I didn't like this movie.
SPOILERS
Here's the thing that I think matters. Not every movie has to be life-affirmingly and heart-warmingly entertaining. Movies can explore the dark side of existence, and it's a good thing that we have movies to do this. But when a movie does this, it has to be one of two things (preferably both):
1. Smart
2. Well done
Prometheus definitely wasn't that smart. Obviously, the Red Letter Media video points out the ubiquity of the plot holes in this movie. But more importantly the movie fails fundamentally to be a movie.
I understand that they wanted this movie to be the start of a franchise. That's unfortunate but also the reality of the movie business. But do it right. In the first Sherlock Holmes movie, even though the Moriarty thing was laid in for the next movie, we still got to see the answer to how the one guy was doing what appeared to be magical. The dramatic question of the movie was answered.
With Prometheus, the central question of the movie was "Why were humans made?" And the question wasn't answered. On purpose. So in a sense the whole point of the movie was just to set up the next movie. This isn't a TV show though. A movie's supposed to work as a self-contained experience.
Also, as an exploration of faith, meaning, and whatever, it's basically useless. Nothing that happens means anything relative to the human experience.
I know it's not a movie, but Oz is an excellent example of a TV show that successfully goes to dark places in part because it goes to those dark places to explore and comment on pretty heady ideas. This can be done. Prometheus just fails at it.
So is the movie well done? Well.... not really.
To be complimentary - the atmosphere of the movie is incredible. The opening title sequence had me riveted. And I loved the thing where the alien sacrificed himself as the UFO floated away. It was mysterious and interesting.
But when it was time to pay that off, it didn't really do it. I loved the central idea of the movie, that the beings that created us would want to destroy us. But it never really worked with it. There was stuff with alien tentacle monsters and some old guy or whatever that was a distraction. I thought, based on the previews, that there was going to be some kind of deliberate thing happening. Like the aliens purposefully conspired to bring the humans to this location for some reason. And really, what I was given instead was less interesting. Like, there's the scene where the engineer is about to fly to Earth in order to wipe us out. But, he just happened to have been awoken so he could do this. It wasn't interesting in the context of the other events. It just happened. There were penis monsters or whatever. But they were basically their own thing that just wantonly killed people.
I feel like something was wrong with every scene. Like, why did the one guy come back as a zombie except to kill more people. It was repulsive and gruesome, but not really scary on any kind of deep level. It actually diminished the tragedy of the scene where he was killed, because it felt like the filmmakers were saying "let's take one of the most important characters in the movie and degrade him into a zombie monster we use to pad the movie's running length."
The abortion scene was the best scene in the movie because it was horrifying in a specific way. It was desperate. It was claustrophobic. It was viscerally and mentally awful to even think about. Things were happening.
I don't hate this movie. Within the limitations of what it is, it's well executed. It's a genuine attempt to do something, which is more than what can be said for a lot of movies. But I didn't like it. I wouldn't really want to see more movies like this made. I feel like a lot of people are thinking "See? When a director makes a real movie, the stupid masses reject it. This is why Hollywood keeps making more and more schlock." Not really. I don't know if the Avengers is the third greatest movie ever, but it was an excellent movie. It's very deservedly successful. It's possible to make movies that are both substantiative and able to relate to an audience. Prometheus was not a movie like that.
Perhaps ironically, I liked the very last scene the best. As an origin for the Aliens, it's perfect. So what you're telling me is that the aliens were born from an orgy of violence and rape metaphors that make you question whether or not being alive is worth it? Sounds right to me.
4/10
Topic: Prometheus (Ridley Scott's new movie) ***SPOILERS*** (Read 36744 times)
