Ridley Scott’s highly-anticipated return to science
fiction after a 30 year hiatus turns out to be provocative, fascinating and
also deeply flawed. Scott has continued to ride a wave of good will brought
about by having directed two of the best science fiction films of all time.
Since then, he’s unleashed a stunning torrent of fodder for the masses, the
vast majority of which has been utterly forgettable – even the best among them
like Black Hawk Down.
In Prometheus
he returns to Alien territory in a
film that takes place within the same universe, so to speak, but is really
cagey about the connections until the end. It takes place about 30 years prior
to the events in Alien and like other
prequels made long after their predecessors, it suffers from use of technology
that is far more advanced than what was used previously. Consider that in Alien a simple two-dimensional grid
pattern screen is used for tracking the creature and Dallas, represented by
crude dots. In Prometheus, a high
tech 3D holographic image of an elaborate system of caves can indicate where ay
life is. To the great credit of the production team, the design of the
eponymous ship: everything including walls and corridors; doorways and hatches,
is fairly consistent with the original. Considering it is still the fictional Weyland
Corporation, that makes good sense.
