Bovie Movie

Big-budget special effects, swiftly paced action, and a distinct feminist subtext from writer/director James Cameron turned what should have been a by-the-numbers sci-fi sequel into both a blockbuster and a seven-time Oscar nominee. Sigourney Weaver returns as Ellen Ripley, the last surviving crew member of a corporate spaceship destroyed after an attack by a vicious, virtually unbeatable alien life form. Adrift in space for half a century, Ripley grapples with depression until she’s informed by her company’s representative, Carter Burke (Paul Reiser) that the planet where her crew discovered the alien has since been settled by colonists. Contact with the colony has suddenly been lost, and a detachment of colonial marines is being sent to investigate. Invited along as an advisor, Ripley predicts disaster, and sure enough, the aliens have infested the colony, leaving a sole survivor, the young girl Newt (Carrie Henn). With the soldiers picked off one by one, a final all-female showdown brews between the alien queen and Ripley, who’s become a surrogate mother to Newt. Several future stars made early career appearances in Aliens (1986), including Lance Henriksen, Bill Paxton, and Reiser.

The fourth film in the Alien series, directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet (Delicatessen, The City of Lost Children) at a cost of 70 million dollars, takes place aboard an immense ship, the Auriga, where General Perez (Dan Hedaya) heads a staff of seven science officers and 42 enlisted, all employed by United Systems Military (replacing the Company of the earlier films). The time is 200 years after the events of Alien 3. Scientists researching the aliens need hosts, and they rely on space mercenaries who make spacecraft raids to acquire bodies. The research requires an Alien Queen specimen, so Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) has been cloned from preserved blood samples. The scientific team then removes the baby Alien Queen from Ripley’s chest. Since the Ripley clone has alien DNA mixed into her genetic structure, she is not totally human. Later, a commercial freighter, the Betty, arrives with a crew of mercenaries — Elgyn (Michael Wincott), pilot Hillard (Kim Flowers), paralyzed mechanic Vriess (Dominique Pinon), space jock Johner (Ron Perlman), and junior mechanic Annalee Call (Winona Ryder) — who deliver a load of human hosts with alien eggs. Problems begin when the mercenaries take over the Auriga, and aliens escape to massacre humans. As the aliens attack, Ripley and the mercenaries try to reach the Betty in order to escape. Cinematography by Darius Khondji features the same ENR process he used on Seven, adding silver to the printing process to heighten contrasts, making the dark colors richer. An electric-blue tint was employed during the underwater firefight between the mercenaries and the aliens. For the more physical aspects of her role, Ryder got in shape with six hours of daily workouts. Although all previous films in the series were shot at London’s Pinewood Studios, filming of Alien Resurrection took place West Los Angeles soundstages with special effects in California and Paris.

Four men are changed forever by an act of mercy — changes which have a profound impact many years later — in this blend of horror and science fiction based on a novel by Stephen King. Jonesy (Damian Lewis), Henry (Thomas Jane), Pete (Timothy Olyphant), and Beaver (Jason Lee) were four friends who, as schoolboys, rescued a boy with Down’s Syndrome, Duddits (Donnie Wahlberg), from a savage beating at the hands of bullies. Their experience with Duddits left the boys profoundly changed, as they discovered they had developed psychic powers which allowed them to wordlessly communicate with one another, read the minds of others, and see events in the future. The four remained close friends into adulthood, and meet every year for a weekend get-together at a remote hunting lodge. However, one year Jonsey is approached by the spirit of Duddits, which leads him into a severe auto accident, though his wounds heal with mysterious speed and are gone by the time he and the guys get together a few months later. As the guys drink and swap stories, a desperately ill hunter makes his way into the cabin, whose body has become the host for a horrible wormlike creature, which breaks free and soon goes on a killing spree, leaving only Henry alive. In the wake of this attack comes a massive snowstorm, and Henry learns that these events are the first signs of a major attack by a powerful alien force which can assume any form it wishes. As duplicitous military leader Col. Abraham Curtis (Morgan Freeman) comes in to quell the menace, Henry finds himself in communication with the late Jonsey, whose previous near-death experience gives him an unexpected advantage in stemming the alien tide.

Acclaimed director David Fincher’s promising career was lucky to survive this astonishingly wrong-headed, almost universally despised second sequel to Alien (1979). The film careens into oblivion virtually from the beginning, as Lt. Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) is the only survivor of a crash-landing on a hellish, God-forsaken prison planet. Not only does the crash kill little Newt, completely obviating the entire point of the superior Aliens (1986), but Fincher then compounds his betrayal of that film’s fans by having Ripley attend the girl’s gruesome autopsy and barely bat an eye as the child’s chest is bloodily ripped open with a steel bonesaw. Things just go downhill from there, as the rather unthreatening rapists and murderers harass Ripley and curse a great deal before being torn apart by large fans, having their heads crushed by the unconvincing CGI alien, and finally volunteering to be murdered by the beast rather than letting the evil Company get hold of it. Fincher does the best he can with a terrible script, and there are some nice supporting turns by Charles S. Dutton, Charles Dance, and Brian Glover, but nothing could redeem the film’s first 15 minutes. By the time Ripley takes a suicidal swan-dive into a vat of molten lead, cradling a baby alien as it explodes from her chest, many viewers will not know whether to reach for the remote control or a warm bath and a razorblade. A loathsome experience by any standard, Alien 3 still made enough money for Weaver to return as a Ripley clone in Alien Resurrection (1997).

“In space, no one can hear you scream.” A close encounter of the third kind becomes a Jaws-style nightmare when an alien invades a spacecraft in Ridley Scott’s sci-fi horror classic. On the way home from a mission for the Company, the Nostromo’s crew is woken up from hibernation by the ship’s Mother computer to answer a distress signal from a nearby planet. Capt. Dallas’ (Tom Skerritt) rescue team discovers a bizarre pod field, but things get even stranger when a face-hugging creature bursts out of a pod and attaches itself to Kane (John Hurt). Over the objections of Ripley (Sigourney Weaver), science officer Ash (Ian Holm) lets Kane back on the ship. The acid-blooded incubus detaches itself from an apparently recovered Kane, but an alien erupts from Kane’s stomach and escapes. The alien starts stalking the humans, pitting Dallas and his crew (and cat) against a malevolent killing machine that also has a protector in the nefarious Company.

Terror lurks deep beneath the surface of the Earth in this thriller. While on a dig in a Romanian forest, a group of scientists make a startling find — they find a huge abbey, dating back to the 13th Century, which was built over the entrance to a massive network of subterranean caves. Eager to learn what lurks within the caves, the scientists discover to their peril that a large part of the cave system is under water. Undeterred, the remaining scientists hire a team of American spelunkers who are trained in exploring underwater caves, led by brothers Jack (Cole Hauser) and Tyler (Eddie Cibrian). Armed with new high-tech SCUBA gear that allows them to stay under water for a full 24 hours, Jack, Tyler, and the rest of their crew dive in to investigate the caves, but a mishap traps them in a cavern beneath the surface, and they soon discover they are not alone, as strange and bloodthirsty creatures make their presence known. The Cave also stars Morris Chestnut, Rick Ravanello, Piper Perabo, and Lena Headey.

In Slither, James Caan plays Dick Kanipsia, a recently paroled car thief whose plans to go straight are interrupted when his best pal Harry Moss (Richard B. Schull) is shot and killed. As he lies dying, Moss advises Kanipsia to seek out fellow crook Barry Fenaka (Peter Boyle), who knows where a huge amount of money stolen by Moss is hidden. Aware that he himself is a marked man, Kanipsia has to play it cool en route to Fenaka. This proves difficult when his erstwhile travelling companion, dopehead Kitty Kopetzky Sally Kellerman, robs a roadside diner in his presence. Since nothing is ever quite what it appears to be in Slither, perhaps we shouldn’t tell you any more. This truly serpentine tale served as the feature-film directorial debut of Howard Zieff, the former TV-commercial helmsman responsible for the famous Spicy Meatball ad.

Be sure to turn off the lights and draw the shades so they won’t see you from the sky as you bear witness to some of the most harrowing tales of alien abduction ever recorded. From laser dissections to memory modification and human branding, these testimonials are likely to make a believer of even the most hardened skeptic.