#MovieReview: Romulus delivers chills in Alien, but falls short of franchise glory
When watching Alien, you cannot help but root for the hodge-podge group of misfits as they come up against the perfect killing machine.
Alien: Romulus is slickly horrifying and is a mostly worthy entry into one of cinema’s best loved franchises.
Directed by Fede Alvarez, this film is the seventh in the Alien series and tries to return to the roots of Alien (1979) and Aliens (1986), but does not reach the highs of either.
Romulus is set between those two films and serves up an exciting new female star (Cailee Spaeny as Rain) in the ‘Ripley’ role made famous by Sigourney Weaver.
Spaeny is the best part of the cast which is largely populated by actors I had never previously seen.
That is part of the problem of Romulus, where the characters do not pop in the same way as the ensemble casts of the early films.
When watching Alien, you cannot help but root for the hodge-podge group of misfits as they come up against the perfect killing machine.
In Romulus, I occasionally found myself rooting for the aliens.
What saves the film is a series of excellent set pieces, some of which thrill and some of which are genuinely horrifying.
That is the skill of Alvarez, who previously waded into big movie reboots with the first return of Evil Dead in 2012.
He has been trusted with big ticket intellectual property because of an exciting visual style and calm hand behind the camera.
But there is little beneath the surface of Romulus to warrant rewatches, and the only interesting thematic element comes via a decision to revive a former character.
Without spoiling the reveal, one of the characters from a previous Alien film is revived by way of CGI.
It is a bold choice, which really did not work for me and only had the effect of making me concerned for what AI deepfakes might do to the beloved movie canon in the future.
Will we one day be watching a reanimated Tom Cruise in Mission: Impossible 15 long after he has passed away?
Aside from the initial shock value of the character reveal, however, I was mostly kept interested by Romulus, which moves along pretty swiftly.
Rated 16 for scenes of Horror, Language and Violence.
3/5.
Stay in the loop with The North Coast Courier on Facebook, X, Instagram & YouTube for the latest news.
Mobile users can join our WhatsApp Broadcast Service here or if you’re on desktop, scan the QR code below.
