Ridley Scott Prometheus: NOT the Alien Prequel Details

From what Ridley Scott has said about the movie, it's sure that Prometheus refers both to the name of the ship AND the myth, being in this case the Space Jockeys the creators of mankind. So yes, the lyrics of that song really fit the plot of the movie so far as we know.
 
I love how everyone blurted out the spoiler hansicle tried to keep from those of us who didn't want to know. :darnkids
 
They said in a interview that they re-created the space jockey Telescope and seat which leads me to beleive that we will see the space jockey in a living state and the sets are huge if you look the different shots that are out there maybe we will see the space jockey race walking around or will they hold us in suspense and reveal him towards the end, thats what I'm thinking. Here is a supposed leaked synopsis of the story It may a fake to mislead everyone or it could be real, Is This Leaked Synopsis for RIDLEY SCOTT'S 'PROMETHEUS' Real? | Scriptflags.com
 
You know, listening to the Ridley interviews and watching the DVD commentary and whatnot I have come to a conclusion (which I have no evidence to back this up): Ridley Scott didn't like what they did with Aliens and the following movies. I think he was insulted by what happened to his franchise. I think that Prometheus is basically going to take everything that happened after ALIEN and retconn it away. Like I said, I have no evidence for this. Just a feeling. And I will be happy. (Although I will secretly mourn the M41A1).

Charlie
 
I think he was insulted by what happened to his franchise.
"HIS" franchise? Are you implying that the Alien franchise belongs to Ridley Scott? Because it doesn't. He didn't write it, produce it, nor was even the top choice of directors chosen to do it. Of course he incorporated MANY excellent things that should no doubt be credited to him, none the least being the film's director, but he is what he is. The director. If this was his franchise, why didn't he come back for any of the sequels?

I don't look at Ridley Scott returning to the alien franchise as a means of "making things right", I see it as him returning to the science fiction genre that he hasn't been a part of in decades. It's a refresher.
 
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Seeing as all of this takes place before the first film, I don't think there's much of a way for him to retcon anything away.

I have to agree with Jeyl now that I've thought about it.. while Ridley is absolutely one of the main reasons why the original film was successful (no one's going to dispute that), the franchise as a whole was never was really "his". He influenced it, certainly, but that's about it.

If I had to pick one person that the franchise should have belonged to (if it were to belong to any one person), it would be Dan O'Bannon. But even he wasn't involved after the first film, the rights belonged to Fox.

Don't get me wrong, I'm very excited to see Ridley Scott come back to this.. not just sci-fi in general, but the Alien universe specifically. If anything, I'm probably too excited. I'm afraid that the film couldn't possibly live up to my expectations for it.
 
Much like Star Wars, it was a collaborative effort. Lightening in a bottle. The planets aligned. If Ridley is gonna demystify the jockey and other alien mysteries, it could suck much like it sucked when I saw Darth Vader attending a funeral in Luke's backyard.
 
Jeyl, yes I was implying it. More than any one person, or group, Ridley Scott controlled the direction and creation of the movie, and thus the franchise. Certainly any undertaking like that is a major group effort, but knowing how much Ridley influences the film he directs, from storyboarding to concept design to cinematography, he MADE that movie. Had anyone else been the director, it would not have been even close to the same movie. I shudder to think what it would have been if Roger Corman had actually made it. Much like Blade Runner, this movie belongs to Ridley. I put the credit for this movie on his shoulders, much like I put the blame for the suckage of AvP right on Paul W.S. Anderson. Of course, this is all just my opinion.

Jedi2016, I think there is a lot he can do. He can basically take everything after ALIEN and trash it by changing the creatures life cycle. Go back to the original, which I think is why he added it in the rerelease in 2004. I think Dan O'bannon had a lot to do with the story, but so did Ron Shusett. Great story doesn't necessarily make a great movie though. The drawing of all the elements is what makes a great film. I think Ridley did that.

And Clutch, I can certainly see ALIEN being a one shot, never to be replicated event. The new movie could totally ruin yet another aspect of ALIEN. I hope it doesn't, but its not only likely, but probable. I just tell myself it can't be any worse than Alien Resurrection.

Charlie
 
Its evident from the last few comments just how desparate we all are to see a film that at least in some ways replicates the original movie. This is starting to sound very prequel Star Warsian, with the expectations of everyone being so incredibly high that the new film almost HAS to fail to be what we want and expect of it.
I think the "lightning in the bottle " phrase gets it just about right. As with the original Alien/Star Wars ,a collaboration of extremely talented people quite literally fought the Studio and eachother to get their vision of the story on to film. Watch or read anything about the making of Alien or Starwars and you'll understand just how much of a battle it was to get both of those films made at all and how significantly they were changed time and again from the original concept and script.
Ultimately it was the Directors choices that almost entirely determined what appeared on the screen eventually, from the conceptual art and script in development through to the final edit and soundtrack, it remains mainly his say, his choice over all others as to what will or won't work in the film . He negotiates between the studios financial backing and the original scripts demands to get something that is always inevitably a compromise for everyone involved made and eventually into the cinemas in a form that hopefully audiences respond to well enough to make some profit . If the film does well he gets the credit. If it dies he'll get the blame entirely.
Yep, it was Ridleys baby, just as Terminator was Camerons and niether director was entirely complimentory about where the next director took the franchise after they were done with it. Remember the films only really became "franchised" because of their continued individual commercial success and the studios willingness to try and get another one like it made again, until they didn't.
Making a prequel, as we all know, is a huge gamble. Because it risks devaluing the pre existing experience of a devoted audience that already approves of the original for what it is. The phrase, "if it ain't broke don't fix it "comes to mind or rather "if you don't need to explain it don't bother saying it". It really has to be an outstanding script to manage the imagination of the millions of people that have already seen and explained the original for themselves. And lightning ,as we all know ,rarely strikes in the same place twice.
But it can happen.
I have faith that Mr Scott will produce something that will look fantastic. I know they have already retro designed the film so it looks entirely consistent with the original. I don't fear on any level that what we see will be anything less than absolutely breath taking.
I am bothered about the story though ,because it could fail in so many ways to really explain the original. That was a very simple monster- in- the- cellar story that was rebranded and packaged in to a spectacularly successful sci fi /horror film that really has not been equalled in the last three decades.
And in a very strange way although I want to know this film will be as good as the original I still need to be as amazingly surprised by it in the same brilliant way that "Aliens" manged to take the series forward for me. And I don't believe, hand on heart, as much as I want to, that that will be possible. Though it doesn't stop me wishing on that distant star very hard indeed.
 
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Much like Blade Runner, this (ALIEN) movie belongs to Ridley.

With all due respect, comments like these are an insult to those who actually AUTHORED the works involved.

Without the creative efforts of P.K. Dick and Dan O’Bannon (among others) Scott would have had nothing to do. Nor would have anyone else involved in the aforementioned productions.

No one has more respect for Ridley Scott’s directorial ability than I do, but literally years of combined labor were expended by the writers of these properties before Scott was even a blip on the directorial radar screen.

Scott may have delivered the “baby” we know as ALIEN (and accepted the lion’s share of the credit), but not before that baby had already spent years incubating inside the minds of the screenwriters.

Until Scott develops the ability to generate his own stories out of nothing he will never be the sole “creator” of his films. He’ll just have to settle for being one of the cinema’s greatest living directors.
 
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I have to Agree with Carson and also that this was a team effort that made this a classic and lets not forget H.R.GIGER he created alot of the look and feel of Alien and the concept artists with the design of the ships, suits, interiors, planet and so forth. Ridley was the cook that took all these ingredients and made a delicious dish.
 
I don't think "franchise" is the best word to use in this case. I would say that maybe Scott was dismayed that the following movies did not follow the style and vision of the first movie. Aliens was a simplified more mainstream and audience friendly movie, Alien 3 was an operatic gloom and doom goth fantasy, and Alien Resurrection was a weird action, goth, french wtf pos that really defies description or genre. There has been no consistent tone or style throughout the series and the storyline has zig and zagged every which way because of the various writers and directors.

I for one find the footage we are seeing from Prometheus to have some of the most visually striking images I have seen in a movie in long time. Reminds me of the seventies and very early eighties when science fiction had a more interesting feel to it. Looking forward to this.
 
Just a word of warning to anyone thinking of posting information specifically about "Prometheus" obtained without release approval from Fox here on the RPF.
In a word "DON'T"!
Fox have an amazingly proactive legal team involved in securing leaked material,particularly over the internet, and they are reacting serverely to any illegitimate sources of info ,shutting down whole threads, blogs ,tweets etc.
A test cinema teaser trailer, rumoured to be released at the end of October was viewed and comments posted about it less than 24 hrs ago. It was legitimate because FOX has had everything removed that was posted about it and I mean everything, including posts that linked to the sites and sources.
So anyone with a grain of sense and respect for the RPF and people working in the industry please be extremely careful with what you may be tempted to post. The trouble this is attracting is beyond any level of secrecy attatched to a film release before and people are getting into real legal difficulties where it can be proved they have had access to none approved release material and have gone public with it.
This is why so little information has been available incomparisson to other films . They are not messing about with this one!
"Speculate" to your hearts content but I wouldn't post anything that can be linked to "specific" sources, not unless you want to visit the WRATH OF FOX upon anyone.
 
Carson, did you ever read "Do Androids Dream of ELectric Sheep?". The book is almost unrecognisable to the film. At best "Bladerunner" was an extremely loose adaptation of the story with key elements totally removed or underplayed from it.They may have kept some of the character names and the hunt for the replicants but it is hugely different in every other way.
Deckard was never an Android (renamed replicant in the film). He was a definitely married human being, living in a post nuclear radioactive world that was almost empty of other human beings and animals. The whole backstory about Empathy boxes, the Mercerism religion, kipple, and the kidnapping by the androids to a police station is gone. John Ishidores character disappears as a sub normal human though he is arguably replaced by Sebastian, but there were no links to the Rosen (Tyrel) corporation. The Androids are killed very easily by Deckard who then goes home to his wife and finds Rachel has killed his Goat but let his wife live.
I remember sitting through the film and wondering what the hell was going on, it was that different from the book.
But theres the rub.
It was a significant improvement on the story, simpler to understand and yet more profoundly moving, particularly the ending ,as a way of showing how the replicants had become more human than the people hunting them. Batty saving Deckard, even when he was in the mists of death, was hugely touching.
Without that " Tears in the Rain " speech ( that was not even in the shooting script being included by Ridley only after Rutger penned it) can you imagine how much weaker that scene would have been?
That was his job as the director. To take the screenplay by Fancher and Peoples and improve upon it with his VISUAL direction.
Again the same was true of Alien. O'Bannon wrote it along with Shusett but Giler and Hill then redid the script almost entirely. O'Bannon remained embittered until the day he died over how much was changed from his "baby" and was convinced, right up to the moment it was screened they had "butchered" it and made a flop. It was Alann Ladd that brought the female character Ripley to the fore as heroine and radically changed the whole movie.
Read the making of books or watch the DVD's. Nobody mentions Chris Foss as a conceptual artist because nothing he did was used. O'bannon brought him in long with Giger and Cobb because they had worked on Dune. But it was Ridley that chose what appeared on the screen. It was his visual choice and style that totally influenced the way the film looked.
Nobody is disagreeng that there was a hugley creative force from writers, artists, set designers ,actors ,camera men etc that helped make the film what it was, but it was Ridleys choices as Boss man that gave the film its entire visual direction.
Even the spacejockey was a mutation of an idea.
 
CutThumb got to this before I did, but I agree with his statements. The finished version of ALIEN and Bladerunner have very little to do with the original stories. While those involved deserve credit where it is due (cutting Giger out of the rest of the movie was a slap in the face), Ridley Scott is much like a chef. He took all the various elements (screenplay, script, design) and crafted them together. As amazing as the individual elements may be, they cannot compare to the final, finished product.

And to Mola Rob, I think using "franchise" is a pretty safe term. I don't believe that what was intended, certainly not with the following films, but the "Alien" idea has become a stand-alone franchise. Alien, Predator, Terminator, Star Wars; they all immediately conjure up a mental composite of all the films. When someone says "ALIEN" to me, the first thing in my mind is the Nostromo and the facehugger, but the Queen and the M41 are also there (and the wall-eye viewpoint of Alien 3). I agree that the movies, especially in the Aliens franchise are a mish-mash of differing styles, but that is more the fault of the studio than anything else.

Charlie

BTW, just want to say that I'm really enjoying the discussion. Our viewpoints may not agree, and I don't think we'll convince one another to change, but I like seeing the different perspectives.
 
Nobody mentions Chris Foss as a conceptual artist because nothing he did was used..

Now don't get me started on this again, tee hee... The Nostromo is 70 % 'Cobbled' together from 3 early Foss designs (and I don't care if even Foss himself can't see this, which he claims not to). The upper module is lifted verbatim from his 'space train' sketch; the hull core and general configuration are lifted from the 'Fountain Line' ship; the flanking engines are a Foss trademark and their forms are clearly inspired by the giant flanking box forms (right down to the degree of radius on the cornering) in his early alien temple sketch. All sketches can be found in 'The Book of Alien'. And these three sketches date from a period when Cobb's ships are looking nothing like the final Nostromo, instead being flattened streamlined slab-like things, the opposite of the final design's Foss-like boxiness.
 
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