn’t help and the supporting cast of characters in the Alien franchise are as equally important as Weaver herself. AlienResurrection disposes of those potentially classic characters all too soon here (goodbye Michael Wincott – in one of the dumbest moves a character can make in any film – off to investigate a dark corridor to find out what that strange noise was???? Goodbye Dan Hadeya in one of the most bizarrely comic deaths ever. Even Brad Douriff’s nutty scientist disappears for most of the film). Still, we are left with Ron Perlman, which is never a bad thing. But we are also stuck with a great looking, but poorly acting Winona Ryder. Who, instead of pulling back on her skills to give a nicely measured and what could have been fairly cold performance as an android, instead decides to get far too emotive and drop in a few f-bombs to accentuate her sentences – leaving her character far more reminiscent of the one she played in Heathers.

The director’s cut of this film isn’t really far different from the original version. Seems they wanted two versions of all the films available so thought “what the heck” with this one and just did a few things to it. There is another cut and paste commentary here which will work for enthusiasts, but is missing a few of the bigger names.

DISC 5 MAKING THE ANTHOLOGY
By and large this is the documentary interviews from the last release, but all put onto one disc. What is more impressive and important to those who already own the previous nine disc edition is the inclusion of the enhancement pods. We already got a pretty good deal on the DVD release; now though they go even deeper and add some real meat to the background of this franchise. This is probably the first place to go if you want to get behind the drama of each film. Most of the contributors are fairly candid about each film and the first three films do get some great depth. Even the third film has producers and crew being honest about the treatment of the script and also David Fincher. The only thing missing as mentioned before is any involvement from Fincher. There is a great interview out there waiting to happen with him on the film where he gets to give us his input, but it is missing here.

The fourth film has some good coverage but you feel it goes past a little bit quicker than the previous films focus. It is still in depth, but you do feel that the documentary makers dismissed it a little bit which is a mistake to do so. Just because it is the least popular doesn’t means we should analyse it any less. This may seem like splitting hairs over an already overly generous boxset – but there was such a colourful cast involved in the fourth film and not nearly enough of them were interviewed.

There is literally hours upon hours of documentaries here on each film that go right from script to release. While it is tempting to get on the side of the artists who want more time and money, you also have to be sympathetic to the suits who did not give out any more money. Why? Well just go look up how much money these films made in America. It isn’t as high as you might expect.

DISC 6 THE ANTHOLOGY ARCHIVES
Yes, yes, oh yes! If you love galleries and production notes it’s all here. This disc houses all the leftovers and hand me downs from previous editions including Laser Disc extras. You’ll find all the text based extras, galleries, trailers and a few old documentaries and promotional videos on this disc.

To think that Ridley Scott is returning for a prequel, Alien is back in fashion in a big way – let’s hope they tailor it for the fans and not the bank.

Steven Hurst