Sometimes you can tempt fate once too often.
“Alien Resurrection,” the fourth episode of the long-running high-tech horror movie series, brings back from the dead Sigourney Weaver’s Ellen Ripley, while also resurrecting the horrendous reptilian extraterrestrial who has been chasing her across the universe since the first “Alien” back in 1979.
Once again, spectacular visuals and graphics mix with horrific chases and violence. Hot in pursuit of the indefatigable Ripley is the equally tireless alien, cloned back into existence along with Ripley and up to its old tricks.
As Ripley and her nemesis race around the spaceships Auriga and Betty, taking part in one blood-drenched confrontation after another, they are joined by a fatuous team of scientists and soldiers, led by Gen. Perez (Dan Hedaya), who are idiotically trying to breed the monsters back into existence. Also around for the ride: a rebellious group of space smugglers that includes Michael Wincott as the pirate king, Winona Ryder as a sex machine, Ron Perlman as a male chauvinist and Dominique Pinon (the pint-sized scene-stealer of “Delicatessen” and “Diva”) as a wheelchair-bound mechanic.
Inevitably, once the alien is aroused, it escapes, goes on a rampage, plants eggs in human hosts, leaps bloodily out of human ribcages and commits one atrocity after another. Inevitably, Ripley fights back, and one bloody cliffhanger follows another.
The “Alien” series, up to now, has been one of the most sophisticated and visually striking of all horror-movie series. But this latest go-round for Ripley and her beast is also, by far, the silliest. Whatever points the movie gets for its spectacular design and amazing cinematography are frequently sacrificed to inane dialogue and absurd plot twists.
The hook for the story is that mystifying plan by the scientist team to clone the monster, which died with Ripley at the end of “Alien3.” There are two key twists. The resurrected Ripley is a superwoman, a basketball whiz and even more of a mordant wisecracker. The renewed alien is the same old killjoy, except that it regards Ripley at its “mother” and, between massacres, follows her around plaintively, as if wanting to be weaned, petted or teased. Motherhood has received few more bizarre tributes than the ending of “Alien Resurrection” — which collapses into a mass of sexual symbols that surpasses all three “Aliens” before it.
Masterminding all this are Joss Whedon, the screenwriter of the first “Speed,” and Jean-Pierre Jeunet, one-half of the French directorial team that brought us the wildly imaginative science-fiction/fantasy visions “Delicatessen” and “City of Lost Children.” (The team’s other half, visual specialist Marc Caro, is buried deep in the “Resurrection” credits as a “design consultant.”)
Jeunet obviously was hired for his visual panache, and he and cinematographer Darius Khondji (“City of Lost Children,” “Seven”) make this film look better than any “Alien” but the original 1979 edition — with its hair-raising designs and images by director Ridley Scott and artist H.R. Giger.
But looks aren’t everything.
Just like the maniacal monster, this mindless screenplay for “Alien Resurrection” chases us everywhere, spitting out bad jokes, atrocious lapses in logic and awful dialogue.
“You look dead,” one of Ripley’s playmates informs her toward the end. “Yeah, I get that a lot,” the recently revived heroine replies. If that’s your idea of clever repartee, you might actually enjoy the four-letter-laced chatter of “Alien Resurrection.” But that’s as good as it gets.
The movie is lucky to have Weaver, who — along with Wincott — is one of two cast members who don’t sink under the dialogue. Weaver became a star in the first “Alien,” and she still plays Ripley with lots of presence, intelligence, gravity and irony. By now, with her firm jaw and piercing eyes, she perfectly suggests a weary but game sci-fi warrior. But because the script grants Ripley new superpowers and alien qualities, we don’t worry about her as much.
It’s the others we worry about. Ryder, playing another lady in distress with an odd secret, looks and sounds madly out of place. Her colorful smuggling crewmates babble courageously. The various villains behave stupidly and overact outrageously.
Every once in a while, there’s a hair-raisingly effective scene: like the one where Ripley walks, transfixed, though a gallery of freaks — all with her face, all previously unsuccessful attempts to clone her — or an underwater chase sequence that unfolds like a ballet of slaughter.
Then, there are the ridiculous sequences: like Ripley’s in-your-face basketball challenge to Perlman’s character, which ends with the heroine delivering a behind-the-back, over-the-shoulder, long-range swish. Or the climactic episodes involving mad Dr. Wren (J.E. Freeman) and technician Purvis (Leland Orser).
For some audiences, none of this will matter. After all, Ripley is back and so are the monsters, gore and special effects. Who cares if everyone keeps babbling cliches and exposition?
For others, though, “Alien Resurrection” will be an outstanding example of how high financial expectations and weak scripts can destroy even the most imaginative series. Watching “Alien Resurrection,” we see a different kind of Hollywood nightmare than the one intended, as the monsters of cliche and mindlessness leap out of hiding to tear the movie to bits.
”ALIEN RESURRECTION”
(star) (star) 1/2
Directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet; written by Joss Whedon; photographed by Darius Khondji; edited by Herve Schneid; production designed by Nigel Phelps; music by John Frizzell; produced by Bill Badalato, Gordon Carroll, David Giler, Walter Hill. A Twentieth Century Fox release; opens Wednesday. Running time: 1:48. MPAA rating: R. Language, nudity, violence.
THE CAST
Ellen Ripley ……………… Sigourney Weaver
Annalee Call …………………. Winona Ryder
Johner ……………………….. Ron Perlman
Vriess ……………………..Dominique Pinon
Elgyn …………………….. Michael Wincott
Gen. Perez …………………….. Dan Hedaya
