ALIEN : ROMULUS - Tuesday 20th August 2024.

I saw the MA15+ Rated 'ALIEN : ROMULUS' earlier this week, and this American Sci-Fi horror film is Co-Written, Executive Produced and Directed by Fede Alvarez, whose previous film making credits take in 2013's 'Evil Dead' in his feature Directorial debut, then 'Don't Breathe' in 2016, 'The Girl in the Spider's Web' in 2018, and now this film. It is the seventh instalment in the 'Alien' series and serves as a standalone film set between the events of 1979's 'Alien' Directed by Ridley Scott, and 1986's 'Aliens' Directed by James Cameron. The first six films in the franchise grossed at the global Box Office US$1.35B off the back of combined production budgets of US$376M, with Ridley Scott returning to Direct 'Prometheus' in 2012 and 'Alien : Covenant' in 2017, with him taking a Producer credit on this film. Costing US$80M to produce, the film has so far grossed US$122M and has generated largely favourable reviews.

The film opens with a scene of a Weyland-Yutani space probe investigating the wreckage of the Nostromo which has laid dormant and drifting in space for a couple of decades now. From the Nostromo they collect an inanimate albeit organic rock like structure that the crew set about lasering until it breaks open revealing a Xenomorph. 

Meanwhile, on the mining space colony Jackson's Star, Rain Carradine (Cailee Spaeny) an orphan, works with her adoptive brother Andy (David Jonsson), an android reprogrammed by her father before he passed away succumbing to years of working the mines. After her contract is forcibly extended by Weyland-Yutani for another ten years, she agrees to join her ex-boyfriend Tyler (Archie Renaux) to a derelict spacecraft to retrieve cryostasis chambers. These chambers will allow Rain and her friends, Tyler, his pregnant sister Kay (Isabela Merced), cousin Bjorn (Spike Fearn), and Bjorn's girlfriend Navarro (Aileen Wu) to in turn escape to the planet Yvaga. Andy's ability to connect with the onboard computer system is crucial for the mission. Rain is hesitant to send Andy but is convinced by Tyler and Andy to allow him to assist.

They fly Tyler's hauler the Corbelan to the derelict spacecraft, which is revealed to be a station divided into two parts, Romulus and Remus. While retrieving the stasis chambers from the bitterly cold spacecraft, Tyler, Bjorn, and Andy accidentally revive frozen facehuggers when the temperature starts to rise dramatically, and triggers a lockdown. To override the lockdown, Rain installs a chip from a damaged android, Rook (voiced by Daniel Betts and based on the physical likeness of Ian Holm who portrayed the android Ash, in the original film), into Andy, granting him access to the station while also updating his thought processing and general efficiency. Unknown to the others, this also changes his 'prime directive', making him loyal solely to the Weyland-Yutani Corporation.

With the group fleeing the chamber, a facehugger connects onto Navarro. Rain reactivates a dismembered Rook, who states that the station's crew was killed by the Xenomorph and its clones. While Tyler tries to remove the creature by freezing its tail, which proves successful, while Rook warns it may have implanted a 'seed' inside her. Despite Andy's attempts to stop him, Bjorn flees with a now coherent Navarro on the Corbelan. A short time later a chestburster hatches from Navarro's rib cage, killing her. The Corbelan, with Kay and Bjorn aboard, crashes into the Romulus hangar, putting at risk the station's orbit and leaving less than an hour before it collides with Jackson's planetary rings. Kay is knocked unconscious from the impact and the chestburster escapes into the ship. She regains consciousness and runs into Bjorn, who discovers and attacks the Xenomorph gestating into its adult form before dying from its acid blood which rained down on him from above. 

Rain, Tyler and Andy navigate to the bay while carefully avoiding the facehuggers. Kay escapes the Corbelan but is stalked by a Xenomorph trying to lure the others into a trap. Andy refuses to unlock the door so as not to put everyone at risk, and they watch helplessly as Kay is attacked and dragged away. Andy finds vials of a compound scientists had extracted from the Xenomorphs, which Rook calls the 'Prometheus fire', which it is intended to 'perfect' humans. Rook insists the samples must be brought to the colony and prevents the Corbelan from leaving without them. 

Rain and Tyler rescue Kay from a cocoon, but Tyler is killed and Andy is incapacitated. Badly injured, Kay injects herself with the compound during their escape. Rain returns to the Romulus, helps Andy by removing the control chip, thus returning his loyalty to Rain, and disables the ship's gravity in order to shoot the Xenomorphs while keeping their acidic blood away from the hull. They make it back to the Corbelan with moments to spare before the station crashes into the rings, and destroying Rook.

As Rain and Andy ready themselves for their journey to Yvaga, Kay, affected by the compound injection, gives birth to a rapidly growing human Xenomorph hybrid (Robert Bobroczkyi). The hybrid kills Kay and injures Andy, but Rain manages to eject the creature into Jackson's rings. She places Andy in a chamber saying that she will fix him, and records a log about their wished for arrival at Yvaga before entering stasis herself.

'Alien : Romulus' is a welcome nod to the first two films that launched this franchise some 45 and 38 years ago by retaining the very workmanlike look and feel of the crew; the muted visuals; the rampant and marauding facehuggers, chestbursters and Xenomorphs; and the combined sense of dread and urgency that was so effective in those first two instalments. Fede Alvarez has crafted a stand alone film in this franchise with nods aplenty to those first two films, while creating something fresh and interesting to those viewers unfamiliar with the original movies. The performances of Spaeny and Jonsson in particular are on point here, and Alvarez's use of practical effects over CGI adds a sense of realism to the proceedings. My only gripe at the film was how the Xenomorph and the Hybrid went from being hatched/born to being fully grown killing machines each in a matter of minutes, as the whole film plays out over the course of just a few hours - that I have to say stretches the bounds of the imagination just a little too far in my humble opinion. That said, a solid entry into the Alien canon that is worth the price of your cinema ticket.

'Alien : Romulus' merits four claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-