Film Friday: Prometheus (2012)

Prometheus is perhaps one of the most anticipated films of modern times. Tantalizingly premised on the Alien universe and directed by Ridley Scott, who has redefined science fiction a couple times, this was a film everyone wanted to see. So how was it? Well, that depends.

** MAJOR spoiler alert **

The Plot

Prometheus opens with a truly inspired scene where a human-like creature kills himself so he can release his own DNA into a waterfall. This was the creation of the human race. Flash forward to two scientists (Shaw and Holloway), who discover a cave painting in Scotland, which they think tells us where we can find the beings who created humanity (“the Engineers”). Flash forward a couple more years and we are onboard the Prometheus, a spaceship on its way to that planet. The Prometheus belongs to the Weyland Corporation, the corporate quasi-villain of the Alien series. Weyland Corp. hired Shaw and Holloway to lead the expedition, but the ship is actually under the control of a woman named Vickers (Charlize Theron), though confusingly the ship also has a captain. So it’s not really clear who is in charge. Also among the crew are several scientists and android David (Michael Fassbender).

When they get to the world they are seeking, they find a man-made structure and they investigate. Inside, they learn that some disaster has befallen the Engineers. Some people die. Some twists happen. We learn the evil truth about the alien and the Engineers. The credits roll.

Where The Movie Excelled/What Sucked

This film is stunningly beautiful. It looks like science fiction should look. And if you know nothing about Alien, and you can ignore some problems, then you will also find this film to be quite impressive. The film builds a mystery quite nicely and it leads to some shocking moments. Its pacing is good. Its writing is solid for what it offers. The Engineers are beautifully designed (though the makeup to make Weyland look old is pathetic). There is a little tension now and then. And Fassbender does an excellent job of presenting us with a robot without morals.

The film also does an excellent job of raising really great issues. What if we were created by an alien species. Would that mean there is no God or just that there is a different God than we thought? The Engineers seem to be rather evil, quite frankly, so does that affect our nature? The film also raises the issue of the Engineers creating us and then deciding to kill us off. Why? Are we just a lab experiment that has run its course? Do they want the planet for something better? Did we turn out to be too dangerous? These are great questions. Too bad they’re never developed.

Indeed, this film has some serious problem, especially if you know Alien. If you’ve seen Alien, then forget everything I just said about the film creating mystery because none of the surprises will surprise you. The moment they say, “Gee, it looks like something came out of this Engineer’s chest,” you know exactly what that means and the mystery ends. From that point on, it’s just a matter of watching the alien evolve from worms to snakes to giant face huggers to finally the familiar form, though annoyingly, the film keeps acting like it’s surprising you with each step.

Moreover, the film is totally predictable if you’ve seen Alien v. Predator, because it’s the same movie. Swap out the Predator for the Engineers, set the movie in space, and you’ve got the exact same film: minority chick/scientist hired to lead expedition, Weyland comes along seeking a form of immortality, they find ancient pyramids where there shouldn’t be any, all ancient Earth cultures worshipped these creatures as gods, unleash aliens, run from aliens, scientist-chick fights back and saves the day, and aliens fight each other to the death. Same plot... same story arc... same characters. Unfortunately, this makes it very easy to guess what will happen next in scene after scene.

There are other problems too. Scott keeps trying to reach back into the prior films to take things that worked well before, but he doesn’t ask if they work here. For example, in Alien, the crew constantly argued because they were sick of each other and they were in the middle of a contract dispute. Hence, they were surly. Scott tries to recreate that here, but it doesn’t make sense because this crew consists of scientists who have only just met. Why would they in-flight and treat each other with contempt for no reason whatsoever? Scott also tries to repeat the idea of the crew being blue collar, as they were in Alien even though it makes no sense this time because this is a scientific crew, not a space freighter. Thus, even though they are all scientists who are put into stasis the moment they board, they show up dressed like grizzled lumberjacks and truck drivers in dirty work boots and flip-flops and they act like longshoremen. It doesn’t make sense.

Another problem is that most of the characters are meaningless. You could remove everyone except Holloway, Shaw, David and the Captain and not a thing would change in the story. Basically, it’s red-shirts galore. That means most of the setup, like the tension between Vickers and everyone else or between the various scientists is just pointless filler.

Even worse, there’s a frenetic twenty-minute period toward the end of the film where everything completely falls apart. It begins when Holloway is poisoned and turns into a monster and needs to be killed. Strangely, only Shaw is freaked out about this; everyone else acts like nothing happened. Would real people not care? Shaw then immediately learns that she’s been impregnated by an alien (through Holloway) and she wants it removed from her. David, however, decides to freeze her against her will. The reason isn’t given but presumably he wants to preserve the specimen -- the same idea as in Aliens. This makes sense at first, but a moment later he mysteriously lets her run away after beating up two doctors and he doesn’t even chase her. No one else tries to stop her either, or even follow her, even though they know she’s infected with something. That makes no sense.

She then reaches the surgery pod, which you would assume would be part of the ship, but they pointlessly made a big deal of it being something Vickers brought on board herself. Shaw climbs into the pod and has the alien taken out of her. It’s still alive, so she hits the decontaminate button and walks off. . . never waiting to see if it’s actually dead. What? She then stumbles around the ship like she’s dying since she just underwent major surgery until she happens upon Weyland himself, who faked his death and came aboard the ship secretly. Huh? The guy owns the company. He owns the ship. No one would tell him he couldn’t go if he wanted. So why do this in secret?

Bizarrely, neither Weyland nor David nor any of the new crewmembers with them act at all surprised to see Shaw, nor are they alarmed by her ill appearance. They chat as if nothing is happening, with the infection/freezing alien issue entirely forgotten. Shaw then leaves again to wash up. After she leaves, we learn that Vickers is Weyland’s daughter, and we just don’t care because it means nothing to the story. Not only does Vickers add nothing to the story, but her being Weyland’s daughter is never used in the plot in any way.

Suddenly, we’re off to see the last living Engineer. Once they find it, it chooses to attack them for no apparent reason. . . actually, the reason is that if it spoke to them, then it would need to say answer some questions and Scott didn’t want to answer questions. At that point, the plot returns to a simple chase film and sanity is restored. For about 20 minutes though, nothing in this film made any sense – not the actions of the characters, not the things they said, not the plot itself.

Finally, while there’s nothing wrong with science fiction films leaving ideas unexplained so the audience can fill them in, it is a cardinal sin not to at least give the audience some clues. This film, unfortunately, does this all the time. For example, it raises the issue of how the meaning of God would change if we were created by mortal beings, but it never addresses it beyond asking the question. By comparison, Tom Sizemore gives a four or five line speech in Red Planet that is deeper and more meaningful than all the discussion on this topic in Prometheus. Another example is why the Engineers would create us and then decide to kill us? Sadly, we don’t know. The film never even speculates as to a motive. Thus, there’s nothing to debate except “why might someone want to commit genocide?” which isn’t really that interesting of a question as it’s too abstract. It also strikes me that the Engineers must be clones, but that’s never mentioned. Intellectually, the film is a complete disappointment. It’s like someone suggesting topics you could discuss and then walking away without saying anything further.

Ultimately, what you get here is a film which is probably excellent for anyone who hasn’t seen Alien, but is weaker if you have. I enjoyed the film a good deal and it held up to being watched a second time. But I can’t help but feel let down. This is a film with so much potential throughout, but it always feels lazy to me. They raise ideas, but don’t address them - they don't even tease them. They constantly swipe from the prior films (almost every scene steals from prior films, right down to the heroine walking around in the same underwear Sigourney Weaver’s character wore). In fact, if this had been a film outside of the Alien universe, people would be angrily denouncing it as “a total ripoff.” They establish ideas they then ignore because they didn’t want to bother making them work. And ultimately, little in this film matters. You don’t care that any of these people are dead. There is no sense of terror that something bad will ultimately happen. And there’s no sense of wonder or the type of thought provoking that usually happens with good science fiction. That makes this a bit disappointing, especially as I think each of the mistakes was avoidable.