My childhood memories of Alien franchise are nothing but horror. I did not care for umpteen ventures and the original in terms of characters, the story and the film itself whatsoever because it caused a permanent scar of scare that ingrained after seeing Sigourney Weaver’s Ellen Ripley having a nightmare of an alien coming out from her stomach. Those images are still vivid and visceral which caused me to shun any kind of contact with that franchise. Infact that might very well be the reason for my dislike towards horror genre along with Evil Dead. Now after twenty odd years I am here witnessing “Prometheus”, a supposed prequel to Alien and the best thrill I got from it is a violent, disgusting and horrific scene that involves Noomi Rapace’s Elizabeth Shaw in a highly technological medical pod that does precise surgeries on her stomach.
The haunting question of a curious mind is the idea of life, beginning and ending. We understand the science of the beginning and the biological end of it. I personally in my laziness believe in the concept of nothingness. Makes my life real simple but given there is a box full of answers, I might very well tilt towards learning about the secrets. We are indeed curious people. Hence comes “Prometheus” which begins with an abnormally huge and chiseled human like being swallowing a gooey potion with a space vessel above to disintegrate to give the audience up and close DNA development. Director Ridley Scott with his writers Jon Spaihts and Damon Lindelof goes for the holy grail of origins, existence and demise of the humankind.
The year is 2089 and Dr. Charlie Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green) with his love interest Dr. Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace) have long investigated ancient cave drawings of star map. We are not exposed or explained in to that in big deal. We are only made aware that a wealthy man Weyland shares this passion of finding this moon and therein find the “Engineers” they call it who gave birth to us, the humans. Elizabeth strongly believes in that faith of those Engineers creating the man kind. As they sleep in to cryostasis on this journey, Michael Fassbender is David, a perfectly groomed and systematic robot that is human in every way except the so called soul. He takes care of them in their sleep, reading through their memories and dreams, watching Peter O’Toole’s mannerisms in films and learning all the knowledge he could to guess on the possible dialect these Engineers might speak. He does not emote through his face but he has agendas and he executes them mercilessly. He in my opinion has a soul. Charlize Theron is Meredith Vickers, a lead woman who knows the purpose and has the authority over this crew. Idris Elba is the Captain Janek who is as detached and at the same time a logical and compassionate person amongst the crew. They are here to be answered and then fight for their lives.
“Prometheus” apart from having stellar cast is mainly engaging. It has creepy creatures killing people in the darkest of places. It has this new world where they explore only one structure to have all the adventures and chaos they could hope and have got more than they bargained for. It has some breathtaking visual that would keep any audience riveted through the seats. Yet it does not go all the way in explaining itself in detail. While it is foolish to expect a detail thesis on this whole thing, the way they arrived to the conclusion of the star map is nothing but baseless. Nevertheless it creates a terrific thought provoking idea of the origins of life and mainly the characters’ perspective.
A spectacular perspective is that of David, the robot created by humans. He asks Charlie Holloway what is his drive in meeting these Engineers and why was he disappointed on the sight of their absence. Charlie replies that he wants to know why and David responds with why they created robot like him and Charlie says because they could. David’s response would make you wonder on the things of simple acceptance of certain things and make the life easier. It is a philosophical plane wherein Ridley Scott weaves some serious entertainment.
Noomi Rapace is the perfect choice for this role. While she portrayed a rather callous but emotional Lisbeth Salander in the The Girl with Dragon Tattoo trilogy, she brings forth the raw survival skills of that but adds and exhibits deeper emotional compassion and beauty to Elizabeth Shaw. I mentioned about the scene that had the best thrill in the most disgusting and violent nature of it and in that Rapace makes it seamless to work that in its highest degree.
I enjoyed “Prometheus” for its grandeur nature in employing special effects for what it really is. It has thrilling sequences to keep you glued and yes some various natures of reptilian beings sucking the life out of the crews in stomach churning manner. It has few predictable scares as well but the core of the film is the discussion it brings and the boldness in presenting them despite the people’s nature to make it unnecessarily controversial. The film ends with more unanswered questions opening for the inevitable sequel.
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