{"id":29259,"date":"2024-08-15T23:46:04","date_gmt":"2024-08-16T06:46:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cinemastance.com\/?p=29259"},"modified":"2024-08-15T23:46:04","modified_gmt":"2024-08-16T06:46:04","slug":"alien-romulus-keeps-it-simple-but-delivers-the-chills-and-thrills","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/?p=29259","title":{"rendered":"ALIEN: ROMULUS Keeps It Simple, But Delivers the Chills and Thrills"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Running Time: 119 minutes<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This feature from 20th<\/sup> Century Studios opens\nexclusively at theaters on August 17th<\/sup>.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Alien franchise is one of the biggest in horror movie\nhistory. The original classic has spawned numerous follow-ups of varying\nquality. Personally, I really appreciated the first two films in the series, as\nwell as Prometheus<\/em> (a follow-up which still divides fans). It has been 7\nyears since the less engaging Alien: Covenant<\/em>, but now the latest\nchapter is finally arriving at theaters. Alien: Romulus<\/em> takes things\nback to basics, at least to some degree. The cast is tiny and the setting is\nmore claustrophobic than the previous few chapters. While the end result isn’t\nperfect, this is a tense effort that delivers a lot of what initially drew fans\nto the series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Set between the events of the first and second Alien<\/em>\npictures, the plot follows Rain Carradine (Cailee Spaeny), a young woman who\nhas lived her entire life on a planetary mining colony run by the sinister\nWeyland-Yutani corporation. With her father now deceased, Rain devotes most of\nher time to protecting a surrogate brother of sorts named Andy (David Jonsson)\nand working enough hours to allow her to leave the colony. When she discovers\nthat Weyland-Yutani has no interest in letting her go, she makes alternate\nplans with associate Tyler (Archie Renaux) and his crew. They have discovered\nan abandoned space station and plot to scavenge valuable parts from it before\nit is destroyed by icy, rocky rings sweeping around the planet. But after\nboarding, they discover much more than they bargained for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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This film features a small and very young cast. Some of the\ncrew members are drawn in broad strokes, including Tyler\u2019s pregnant girlfriend\nKay (Isabela Merced), the ill-tempered Bjorn (Spike Fearn) and pilot Navarro\n(Aileen Wu). Thankfully, the unique relationship between Rain and Andy is sweet\nand more nuanced, drawing the viewer into the story and covering for the lack\nof development with the supporting cast. Spaeny easily communicates a sense of\nloss, as well as the role Andy plays in keeping some part of her past alive.\nIt\u2019s an interesting dynamic and one that serves as the heart of the film. And\nwhen the time comes to take a stand, use her wits and fight back, the performer\nsells it convincingly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While some have called this film a standalone sequel, it is\nnot the case. Alas, the story doesn\u2019t answer all the questions raised in the\nprevious chapter. But for those familiar with the first Alien<\/em>, there is\na major connection that results in the unexpected return of a familiar visage.\nThe artificial technology used to bring this figure back is not always\nconvincing, but the jarring appearance isn\u2019t as hard to accept as it could have\nbeen, especially given the nature of the revived standout.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Of course, what the movie really excels at is thrills and\naction. Director Fede Alvarez started his feature career with the Evil Dead<\/em>\nremake and the remarkably effective Don\u2019t Breathe<\/em>, and his skill set\nserves this picture well.  Despite taking place on a grand space station,\nthis is a claustrophobic film with some striking visuals. The filmmaker hides\nthe monsters in plumes of steam or conceals them in water, frequently jolting\nthe viewer when they suddenly slither and appear. Even when the camera moves outside\nthe orbiting spacecraft as it drifts closer and closer to jagged and icy\nplanetary rings, it’s as distressing as it is epic and beautiful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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And there are chilling, graphic sequences that use the\nfamous monsters in new and interesting ways. This includes the leads attempting\na new way to avoid detection from the creatures, as well as a thrilling\nconfrontation in zero gravity. In fact, the final thirty minutes is\nparticularly wild (with one notably ghastly and graphic development),\ndelivering an intense finale as those attempting to survive the ordeal make\ntheir last stand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yes, fans of the series should keep their expectations in\ncheck. This certainly isn\u2019t the best Alien<\/em> film and it could have used a\nfew more minutes early on to develop supporting characters. But this is an\neffective, straight-forward science-fiction\/horror picture that delivers plenty\nof jolts that will keep fans on the edges of their seats. In the end, it\nprobably ranks somewhere in the middle of all the entries. Alien: Romulus<\/em>\nkeeps it simple, and thanks to its two leads and some wonderfully captured shocks,\nmanages to keep the franchise from going stale. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Running Time: 119 minutes This feature from 20th Century Studios opens exclusively at theaters on August 17th. The Alien franchise is one of the biggest in horror movie history. The original classic has spawned numerous follow-ups of varying quality. Personally, I really appreciated the first two films in the series, as well as Prometheus (a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":29260,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[215,873,1047,1054,1055,1056,1057,1059,3753,5311,7810,9319,9960,17776,18035,18854],"class_list":["post-29259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-215","tag-aileen-wu","tag-alien","tag-alien-romulus","tag-alien-romulus-film-review","tag-alien-romulus-movie-review","tag-alien-romulus-review","tag-aliens","tag-cailee-spaeny","tag-david-jonsson","tag-franchise","tag-horror","tag-isabela-merced","tag-science-fiction-2","tag-sequel","tag-spike-fearn"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29259\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}