Prometheus (2012)

[happydood]

Originally Posted by Ray Jackson

As happy as I am about the deal I got, I just realized that I don't really like this movie very much.

It's okay...it looks great...but it's far from a great film imo.

As much as I loved Noomi Rapace in The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, I still think she was terribly miscast in this role. Not to mention the generic pretty boy they hired to play her boyfriend. What's he up to these days?

I think I saw the guy who played the biologist in a Geico commercial recently.

Good for him.

...glad to see he's still getting work.

He's in a movie called The Invitation that I recently watched on Netflix after hearing many recommendations. It's a solid little horror thriller and he's pretty good in it. I think he's a little rough in Prometheus because his part is kinda poorly written.

[Early Memphis]

Originally Posted by Ray Jackson

The sticker on the shelf still said $9.99.
When I took it to the register it rang up at $24.99.
Apparently they had forgotten to change the sticker after the sale ended.
So they had to honor the price that was on the shelf.
On top of which, I had a $5 reward zone coupon, so I got it for $4.99.
...

Glad you made them honor the sticker, too many folks fold ...

[Ray Jackson]

Originally Posted by Ray Jackson

As happy as I am about the deal I got, I just realized that I don't really like this movie very much.

It's okay...it looks great...but it's far from a great film imo.

As much as I loved Noomi Rapace in The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, I still think she was terribly miscast in this role. Not to mention the generic pretty boy they hired to play her boyfriend. What's he up to these days?

I think I saw the guy who played the biologist in a Geico commercial recently.

Good for him.

...glad to see he's still getting work.

You make some interesting points Ray, but to suggest that this is a bad movie is a bridge too far in my opinion.

There are some components of this picture that are admirable--both in terms of theme and style. Unfortunately I must agree with your assessment that the casting is a particularly troubling weakness. With the exception of Sir Michael Fassbender, and perhaps Idris Elba, none of the actors seem particularly well suited for the roles they were hired to play.

Difficult to say how much of that is a bi-product of bad writing. But none of the performances are memorable in any way, other than how egregiously annoying some of them are.

...it vexes me.

[P-Rock]

The first half of the movie is excellent, with a great build up, but then it all falls apart. When I saw zombie Fifield in the theater I was like: Really??? The alternate scene works much better imo, because Fifield has more Alien features, but then Ridley decided he wanted to focus on the engineers and decided that Lindelof should eliminate everything Alien from the script. And Lindelof just isn't a very good writer.

[MifuneFan]

I've watched this 3 or 4 times now, and it's actually gotten worse with each viewing. It's such a needlessly stupid film. Just extremely poor dialogue, wooden characters with zero depth, and a horrible mess of a story. If I didn't know better I'd say it was some shit Alien reboot attempt from another director, not from Ridley Scott himself. I really like the visuals, and production design, I think that's one of the reasons I still revisit it, but man, it's just too dopey a film.

[Guiltydrummer]

Originally Posted by MifuneFan

I've watched this 3 or 4 times now, and it's actually gotten worse with each viewing. It's such a needlessly stupid film. Just extremely poor dialogue, wooden characters with zero depth, and a horrible mess of a story. If I didn't know better I'd say it was some shit Alien reboot attempt from another director, not from Ridley Scott himself. I really like the visuals, and production design, I think that's one of the reasons I still revisit it, but man, it's just too dopey a film.

Wow. I love every second of this film. To me it's one of the best movies of the last 20 years.

[DR Herbert West]

Second best Alien film.

[Cremildo]

Originally Posted by Guiltydrummer

Wow. I love every second of this film. To me it's one of the best movies of the last 20 years.

Agreed. I had it at #2 on my ballot for the Community Top 100 Films of the 2010s.

[Bobbyjoe766]

Good film. This could’ve been great. As noted, the film has its dopey moments. Perhaps (the 1979 original for me) the prettiest ALIEN film so far?

[Guiltydrummer]

Originally Posted by Cremildo

Agreed. I had it at #2 on my ballot for the Community Top 100 Films of the 2010s.

Cool wasn't aware of the pole.
These are my 5 best, not in order
Prometheus
Oldboy
There Will Be Blood
Enter the Void
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

[Guiltydrummer]

Originally Posted by Guiltydrummer

Cool wasn't aware of the pole.
These are my 5 best, not in order
Prometheus
Oldboy
There Will Be Blood
Enter the Void
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

I said pole...

[bonehica]

Originally Posted by Guiltydrummer

Cool wasn't aware of the pole.
These are my 5 best, not in order
Prometheus
Oldboy
There Will Be Blood
Enter the Void
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

Oldboy, There Will Be Blood and Enter the Void wouldn't have been eligible, as they were made prior to 2010. Assuming, however, you are talking about Park Chan-wook's Oldboy and not Spike Lee's abomination.

[Guiltydrummer]

Originally Posted by bonehica

Oldboy, There Will Be Blood and Enter the Void wouldn't have been eligible, as they were made prior to 2010. Assuming, however, you are talking about Park Chan-wook's Oldboy and not Spike Lee's abomination.

I wouldn't watch Spikes version if you paid me. I see, i thought we were talking from 2000- on

[Surge92]

Originally Posted by Guiltydrummer

I wouldn't watch Spikes version if you paid me. I see, i thought we were talking from 2000- on

It wasn't that bad, but it's obviously nowhere near as good as the original.

[MifuneFan]

Originally Posted by Guiltydrummer

Wow. I love every second of this film. To me it's one of the best movies of the last 20 years.

I could elaborate a lot more, but off the top of my head here's just some things I really dislike about the movie. Possible spoilers below for those that haven't seen it.

• The Engineers origins story. What a complete disappointment.
• The completely illogical science behind the Engineers DNA - An Engineer disintegrates into a waterfall, and voila humanz is created! Exact same DNA as us despite the smallest sample being dropped into a body of water, and the countless mutations, and evolutionary processes that would have to take place from that point to homo sapiens. I know you have to suspend some belief, but this is just insulting our intelligence.
• Idris Elba's jarring, weird, and inconsistent accent (is it Southern, is it Australian? wtf is he doing? He is my fav. character though)
• The unbelievable amount of times these "Scientists" acted completely idiotic (Hey let's all take off our helmets in a completely foreign world" "Hey let's smoke weed in our suits!" "Hey let's wander around in the dark, especially in a place that may have alien actvity" "Hey let's not get the hell away when we see an alien creature". There are so many more it's not even funny)
• The "twists" that you can see a mile away
• The cliched father / daughter nonsense
• How completely dislikable they made "Charlie" in every scene. It felt completely forced just to help support what happens to his character
• Zero emotional connections. Like literally none.
• Zero character depth. Seriously some of the hollowest characters on film.
• Cliched dialogue
• Weyland's grotesque (and completely unnecessary) toes/feet
• The nearly indestructible zombie geologist
• The holograms of the Engineers movements, which makes no sense why they exist other than to basically show David how to operate the ship, etc..What triggered the holograms, David pressing a button? Did they create them for the sole purpose that humans would visit? I highly doubt that. Their existence makes no sense, and is just lazy script writing

Like I said, I could go on. This is a really dumb film that is trying to appear more intelligent than it is. It has great production design as I said, and even has a solid mysterious setup at first, but is hampered greatly by terrible characters, and generic Sci-fi nonsense. This is closer to something like Cloverfield Paradox than it is Alien in my opinion. I think the fact that this is an Alien film from Ridley Scott makes me more disappointed than had it been some reboot attempt by let's say JJ Abrams or something. Alien is masterpiece, while this is just a mostly forgettable Sci-Fi romp with nice atmosphere.

I'd probably rank it just a little bit higher than Alien 4, and I'm not even sure about that. It may very well be the worst Alien film (not counting any of the predator cross-overs). I'll have to revisit Covenant though. Only seen it once, and thought that was hugely disappointing too, but willing to give it another chance.

[Gunsnroses092789]

Originally Posted by MifuneFan

I could elaborate a lot more, but off the top of my head here's just some things I really dislike about the movie.

• The Engineers origins story. What a complete disappointment.
• The completely illogical science behind the Engineers DNA - An Engineer disintegrates into a waterfall, and voila humanz is created! Exact same DNA as us despite the smallest sample being dropped into a body of water, and the countless mutations, and evolutionary processes that would have to take place from that point to homo sapiens. I know you have to suspend some believe, but this is just insulting our intelligence.
• Idris Elba's jarring, weird, and inconsistent accent (is it Southern, is it Australian? wtf is he doing? He is my fav. character though)
• The unbelievable amount of times these "Scientists" acted completely idiotic (Hey let's all take off our helmets in a completely foreign world" "Hey let's smoke weed in our suits!" "Hey let's wander around in the dark, especially in a place that may have alien actvity" "Hey let's not get the hell away when we see an alien creature". There are so many more it's not even funny)
• The "twists" that you can see a mile away
• The cliched father / daughter nonsense
• How completely disliable they made "Charlie" in every scene. It felt completely forced to help suppot what happens to his character
• Zero emotional connections. Like literally none.
• Zero character depth
• Cliched dialogue
• Weyland's grotesque (and completely unnecessary) toes/feet
• The nearly indestructible zombie geologist
• The holograms of the Engineers movements, which makes no sense why they exist other than to basically show David how to operate the ship, etc..What triggered the holograms, David pressing a button? Did they create them for the sole purpose that humans would visit? I highly doubt that. Their existence makes no sense, and is just lazy script writing

Like I said, I could go on. This is a really dumb film that is trying to appear more intelligent than it is. It has great production design as I said, and even has a solid mysterious setup at first, but is hampered greatly by terrible characters, and generic Sci-fi nonsense. This is closer to something like Cloverfield Paradox than it is Alien in my opinion. I'd probably rank it just a little bit higher than Alien 4.

Don't forget that the main character has some major surgery

[Show spoiler](the alien C-section)

and after a few lousy staples and some anesthesia, she's up and running around at like she's almost fine.

All in all, I do like the movies, despite its flaws. It's not great, but has some good ideas and some solid suspense.

I'm probably in the minority here, but I love Alien: Covenant. I like it much better than Prometheus.

[levcore]

Originally Posted by MifuneFan

I could elaborate a lot more, but off the top of my head here's just some things I really dislike about the movie. Possible spoilers below for those that haven't seen it.

• The Engineers origins story. What a complete disappointment.
• The completely illogical science behind the Engineers DNA - An Engineer disintegrates into a waterfall, and voila humanz is created! Exact same DNA as us despite the smallest sample being dropped into a body of water, and the countless mutations, and evolutionary processes that would have to take place from that point to homo sapiens. I know you have to suspend some belief, but this is just insulting our intelligence.
• Idris Elba's jarring, weird, and inconsistent accent (is it Southern, is it Australian? wtf is he doing? He is my fav. character though)
• The unbelievable amount of times these "Scientists" acted completely idiotic (Hey let's all take off our helmets in a completely foreign world" "Hey let's smoke weed in our suits!" "Hey let's wander around in the dark, especially in a place that may have alien actvity" "Hey let's not get the hell away when we see an alien creature". There are so many more it's not even funny)
• The "twists" that you can see a mile away
• The cliched father / daughter nonsense
• How completely dislikable they made "Charlie" in every scene. It felt completely forced just to help support what happens to his character
• Zero emotional connections. Like literally none.
• Zero character depth. Seriously some of the hollowest characters on film.
• Cliched dialogue
• Weyland's grotesque (and completely unnecessary) toes/feet
• The nearly indestructible zombie geologist
• The holograms of the Engineers movements, which makes no sense why they exist other than to basically show David how to operate the ship, etc..What triggered the holograms, David pressing a button? Did they create them for the sole purpose that humans would visit? I highly doubt that. Their existence makes no sense, and is just lazy script writing

Like I said, I could go on. This is a really dumb film that is trying to appear more intelligent than it is. It has great production design as I said, and even has a solid mysterious setup at first, but is hampered greatly by terrible characters, and generic Sci-fi nonsense. This is closer to something like Cloverfield Paradox than it is Alien in my opinion. I think the fact that this is an Alien film from Ridley Scott makes me more disappointed than had it been some reboot attempt by let's say JJ Abrams or something. Alien is masterpiece, while this is just a mostly forgettable Sci-Fi romp with nice atmosphere.

I'd probably rank it just a little bit higher than Alien 4, and I'm not even sure about that. It may very well be the worst Alien film (not counting any of the predator cross-overs). I'll have to revisit Covenant though. Only seen it once, and thought that was hugely disappointing too, but willing to give it another chance.

Agreed, I love the visuals and atmosphere and ambition but everything else is an infuriating fail. I think it's astonishing that somebody can seriously claim this is one of the best movies of the last 20 years.

[DR Herbert West]

Originally Posted by levcore

I think it's astonishing that somebody can seriously claim this is one of the best movies of the last 20 years.

It would be in my top 20 of the last 20 years.

[dallywhitty]

Originally Posted by levcore

I think it's astonishing that somebody can seriously claim this is one of the best movies of the last 20 years.

Well, there are people who actually think The Revenant is a masterpiece, so anything is possible.

[Gunsnroses092789]

Originally Posted by dallywhitty

Well, there are people who actually think The Revenant is a masterpiece, so anything is possible.

And Manchester by the Sea...