"This movie was made in 1986. It invented all the cliches."
March 1, 2015 4:29 PM Subscribe
Matt Zoller Seitz hosted a sleepover for his 11 year old son and his son's friends. Soon it came time to watch a movie, which produced: Notes on watching "Aliens" for the first time again, with a bunch of kids .
That is surprisingly delightful. Now I want to watch the movie again.
posted by Erroneous at 4:39 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Erroneous at 4:39 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
"There was general agreement amongst the boys that they would like to see a separate film of Newt surviving for weeks on the planet full of aliens."
Are you listening to this, Neill Blomkamp?
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 4:41 PM on March 1, 2015 [10 favorites]
Are you listening to this, Neill Blomkamp?
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 4:41 PM on March 1, 2015 [10 favorites]
Oh, to be 11 again and see Aliens for the first time.
posted by arcticseal at 4:43 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by arcticseal at 4:43 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
Did they already make that Newt survival horror movie, just with a gender and genre change over to Home Alone?
posted by Earthtopus at 4:44 PM on March 1, 2015 [7 favorites]
posted by Earthtopus at 4:44 PM on March 1, 2015 [7 favorites]
Fun read! I showed Aliens to my ex's son and it went over well, although I think it would have gone over better with a group of kids.
Die Hard on the other hand went down like a lead balloon. The pace was just too slow for him.
posted by brundlefly at 4:45 PM on March 1, 2015
Die Hard on the other hand went down like a lead balloon. The pace was just too slow for him.
posted by brundlefly at 4:45 PM on March 1, 2015
Did they already make that Newt survival horror movie, just with a gender and genre change over to Home Alone?
Well, finding out Joe Pesci was actually a xenomorph would explain a lot...
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 4:46 PM on March 1, 2015
Well, finding out Joe Pesci was actually a xenomorph would explain a lot...
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 4:46 PM on March 1, 2015
Home Alone is too violent and mean spirited to be an Alien film.
posted by brundlefly at 4:46 PM on March 1, 2015 [40 favorites]
posted by brundlefly at 4:46 PM on March 1, 2015 [40 favorites]
I, too, wilted when "Princess Bride" elicited only shrugs. They will have to watch "Holy Grail" and "Blues Brothers" without me. (Bill Murray's scenes from "Stripes" will only be shown by my executor when the will is read.)
posted by wenestvedt at 5:00 PM on March 1, 2015 [9 favorites]
posted by wenestvedt at 5:00 PM on March 1, 2015 [9 favorites]
My, then college-age, son went to see Die Hard at a midnight movie and then said something like "I love old cheesy movies."
Hrmph.
posted by octothorpe at 5:07 PM on March 1, 2015 [14 favorites]
Hrmph.
posted by octothorpe at 5:07 PM on March 1, 2015 [14 favorites]
Blues Brothers is next on my list. She has context from Drake and Josh and SNL40, so I'm hoping that will keep her interest.
posted by Ruki at 5:09 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Ruki at 5:09 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
Oh, to be 11 again and see Aliens for the first time.
It wasn't half-bad at twenty-seven.
posted by philip-random at 5:23 PM on March 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
It wasn't half-bad at twenty-seven.
posted by philip-random at 5:23 PM on March 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
Oh, to be 11 again and see Aliens for the first time.
Isn't that the guy from Mad About You? What's he doing in space? Did he take Murray with him? Wouldn't it be funny if he did? Maybe Murray's just chasing that invisible mouse in the ceiling. This is scary. Why can't we watch Star Trek 4 or Star Wars or Ghostbusters? I'm going to the other room to play Nintendo.
( I didn't like Aliens. )
posted by RonButNotStupid at 5:23 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
Isn't that the guy from Mad About You? What's he doing in space? Did he take Murray with him? Wouldn't it be funny if he did? Maybe Murray's just chasing that invisible mouse in the ceiling. This is scary. Why can't we watch Star Trek 4 or Star Wars or Ghostbusters? I'm going to the other room to play Nintendo.
( I didn't like Aliens. )
posted by RonButNotStupid at 5:23 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
The boy who earlier had suggested alternatives to "Aliens" asked the first boy to "just shut up about the face huggers."
I'm with you, kid. I couldn't really handle anything in the way of scary movies till I was older than that. Still pretty much a wimp, but better at dealing with it now. It's tough to be the one kid who's really freaked out by horror in a group full of kids who like it.
My mother-in-law asked me yesterday if she could watch Jaws with my 9-year-old and I said,"Uh, no." but meant, Fuck, No. Unless she's going to live in our house and sit up with him when he has nightmares.
posted by emjaybee at 5:26 PM on March 1, 2015 [10 favorites]
I'm with you, kid. I couldn't really handle anything in the way of scary movies till I was older than that. Still pretty much a wimp, but better at dealing with it now. It's tough to be the one kid who's really freaked out by horror in a group full of kids who like it.
My mother-in-law asked me yesterday if she could watch Jaws with my 9-year-old and I said,"Uh, no." but meant, Fuck, No. Unless she's going to live in our house and sit up with him when he has nightmares.
posted by emjaybee at 5:26 PM on March 1, 2015 [10 favorites]
I am young-ish. But I am stuck in my ways when it comes to movies. We have interns at my department; college kids from 18-21. Via Netflix I have attempted to show them the original Robocop, Mad Max, Leon, Stripes, Silence of the Lambs, and Pulp Fiction.
I am no longer allowed to select movies for movie night.
They said Mad Max was "too slow." ಠ_ಠ
posted by sara is disenchanted at 5:32 PM on March 1, 2015 [19 favorites]
I am no longer allowed to select movies for movie night.
They said Mad Max was "too slow." ಠ_ಠ
posted by sara is disenchanted at 5:32 PM on March 1, 2015 [19 favorites]
Blues Brothers is next on my list.
I laugh when my 7-y.-o. scolds her brother by saying, "You better THINK. You better think about the consequences of your actions!"
She also knows (a little) about James Brown and Aretha. Very cool kid, that one.
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:34 PM on March 1, 2015 [14 favorites]
I laugh when my 7-y.-o. scolds her brother by saying, "You better THINK. You better think about the consequences of your actions!"
She also knows (a little) about James Brown and Aretha. Very cool kid, that one.
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:34 PM on March 1, 2015 [14 favorites]
I guess that I was a weird kid in that I watched tons of old movies when I was eleven and younger. This was the seventies so old then meant thirties and forties era but I was totally into Universal horror pictures, old Hitchcocks, The Thin Man series, Sherlock Holmes with Basil Rathbone, Humphrey Bogart movies, etc.
posted by octothorpe at 5:34 PM on March 1, 2015 [10 favorites]
posted by octothorpe at 5:34 PM on March 1, 2015 [10 favorites]
In high school, my friend's dad (indignant that his daughter didn't get one of his movie references) started hosting a summer classic movie night every week, where all of her friends were invited and he provided limitless pop and chips, and picked two classic movies at Blockbuster that he didn't think we'd seen. We'd vote and then watch it. I saw Citizen Kane, Sunset Boulevard, North by Northwest, The Birds, All About Eve, and several others, for the first time. This is SNEAKY PARENTING because he got to know all of his daughter's friends AND he knew where she was one night a week. I intend to do it to my kids. But probably not with The Birds, because I am still pretty traumatized by that.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 5:41 PM on March 1, 2015 [54 favorites]
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 5:41 PM on March 1, 2015 [54 favorites]
My, then college-age, son went to see Die Hard at a midnight movie and then said something like "I love old cheesy movies."
This is why I never had kids.
posted by entropicamericana at 5:41 PM on March 1, 2015 [13 favorites]
This is why I never had kids.
posted by entropicamericana at 5:41 PM on March 1, 2015 [13 favorites]
The comments are pretty funny, equal parts "oh man, totally cool!" and "I cannot believe you would over-ride a parent's right to blah blah blah" (or at least that was the tally of the comments I managed to read before my head exploded).
Isn't that the guy from Mad About You? What's he doing in space?
This kind of happens to me when I accidentally watch L&O episodes with Chris Noth in them: "Oh man, Carrie is going to be pissed when she finds out Big is a cop!"
posted by mythical anthropomorphic amphibian at 5:42 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
Isn't that the guy from Mad About You? What's he doing in space?
This kind of happens to me when I accidentally watch L&O episodes with Chris Noth in them: "Oh man, Carrie is going to be pissed when she finds out Big is a cop!"
posted by mythical anthropomorphic amphibian at 5:42 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
Octothorpe, you're not the only one.
posted by arcticseal at 5:42 PM on March 1, 2015
posted by arcticseal at 5:42 PM on March 1, 2015
Next up? Schindler's List!
posted by ReeMonster at 5:43 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by ReeMonster at 5:43 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
I had older brothers and they had first choice at the video rental place. I watched Evil Dead when I was 8yo. I also liked The Cure and The Smiths.
I turned out perfectly fine though!
Just fine. Really.
the voices never stop
posted by adept256 at 5:52 PM on March 1, 2015 [14 favorites]
I turned out perfectly fine though!
Just fine. Really.
the voices never stop
posted by adept256 at 5:52 PM on March 1, 2015 [14 favorites]
so... when do i get to watch videodrome with my kids?
posted by ennui.bz at 6:06 PM on March 1, 2015 [7 favorites]
posted by ennui.bz at 6:06 PM on March 1, 2015 [7 favorites]
so... when do i get to watch videodrome with my kids?
"When you're 75, son."
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:14 PM on March 1, 2015 [5 favorites]
"When you're 75, son."
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:14 PM on March 1, 2015 [5 favorites]
Blues brothers was a big hit here. My son and i went as Jake and Elwood for halloween that year. Other kids thought it was Men in Black so they were all forced to come see Blues Brothers too.
Next up is cane toads. But maybe I should give Aliens a try.
posted by chapps at 6:19 PM on March 1, 2015
Next up is cane toads. But maybe I should give Aliens a try.
posted by chapps at 6:19 PM on March 1, 2015
I think this article perfectly describes the experience of sharing a film with 11 year old boys. the talking! Make it stop!!
posted by chapps at 6:20 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by chapps at 6:20 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
They said Mad Max was "too slow."
To be fair, it is a little talkier than, say, The Road Warrior.
The notions of What Kids Today think of as slow is wearying. The teenager of the house finds Raiders of the Lost Ark glacial. I saw Die Hard on the big screen for the first time in 25 or more years just before Christmas at a local art house. There were probably fifty people present and only one viewer who looked as though he might not have had his thirtieh birthday yet. And per an intro by the place's resident film historian with a few questions, the twenty-something guy seemed to be the only one in the room seeing it for the first time. I wonder what he thought (apart perhaps from how jarring it was to see Bruce Willis light up a cigarette in an airport).
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:31 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
To be fair, it is a little talkier than, say, The Road Warrior.
The notions of What Kids Today think of as slow is wearying. The teenager of the house finds Raiders of the Lost Ark glacial. I saw Die Hard on the big screen for the first time in 25 or more years just before Christmas at a local art house. There were probably fifty people present and only one viewer who looked as though he might not have had his thirtieh birthday yet. And per an intro by the place's resident film historian with a few questions, the twenty-something guy seemed to be the only one in the room seeing it for the first time. I wonder what he thought (apart perhaps from how jarring it was to see Bruce Willis light up a cigarette in an airport).
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:31 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
Chris Noth is a homicide cop, and that is all he will ever be.
posted by Brocktoon at 6:32 PM on March 1, 2015 [5 favorites]
posted by Brocktoon at 6:32 PM on March 1, 2015 [5 favorites]
I saw Die Hard on the big screen for the first time in 25 or more years just before Christmas at a local art house. There were probably fifty people present and only one viewer who looked as though he might not have had his thirtieh birthday yet.
This was my experience seeing Ghostbusters last year.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:33 PM on March 1, 2015
This was my experience seeing Ghostbusters last year.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:33 PM on March 1, 2015
Vasquez was the MVP of the movie. I think all eight boys might have a little bit of a crush on her. When she pinned a xenomorph to a wall with her combat boot and blew its brains out, one exclaimed his delight with profanity, then apologized to me for it. ... There was a wave of applause for Lt. Gorman and Vasquez holding hands as they blew themselves up. ("She died like a boss," one said.)
Awww. The kids are all right.
posted by Kat Allison at 6:36 PM on March 1, 2015 [27 favorites]
Awww. The kids are all right.
posted by Kat Allison at 6:36 PM on March 1, 2015 [27 favorites]
I went to see Flash Gordon, prefaced with a Q&A with the director as part of an SF retrospective last Autumn and our was rammed with people who couldn't have been alive for its 1980 release. It seemed to go down pretty well though they were laughing in the wrong places a bit. Also they clearly had no idea who Peter Duncan was.
posted by biffa at 6:41 PM on March 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by biffa at 6:41 PM on March 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
I watched Jaws with my seven year old grandson, at his request. I had never seen it. I followed up with a foam shark and a shark anatomy book at Christmas. The book has clear plastic areas in the pages with the organ systms, it was a show and tell hit.
posted by Oyéah at 6:48 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Oyéah at 6:48 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
I hate to be all prudish, but eleven is probably too young to watch a movie like Aliens. And if your kid is somehow inured to violence at eleven already then what the fuck have you been doing to that kid??
posted by zardoz at 6:53 PM on March 1, 2015 [12 favorites]
posted by zardoz at 6:53 PM on March 1, 2015 [12 favorites]
It seemed to go down pretty well though they were laughing in the wrong places a bit.
There are wrong places to laugh in Flash Gordon?
posted by Sebmojo at 6:55 PM on March 1, 2015 [24 favorites]
There are wrong places to laugh in Flash Gordon?
posted by Sebmojo at 6:55 PM on March 1, 2015 [24 favorites]
This is kind of great. I mean, one of the important things for children, I think, is to be introduced to cultural touchstones that take a wonderful legacy and destroy it. Then, when they become adults, and are capable of understanding great ideas, they can go back and rediscover the sources of those wonderful legacies. I have no doubt that a ton of those children will grow up loving Aliens – but a few of them will finally watch Alien and discover that Aliens is an utter desecration and defilement of all the awesome and incredibly things that made Alien great from script to print. And they will learn to despise James Cameron with an unearthly fury, as all sane adults in a civilized society ought to.
posted by koeselitz at 6:55 PM on March 1, 2015 [28 favorites]
posted by koeselitz at 6:55 PM on March 1, 2015 [28 favorites]
Good point, koeselit, but wait until they see Prometheus!
posted by ReeMonster at 6:58 PM on March 1, 2015 [10 favorites]
posted by ReeMonster at 6:58 PM on March 1, 2015 [10 favorites]
Nice troll Koeselitz, if a little obvious.
posted by Sebmojo at 6:58 PM on March 1, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by Sebmojo at 6:58 PM on March 1, 2015 [4 favorites]
Too young?
Idk. I saw Rocky Horror Picture Show when I was 7 (don't leave your kid alone with the Beta machine after you've gone to bed). My parents thought I wouldn't understand it. And I didn't, until I was about 11 and saw it again...but it probably explains a lot.
Tim Curry is responsible for a lot of things.
posted by sara is disenchanted at 6:59 PM on March 1, 2015 [15 favorites]
Idk. I saw Rocky Horror Picture Show when I was 7 (don't leave your kid alone with the Beta machine after you've gone to bed). My parents thought I wouldn't understand it. And I didn't, until I was about 11 and saw it again...but it probably explains a lot.
Tim Curry is responsible for a lot of things.
posted by sara is disenchanted at 6:59 PM on March 1, 2015 [15 favorites]
There are wrong places to laugh in Flash Gordon?
and who's Peter Duncan?
posted by philip-random at 7:00 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
Jaws at seven? Jesus Christ, that exact parental choice ruined the ocean for me for a decade.
posted by gottabefunky at 7:03 PM on March 1, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by gottabefunky at 7:03 PM on March 1, 2015 [4 favorites]
I was 11 when I first saw Aliens; I loved that film and do no feel like I was warped by it at all. What fucked me up way worse was watching the chestburster scene from Alien at age 4 when it premiered on regular TV.
posted by Renoroc at 7:06 PM on March 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by Renoroc at 7:06 PM on March 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
As an addendum to my earlier comment, it might have been on the VHS VCR. I don't remember. But we had both hooked up to the TV.
posted by sara is disenchanted at 7:07 PM on March 1, 2015
posted by sara is disenchanted at 7:07 PM on March 1, 2015
I wonder what kids these days think about the original animated TMNT TV show and the live action movie? Or even the original weird-assed comics.
One of my oldest memories of watching old media was watching The Mighty Hercules, which originally aired in '63, on TV in the hotel room my family first stayed at when they first moved to Vancouver in '84. The animation on TV at the time was Transformers, first airing in '84, and eventually peaking at GI Joe: The Movie ('87) a few years later.
(or the less-pathetic-than-Gobots, at least, knockoff M.A.S.K. ('85) which tried to capitalize on killing baddies and transforming vehicles.)
Oh man, He-Man ('83) and She-Ra ('85). Jem and the Holograms, also '85.
Huh. That Hulk Hogan Saturday morning cartoon also first aired in '85. WTH, Punky Brewster also first aired in '85.
In contrast, Robotech first aired in Japan in '82.
HOLY HELLS!!, a high-def re-imagining of the Robotech intro.
posted by porpoise at 7:08 PM on March 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
One of my oldest memories of watching old media was watching The Mighty Hercules, which originally aired in '63, on TV in the hotel room my family first stayed at when they first moved to Vancouver in '84. The animation on TV at the time was Transformers, first airing in '84, and eventually peaking at GI Joe: The Movie ('87) a few years later.
(or the less-pathetic-than-Gobots, at least, knockoff M.A.S.K. ('85) which tried to capitalize on killing baddies and transforming vehicles.)
Oh man, He-Man ('83) and She-Ra ('85). Jem and the Holograms, also '85.
Huh. That Hulk Hogan Saturday morning cartoon also first aired in '85. WTH, Punky Brewster also first aired in '85.
In contrast, Robotech first aired in Japan in '82.
HOLY HELLS!!, a high-def re-imagining of the Robotech intro.
posted by porpoise at 7:08 PM on March 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
My son immediately took to Princess Bride, Monty Python's Holy Grail, and What's Up, Doc (with Ryan O'Neal, Barbra Streisand, Madeline Kahn, Kenneth Mars, etc.)...all before he was 12. I didn't want to push it past that, I feel like I gave him a good solid start and he can delight in his own discoveries from there.
posted by Greg_Ace at 7:20 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Greg_Ace at 7:20 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
Blues Brothers is next on my list.
Blues Brothers is my list.
How I feel about someone has some direct correlation to how much they enjoyed it. Thankfully, I don't have kids.
posted by quin at 7:22 PM on March 1, 2015 [7 favorites]
Blues Brothers is my list.
How I feel about someone has some direct correlation to how much they enjoyed it. Thankfully, I don't have kids.
posted by quin at 7:22 PM on March 1, 2015 [7 favorites]
Sturgeon's Law: 90% of everything is crud.
A corollary: the more there is of "everything," the greater the percentage of it will be crud.
posted by porpoise at 7:30 PM on March 1, 2015
A corollary: the more there is of "everything," the greater the percentage of it will be crud.
posted by porpoise at 7:30 PM on March 1, 2015
"This movie was made in 1986. It invented all the cliches."
About two or three years ago, when we first got Netflix, I stumbled across Miami Vice. I laughed, and thought, "Hell, why not?" and put on the first episode.
If you tried watching the pilot episode while playing a Cop Movie/TV Cliche drinking game, you'd straight up die of alcohol poisoning within fifteen minutes of the first scene. I couldn't believe just how over the top it all felt, looking back on it from 2012-ish. It's almost painful.
But it was a trendsetter, and I kept reminding myself, "This is where a lot of those cliches were born."
posted by scaryblackdeath at 7:35 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
About two or three years ago, when we first got Netflix, I stumbled across Miami Vice. I laughed, and thought, "Hell, why not?" and put on the first episode.
If you tried watching the pilot episode while playing a Cop Movie/TV Cliche drinking game, you'd straight up die of alcohol poisoning within fifteen minutes of the first scene. I couldn't believe just how over the top it all felt, looking back on it from 2012-ish. It's almost painful.
But it was a trendsetter, and I kept reminding myself, "This is where a lot of those cliches were born."
posted by scaryblackdeath at 7:35 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
Game over, man! Game over!
Hey, remember Bill Paxton Pinball?
posted by ostranenie at 8:12 PM on March 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
Hey, remember Bill Paxton Pinball?
posted by ostranenie at 8:12 PM on March 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
It's sort of like when John Carter of Mars came out and everyone was comparing its storyline unfavorable with movies like Star Wars, Avatar, and Star Trek, not realizing that it was written by Edgar Rice Burroughs in 1911 and basically invented the genera that all those other films were living in.
It is the origin story for most space science fiction movies today.
posted by quin at 8:17 PM on March 1, 2015 [16 favorites]
It is the origin story for most space science fiction movies today.
posted by quin at 8:17 PM on March 1, 2015 [16 favorites]
I cannot WAIT for my kids to be old enough not to quote Blues Brothers at school so I can show it to them.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:22 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:22 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
At the age of 9 or so, I had a babysitter who would chain smoke and watch horror movies all the time, with a particular fondness for slasher movies. I specifically remember Halloween, Friday the 13th, Christine, Ghoulies, and The Shining. I think the fact that I became fond of second hand smoke (leading to smoking when I got older) may have been worse than the gore special effects from 1970's / '80s horror.
posted by idiopath at 8:23 PM on March 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by idiopath at 8:23 PM on March 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
Game over, man! Game over!
For many years, a friend and I saw all of Paxton's work, appreciating the fact that until top billing in Twister, he died in nearly every film. Weird Science (didn't die but became a huge slug thing, it goes worse for his characters from here.) Terminator, Aliens, Near Dark, Next of Kin, Navy Seals, Predator 2, hell, he even has a death scene in True Lies, even if it was a fantasy.
Because of this, we loved him. This was a man that really died well onscreen, and that was fucking awesome.
posted by quin at 8:27 PM on March 1, 2015 [4 favorites]
For many years, a friend and I saw all of Paxton's work, appreciating the fact that until top billing in Twister, he died in nearly every film. Weird Science (didn't die but became a huge slug thing, it goes worse for his characters from here.) Terminator, Aliens, Near Dark, Next of Kin, Navy Seals, Predator 2, hell, he even has a death scene in True Lies, even if it was a fantasy.
Because of this, we loved him. This was a man that really died well onscreen, and that was fucking awesome.
posted by quin at 8:27 PM on March 1, 2015 [4 favorites]
"He was Sean Bean before Sean Bean was Sean Bean"
posted by DoctorFedora at 8:34 PM on March 1, 2015 [15 favorites]
posted by DoctorFedora at 8:34 PM on March 1, 2015 [15 favorites]
I'm amazed that my siblings' kids immediately refuse to watch anything in B&W because it is therefore "old" and, presumably, worthless.
Article was a nice read. Thanks for the post.
posted by InsertNiftyNameHere at 8:42 PM on March 1, 2015
Article was a nice read. Thanks for the post.
posted by InsertNiftyNameHere at 8:42 PM on March 1, 2015
I saw Jaws when I was eleven, and left the theater feeling like I'd been wrung out like a dishcloth. I imagine that I'd have felt the same way if I'd seen Aliens at that age. Now, I watch it and it's remarkable how many things kind of pop out at me above and beyond the usual fan-favorite moments. The way that the squad looks at Ripley during the briefing when she's trying to tell them what it was like on the Nostromo. All the close-ups that Cameron gives Sigourney Weaver throughout the movie and what she does with them, particularly when Newt asks Ripley about her daughter. The way that Apone treats Ripley (when she asks if she can run the loader) versus how he treats the squad. Sorry, koeselitz, but there's a reason why people actually give a shit about the characters in this movie more than they do about the characters in the first one, and it has nothing to do with the caliber of the actors; despite the quality of the actors in the first movie, they don't seem to have nearly as much to do.
posted by Halloween Jack at 8:45 PM on March 1, 2015 [17 favorites]
posted by Halloween Jack at 8:45 PM on March 1, 2015 [17 favorites]
I'm amazed that my siblings' kids immediately refuse to watch anything in B&W because it is therefore "old" and, presumably, worthless.
I've been a patient at the Marquette Dental School for a year or so now, and one of the most clever things I've ever seen is that, in the lobby/ waiting area, they have a television running silent films; Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, and many others. It's perfect, because they have the audio off (sadly you lose the score), but the movies are entirely watchable without disturbing anyone else.
I watched a lot of Keaton and Chaplin when I was learning about film, but seeing their movies regularly in a pure entertainment form has made me appreciate, once again, how genius these men were.
A few years ago, I would acknowledge the importance of their work; the craft, the editing, the stunts. Now, I can evangalize them as just really fun films. They are ageless in their brilliance.
If you can figure out a way to get them past the black and white thing, there are so many great moments. Maybe introduce them to Jackie Chan and work backwards from there.
posted by quin at 8:56 PM on March 1, 2015 [8 favorites]
I've been a patient at the Marquette Dental School for a year or so now, and one of the most clever things I've ever seen is that, in the lobby/ waiting area, they have a television running silent films; Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, and many others. It's perfect, because they have the audio off (sadly you lose the score), but the movies are entirely watchable without disturbing anyone else.
I watched a lot of Keaton and Chaplin when I was learning about film, but seeing their movies regularly in a pure entertainment form has made me appreciate, once again, how genius these men were.
A few years ago, I would acknowledge the importance of their work; the craft, the editing, the stunts. Now, I can evangalize them as just really fun films. They are ageless in their brilliance.
If you can figure out a way to get them past the black and white thing, there are so many great moments. Maybe introduce them to Jackie Chan and work backwards from there.
posted by quin at 8:56 PM on March 1, 2015 [8 favorites]
I'm amazed that my siblings' kids immediately refuse to watch anything in B&W because it is therefore "old" and, presumably, worthless.
I completely disregarded silent film as a novelty of it's time with a few shining moments like Metropolis. Then one insomniac night, flipping through the channels I saw Intolerance. I had no idea they had such gigantic productions. The sets were enormous! Over 3000 extras in some scenes! And a style of storytelling I've never seen before.
Blew my mind. I thought it was all slapstick and mimes.
posted by adept256 at 9:21 PM on March 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
I completely disregarded silent film as a novelty of it's time with a few shining moments like Metropolis. Then one insomniac night, flipping through the channels I saw Intolerance. I had no idea they had such gigantic productions. The sets were enormous! Over 3000 extras in some scenes! And a style of storytelling I've never seen before.
Blew my mind. I thought it was all slapstick and mimes.
posted by adept256 at 9:21 PM on March 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
I kind of need to know which Costco.
posted by Naberius at 9:23 PM on March 1, 2015 [5 favorites]
posted by Naberius at 9:23 PM on March 1, 2015 [5 favorites]
ALIEN age 11 from the related posts down there seems highly relevant too.
posted by adept256 at 9:25 PM on March 1, 2015
posted by adept256 at 9:25 PM on March 1, 2015
When this movie opened, I was working at a movie theater. We got the movie the night before opening day, and watched it ourselves and with our friends, paying the projectionist in beer.
One of my favorite memories.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 9:28 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
One of my favorite memories.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 9:28 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
idiopath: “At the age of 9 or so, I had a babysitter who would chain smoke and watch horror movies all the time, with a particular fondness for slasher movies. I specifically remember Halloween, Friday the 13th, Christine, Ghoulies, and The Shining. I think the fact that I became fond of second hand smoke (leading to smoking when I got older) may have been worse than the gore special effects from 1970's / '80s horror.”I once was in the home of someone whose toddler's favorite movie was Nightmare on Elm Street. When I expressed concern about this, I was assured the child was too young to understand. "Ask 'er what Freddy does to people."
"What does Freddy do to people?"
"He makes them red!"
This was not the comfort to me the parent thought it would be.
posted by ob1quixote at 9:42 PM on March 1, 2015 [17 favorites]
I like how he gets in an extra little jab at the wimpy kid at the end. Just to make sure you remember that there's someone to make fun of at school the next day ;) lol kids.
posted by wam at 9:59 PM on March 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by wam at 9:59 PM on March 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
Sorry, let me put that more constructively. If your kid asks you if they can watch a specific horror movie, sure, let them watch it. No issue. If someone else's kid asks you if they can not watch that horror movie, maybe find a way to respect that request also. That "outlier" kid did a really great job of suggesting alternatives he was comfortable with, in the middle of a powderkeg of peer pressure, and the author completely missed it.
posted by wam at 10:56 PM on March 1, 2015 [18 favorites]
posted by wam at 10:56 PM on March 1, 2015 [18 favorites]
I like how he gets in an extra little jab at the wimpy kid at the end.
I thought his attitude toward that kid was shitty, actually. No chance that kid doesn't already get picked on at all, huh?
posted by scaryblackdeath at 10:57 PM on March 1, 2015
I thought his attitude toward that kid was shitty, actually. No chance that kid doesn't already get picked on at all, huh?
posted by scaryblackdeath at 10:57 PM on March 1, 2015
scaryblackdeath: Shoot, that comment was meant as sarcasm. I appreciate and wholly agree with your response to a non-sarcastic reading of it.
posted by wam at 11:27 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by wam at 11:27 PM on March 1, 2015 [1 favorite]
Was anyone else just kind of bored with Blues Brothers? There are a lot of touchstones in that film, but I just couldn't feel it at all.
posted by smidgen at 11:52 PM on March 1, 2015
posted by smidgen at 11:52 PM on March 1, 2015
Bored with Blues Brothers? In parts, yes. It is best understood like tapas. Small plates. Largely unconnected with what comes before or after. No through-line. No plot. Sometimes you stop and just have cocktails and talk and pretty soon another plate of sonething arrives.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 11:59 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 11:59 PM on March 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
My mother-in-law asked me yesterday if she could watch Jaws with my 9-year-old and I said,"Uh, no." but meant, Fuck, No. Unless she's going to live in our house and sit up with him when he has nightmares.
My Dad took us to see Jaws. I was like 8. It literally FUCKED ME UP for years.
posted by mikelieman at 12:43 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
My Dad took us to see Jaws. I was like 8. It literally FUCKED ME UP for years.
posted by mikelieman at 12:43 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
My brother at the age of like nine wanted to rent The Day After (the nuclear holocaust one) for his birthday party. This was the eighties, so we were all prepared to chase people around dead cows as Steve Guttenberg did. I guess for my brother, this merely represented the Challenges of the Future.
posted by angrycat at 12:52 AM on March 2, 2015
posted by angrycat at 12:52 AM on March 2, 2015
who's Peter Duncan?
Spare me...
(...the madness.)*
*emphasis mine.
posted by biffa at 2:04 AM on March 2, 2015
Spare me...
(...the madness.)*
*emphasis mine.
posted by biffa at 2:04 AM on March 2, 2015
11 is kind of young for a non-TV edit of Aliens.
posted by GallonOfAlan at 2:48 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by GallonOfAlan at 2:48 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
We saw Jaws in the theater two weeks ago and you could tell just from the crowd reactions how well that film still works.
posted by octothorpe at 3:55 AM on March 2, 2015
posted by octothorpe at 3:55 AM on March 2, 2015
"Vasquez was the MVP of the movie. I think all eight boys might have a little bit of a crush on her."
Jeanette Goldstein pretty much stole the movie from Weaver until her character died. #teamVasquez4EVA
posted by gsh at 4:39 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
Jeanette Goldstein pretty much stole the movie from Weaver until her character died. #teamVasquez4EVA
posted by gsh at 4:39 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
Like some others here, I watched Jaws when I was seven. I am still not OK around deep water. Love the movie. Probably should have waited though.
posted by wabbittwax at 4:39 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by wabbittwax at 4:39 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
I'm amazed that my siblings' kids immediately refuse to watch anything in B&W because it is therefore "old" and, presumably, worthless.
I used to have this unfortunate attitude as a kid too. Reform is possible!
posted by neckro23 at 5:11 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
I used to have this unfortunate attitude as a kid too. Reform is possible!
posted by neckro23 at 5:11 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
GallonOfAlan: "11 is kind of young for a non-TV edit of Aliens."
The Alien movies were never all that gory to begin with, and the practical effects for the bits that were have aged such that I wouldn't expect kids raised on everything-is-actually-pretty-realistic-looking modern CG to be that bothered by it. I'd be warier of the actual monster designs, which were and still are very well executed, and unless the TV edit removes the xenomorphs and the facehuggers entirely...
posted by these are science wands at 5:24 AM on March 2, 2015
The Alien movies were never all that gory to begin with, and the practical effects for the bits that were have aged such that I wouldn't expect kids raised on everything-is-actually-pretty-realistic-looking modern CG to be that bothered by it. I'd be warier of the actual monster designs, which were and still are very well executed, and unless the TV edit removes the xenomorphs and the facehuggers entirely...
posted by these are science wands at 5:24 AM on March 2, 2015
My first attempt to watch "Aliens" was at home, alone, in the dark, just before a storm. When the first alien appeared, a loud clap of thunder paired with a huge flash of lightning just outside my window propelled me behind the sofa (no mean feat since the sofa is right up against a wall). I groped around for the remote and turned off the tv.
I managed to finish watching the movie with my parents around, and all the living room lights on.
posted by Alnedra at 5:26 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
I managed to finish watching the movie with my parents around, and all the living room lights on.
posted by Alnedra at 5:26 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
I'm looking forward to the follow-up post where he gets a bunch of kids to play Alien Isolation.
posted by these are science wands at 5:37 AM on March 2, 2015
posted by these are science wands at 5:37 AM on March 2, 2015
zardoz: I hate to be all prudish, but eleven is probably too young to watch a movie like Aliens.
GallonOfAlan: 11 is kind of young for a non-TV edit of Aliens."
Pretty surprised by this. An eleven year old is in/about to be in middle school, probably has started puberty and would be quite old to be scared of monsters. An eleven year old has already killed about 100,000 monsters, people and aliens on their Xbox.
Really, Aliens is an action thriller; I don't really see the difference between that and Jurassic Park in "think of the children!" terms.
posted by spaltavian at 6:00 AM on March 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
GallonOfAlan: 11 is kind of young for a non-TV edit of Aliens."
Pretty surprised by this. An eleven year old is in/about to be in middle school, probably has started puberty and would be quite old to be scared of monsters. An eleven year old has already killed about 100,000 monsters, people and aliens on their Xbox.
Really, Aliens is an action thriller; I don't really see the difference between that and Jurassic Park in "think of the children!" terms.
posted by spaltavian at 6:00 AM on March 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
nearly all had seen at least one film with a xenomorph in it
This is a very satisfying thing for me to read about a group of kids in the year of our Lord 2015.
At bedtime there was some discussion of whether an army of predators could beat an army of aliens.
That even more so.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 6:12 AM on March 2, 2015
This is a very satisfying thing for me to read about a group of kids in the year of our Lord 2015.
At bedtime there was some discussion of whether an army of predators could beat an army of aliens.
That even more so.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 6:12 AM on March 2, 2015
Twenty years ago, while at university in Scotland, the local cinema staged a through-the-night Alien Trilogy (Resurrection had not yet been made), with Alien starting at midnight and Aliens and Alien 3 following on. A friend and I decided to go. I suggested that we might need some artificial help to stay awake, which my friend decided meant we would need some acid. I scoffed at his foolishness, then took it anyway.
Everything was going creepily wonderfully until early in Aliens when we started seeing actual GIs wandering about the cinema. And the floor was smokey. And then something that looked a lot like a face-hugger scuttled down the aisle. What we didn't realise was that the evening was being put on by a local theatre company and that there actually were people wandering about the place in costume, and the smokey floor was dry ice, and the scuttling face-hugger was attached to some fishing wire.
Full-on panic was minutes from setting in when a "full size" Alien appeared on the periphery of our vision, walking slowly down the aisle. My friend looked at me, terror rising. I can only imagine my face was a reflection of his. We were assessing the exits, ready to bolt as the Alien reached us.
Then suddenly, gloriously, and in a way that will forever be engraved in my memory, the Alien tripped, stumbled, fell and, as his headpiece fell off bellowed in a thick Glaswegian accent: "Awwww fer fuck's sake. Bastardin' alien feet."
The rest of the evening was spent in the grips of trying not to laugh at... everything.
posted by The Ultimate Olympian at 6:17 AM on March 2, 2015 [65 favorites]
Everything was going creepily wonderfully until early in Aliens when we started seeing actual GIs wandering about the cinema. And the floor was smokey. And then something that looked a lot like a face-hugger scuttled down the aisle. What we didn't realise was that the evening was being put on by a local theatre company and that there actually were people wandering about the place in costume, and the smokey floor was dry ice, and the scuttling face-hugger was attached to some fishing wire.
Full-on panic was minutes from setting in when a "full size" Alien appeared on the periphery of our vision, walking slowly down the aisle. My friend looked at me, terror rising. I can only imagine my face was a reflection of his. We were assessing the exits, ready to bolt as the Alien reached us.
Then suddenly, gloriously, and in a way that will forever be engraved in my memory, the Alien tripped, stumbled, fell and, as his headpiece fell off bellowed in a thick Glaswegian accent: "Awwww fer fuck's sake. Bastardin' alien feet."
The rest of the evening was spent in the grips of trying not to laugh at... everything.
posted by The Ultimate Olympian at 6:17 AM on March 2, 2015 [65 favorites]
wabbittwax : Like some others here, I watched Jaws when I was seven. I am still not OK around deep water.
I also saw "Jaws" as a youngster in the Midwest, and only just felt far enough from any salt water to be (mostly) safe. (I still hated deep lakes, though.) Afterwards, I watched every Cousteau documentary on PBS I spotted in the TV listings, and every time I was at my grandparents' house I would read their copy of Jacques Cousteau's book "The Shark: Splendid Savage of the Sea" -- until finally the cover fell off and they said I could keep it.
I still have the book, and I am still spooked by water deeper than maybe my knees. Having moved from the safety of the prairies to Rhode Island, "The Ocean State," I am now perpetually on edge.
The movie poster has the name "JAWS" in all caps, and I still think of it that way because it seems to match the music so well, and also because ol' Bruce looms so large in my feelings about salinity.
posted by wenestvedt at 6:18 AM on March 2, 2015
I also saw "Jaws" as a youngster in the Midwest, and only just felt far enough from any salt water to be (mostly) safe. (I still hated deep lakes, though.) Afterwards, I watched every Cousteau documentary on PBS I spotted in the TV listings, and every time I was at my grandparents' house I would read their copy of Jacques Cousteau's book "The Shark: Splendid Savage of the Sea" -- until finally the cover fell off and they said I could keep it.
I still have the book, and I am still spooked by water deeper than maybe my knees. Having moved from the safety of the prairies to Rhode Island, "The Ocean State," I am now perpetually on edge.
The movie poster has the name "JAWS" in all caps, and I still think of it that way because it seems to match the music so well, and also because ol' Bruce looms so large in my feelings about salinity.
#mediaviewer/File:JAWS_Movie_poster.jpg){kind=link}
posted by wenestvedt at 6:18 AM on March 2, 2015
but a few of them will finally watch Alien and discover that Aliens is an utter desecration and defilement of all the awesome and incredibly things that made Alien great from script to print. And they will learn to despise James Cameron with an unearthly fury, as all sane adults in a civilized society ought to.
This is the wrongest wrong anyone has ever wronged. If sequels must exist, and there isn't a natural story for them to continue with, it makes complete sense to me to do something different. There's no doubt that Men In Black 2 is an incredibly faithful sequel to Men in Black. You can tell that is because it does all the jokes from the first one again. What makes Aliens great is that it takes a cool idea and does something different with it. Aliens can't desecrate Alien, because Alien still exists. Alien will always exist no matter how many terrible sequels you make of it (unless someone decides to Lucas it).
Sorry, let me put that more constructively. If your kid asks you if they can watch a specific horror movie, sure, let them watch it. No issue. If someone else's kid asks you if they can not watch that horror movie, maybe find a way to respect that request also. That "outlier" kid did a really great job of suggesting alternatives he was comfortable with, in the middle of a powderkeg of peer pressure, and the author completely missed it.
Yeah I'm with you on that. 11 is a pretty young age for that. I watched Terminator 2 around that age and had nightmares for quite a while, because while that is fundamentally an "action film" it also has some horrific scenes (particularly the stabby knife in face scene and the nuclear blast scene the latter of which actually still gives me occasional nightmares to this day!).
Really, Aliens is an action thriller; I don't really see the difference between that and Jurassic Park in "think of the children!" terms.
There is fundamental horror imagery in Aliens. I'm thinking of the people trapped in the walls being used for breeding. There's a bit of body horror inherent in the idea of Alien which something like Jurassic Park lacks.
posted by Cannon Fodder at 7:01 AM on March 2, 2015 [9 favorites]
This is the wrongest wrong anyone has ever wronged. If sequels must exist, and there isn't a natural story for them to continue with, it makes complete sense to me to do something different. There's no doubt that Men In Black 2 is an incredibly faithful sequel to Men in Black. You can tell that is because it does all the jokes from the first one again. What makes Aliens great is that it takes a cool idea and does something different with it. Aliens can't desecrate Alien, because Alien still exists. Alien will always exist no matter how many terrible sequels you make of it (unless someone decides to Lucas it).
Sorry, let me put that more constructively. If your kid asks you if they can watch a specific horror movie, sure, let them watch it. No issue. If someone else's kid asks you if they can not watch that horror movie, maybe find a way to respect that request also. That "outlier" kid did a really great job of suggesting alternatives he was comfortable with, in the middle of a powderkeg of peer pressure, and the author completely missed it.
Yeah I'm with you on that. 11 is a pretty young age for that. I watched Terminator 2 around that age and had nightmares for quite a while, because while that is fundamentally an "action film" it also has some horrific scenes (particularly the stabby knife in face scene and the nuclear blast scene the latter of which actually still gives me occasional nightmares to this day!).
Really, Aliens is an action thriller; I don't really see the difference between that and Jurassic Park in "think of the children!" terms.
There is fundamental horror imagery in Aliens. I'm thinking of the people trapped in the walls being used for breeding. There's a bit of body horror inherent in the idea of Alien which something like Jurassic Park lacks.
posted by Cannon Fodder at 7:01 AM on March 2, 2015 [9 favorites]
Yeah, I must be forgetting the bit in Jurassic Park where a child begs for death only for a techno-organic life form to smash its way out of his ribcage just ahead of his corpse being torched.
posted by biffa at 7:21 AM on March 2, 2015 [5 favorites]
posted by biffa at 7:21 AM on March 2, 2015 [5 favorites]
Yeah, I must be forgetting the bit in Jurassic Park where a child begs for death only for a techno-organic life form to smash its way out of his ribcage just ahead of his corpse being torched.
I think that was in the Lost World.
posted by Cannon Fodder at 7:22 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
I think that was in the Lost World.
posted by Cannon Fodder at 7:22 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
I think we all begged for death in Lost World.
posted by biffa at 7:47 AM on March 2, 2015 [15 favorites]
posted by biffa at 7:47 AM on March 2, 2015 [15 favorites]
In all things, YMMV. I saw Jaws at age 8 as half a double feature with Logan's Run. Instead of a fear of sharks, I walked out with a deep, abiding love for Jenny Agutter.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 7:49 AM on March 2, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 7:49 AM on March 2, 2015 [6 favorites]
My son is 11 and we have basically taken every Friday night (after his 6-year-old sister goes to bed) to introduce him to the classics. So far, he has loved (in no particular order):
Princess Bride
Goonies
Ghostbusters
Spaceballs
Young Frankenstein (which he quotes nearly every day)
Holy Grail
Airplane
Noises Off
National Lampoon's Vacation (he loves repeating the line "I think you're all fucked in the head!")
This Is Spinal Tap
Trading Places
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
Raising Arizona
O Brother, Where Are Thou
Oceans Eleven & Thirteen (we assume Twelve doesn't exist)
On the flip side, he was confused by most of Waiting for Guffman, and while he enjoyed Wayne's World, we had forgotten how much of the humor in that movie is early-90s topical, and therefore went right over his head.
Next on the list is Blues Brothers. I've been pushing The Matrix, but his mother thinks he's too young.
The great joy is that we will get to experience this all *again* in five years with his sister. One of the great joys of parenting. (As for the other topic, I was scarred by Poltergeist at 8 and The Shining at 12.)
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 7:51 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
Princess Bride
Goonies
Ghostbusters
Spaceballs
Young Frankenstein (which he quotes nearly every day)
Holy Grail
Airplane
Noises Off
National Lampoon's Vacation (he loves repeating the line "I think you're all fucked in the head!")
This Is Spinal Tap
Trading Places
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
Raising Arizona
O Brother, Where Are Thou
Oceans Eleven & Thirteen (we assume Twelve doesn't exist)
On the flip side, he was confused by most of Waiting for Guffman, and while he enjoyed Wayne's World, we had forgotten how much of the humor in that movie is early-90s topical, and therefore went right over his head.
Next on the list is Blues Brothers. I've been pushing The Matrix, but his mother thinks he's too young.
The great joy is that we will get to experience this all *again* in five years with his sister. One of the great joys of parenting. (As for the other topic, I was scarred by Poltergeist at 8 and The Shining at 12.)
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 7:51 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
I saw Aliens for the first time yesterday, so this post is incredibly timely. I am still processing what I thought of the film, but I enjoyed it!
posted by RokkitNite at 8:10 AM on March 2, 2015
posted by RokkitNite at 8:10 AM on March 2, 2015
I'm in the "11 seems a little young for Aliens" camp myself... but maybe that's just how my parents rolled. I was only a year older than that when I saw it but (for me, anyway) 11-12 was kind of the "little kid to big kid" transition year, and what was "fun scary action movie" at 12 would probably have been "traumatizing nightmare fuel" at 11. My dad took my best friend and I to see Aliens in the theater for my 12th birthday, and I distinctly remember feeling like it was a bit of a rite of passage; my first R-rated movie in the theater!
posted by usonian at 8:29 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by usonian at 8:29 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
I like how he gets in an extra little jab at the wimpy kid at the end.
Matt Zoller Seitz is an asshole and if he had done this to my kid I probably would have done something that would have gotten me arrested.
posted by straight at 8:52 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
Matt Zoller Seitz is an asshole and if he had done this to my kid I probably would have done something that would have gotten me arrested.
posted by straight at 8:52 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
I'm in the "11 seems a little young for Aliens" camp myself... but
by all means, deny your kids access to such "extremes" as Aliens. It gives them something to react to, rebel against, a parental rule to break (or perhaps navigate). When I was eleven or twelve (1971-72), we didn't really have movies like Aliens. Big deal FX-laden sci-fi meant pretty much one movie only (2001-Space Odyssey). As for horror, that was way more about haunted houses, creepiness, unimaginable evils that went down in the shadows ... on late night TV.
As for gore, that was usually in the service of something more "realistic" and was only really available in a movie theater, usually with an age restriction. Which meant, if you were determined to see such stuff, you had to somehow sneak in, resort to subterfuge. Which is how I got to see such movies as Little Big Man, Billy Jack, The Godfather, Frenzy, Dirty Harry (I never did figure out how to get into Clockwork Orange). It took determination, guile. And once seen, you had to keep the fact secret, certainly around the parents.
Character building all the way.
posted by philip-random at 9:06 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
Every kid needs to rebel, but not all of us needed to rebel in exactly the same stupid way that everyone else did. There's a difference between rebelling in the way you want to and some self-absorbed adult ("All kids should want what I wanted at their age!") shoving things at you that you don't want.
posted by straight at 9:10 AM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by straight at 9:10 AM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
Weird. I was 11 in the late 80s, so what we watched at slumber parties was Friday the 13th & Nightmare on Elm Street. Oh, and at one 7th grade birthday party we watched Texas Chainsaw Massacre. While I didn't care for horror as much as my friends, it was all pretty normal, I think.
posted by peep at 9:21 AM on March 2, 2015
posted by peep at 9:21 AM on March 2, 2015
If sequels must exist, and there isn't a natural story for them to continue with, it makes complete sense to me to do something different
Sure. And Aliens is a great "ride" movie--it certainly packs in the pulse-pounding action. But it also does do a certain amount of violence to the mythos of the original Alien movie. A lot of what made that movie so terrific was the sense of unimaginable destructive menace in that one "alien." It's really important to the power of the movie that we hardly ever get a good look at the beast--it's a perfect little exercise in the sublimity of the unknown/unknowable. What's most terrifying about it is that we don't really know what the fuck it is or might be capable of--we project into it all our fears of unnameable bogeymen and things that go bump in the night.
Aliens takes that and turns it into something about as menacing as an angry bear. I mean, you can fight off hundreds of the pesky things with a gun and a flamethrower.
Now, sure, angry bears are scary things in their way and it's easy enough to make an exciting movie around the premise of "will our heroes survive attack from the horde of angry bears." But that's a very different thing from the kind of ineffable, unimaginable menace conjured up in the first movie.
posted by yoink at 9:24 AM on March 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
Sure. And Aliens is a great "ride" movie--it certainly packs in the pulse-pounding action. But it also does do a certain amount of violence to the mythos of the original Alien movie. A lot of what made that movie so terrific was the sense of unimaginable destructive menace in that one "alien." It's really important to the power of the movie that we hardly ever get a good look at the beast--it's a perfect little exercise in the sublimity of the unknown/unknowable. What's most terrifying about it is that we don't really know what the fuck it is or might be capable of--we project into it all our fears of unnameable bogeymen and things that go bump in the night.
Aliens takes that and turns it into something about as menacing as an angry bear. I mean, you can fight off hundreds of the pesky things with a gun and a flamethrower.
Now, sure, angry bears are scary things in their way and it's easy enough to make an exciting movie around the premise of "will our heroes survive attack from the horde of angry bears." But that's a very different thing from the kind of ineffable, unimaginable menace conjured up in the first movie.
posted by yoink at 9:24 AM on March 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
It was a big thing for guys to have parties and semi-secretly watch the Faces of Death series when I was in high school, I wonder if kids still do that too, or if there's another equivalent?
(I was very grateful to be a girl when I heard about it; we sneak-watched watched sex romps like Hot Dog! instead)
posted by emjaybee at 9:29 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
(I was very grateful to be a girl when I heard about it; we sneak-watched watched sex romps like Hot Dog! instead)
posted by emjaybee at 9:29 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
My 8-yr old daughter just watched Jurassic Park for the first time this weekend. She refused to sleep alone that night, but promptly rewatched the whole thing the next afternoon. Overall I think things went fantastically well: we have established that she loves this timeless classic as much as I do, and she has gained a new level of respect for the velociraptor.
Next up will be Blues Brothers and Princess Bride. I am saving Jaws for a few years, because while I don't think a fear of velociraptors will stop her from enjoying forest excursions, a fear of sharks could definitely put a damper on our annual visits to the beach.
posted by Vindaloo at 9:46 AM on March 2, 2015
Next up will be Blues Brothers and Princess Bride. I am saving Jaws for a few years, because while I don't think a fear of velociraptors will stop her from enjoying forest excursions, a fear of sharks could definitely put a damper on our annual visits to the beach.
posted by Vindaloo at 9:46 AM on March 2, 2015
Aliens takes that and turns it into something about as menacing as an angry bear. I mean, you can fight off hundreds of the pesky things with a gun and a flamethrower.
Yes, but Aliens makes them innumerable and inexorable: you can't fight them all off because they just keep on coming and will not stop. (It's the Terminator thing again, right?)
I always thought the Aliens motion tracker was a great invention: it lets Cameron ratchet up the tension of the approaching inevitable horde without needing to show them. So he gets to play both the dread wait and the jump-scare reveal.
(I'm somewhat in team "too scary for 11-year-olds". MZS has been doubling down on it on Twitter: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 9:50 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
Yes, but Aliens makes them innumerable and inexorable: you can't fight them all off because they just keep on coming and will not stop. (It's the Terminator thing again, right?)
I always thought the Aliens motion tracker was a great invention: it lets Cameron ratchet up the tension of the approaching inevitable horde without needing to show them. So he gets to play both the dread wait and the jump-scare reveal.
(I'm somewhat in team "too scary for 11-year-olds". MZS has been doubling down on it on Twitter: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 9:50 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
Does it seem odd to anyone else that this dad is apparently hanging out with the 11 year olds at a slumber party?
Aren't the grown-ups supposed to provide the snacks, do a head count and make themselves scarce until morning?
(Pretending all the while that they don't hear the whispered 1 a.m. kitchen raid or clandestine viewing of Fast Times at Ridgemont High?)
I mean, good on him for wanting to introduce a classic movie to his kid, but c'mon, there's a time and a place.
posted by madajb at 9:56 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
Aren't the grown-ups supposed to provide the snacks, do a head count and make themselves scarce until morning?
(Pretending all the while that they don't hear the whispered 1 a.m. kitchen raid or clandestine viewing of Fast Times at Ridgemont High?)
I mean, good on him for wanting to introduce a classic movie to his kid, but c'mon, there's a time and a place.
posted by madajb at 9:56 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
Yes, but Aliens makes them innumerable and inexorable: you can't fight them all off because they just keep on coming and will not stop.
Right. But while that's scary, it's not the kind of thing that crawls deep into your psyche. "Gosh, there's a hell of a lot of them" while it certainly presents a problem for Our Heroes is an entirely imaginatively encompassable problem. It's a "give us more guns and we wouldn't have to worry" problem. The original Alien was terrifying precisely because it was alien in every sense. We knew nothing about it, we had no idea how dangerous it might be or what it might take to defeat it.
"OMG, Angry Bears...LOTS of really Angry Bears!!" is definitely an Exciting Problem for Our Heroes to Deal With, but it's a problem whose dimensions are pretty stable and predictable.
posted by yoink at 9:57 AM on March 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
Right. But while that's scary, it's not the kind of thing that crawls deep into your psyche. "Gosh, there's a hell of a lot of them" while it certainly presents a problem for Our Heroes is an entirely imaginatively encompassable problem. It's a "give us more guns and we wouldn't have to worry" problem. The original Alien was terrifying precisely because it was alien in every sense. We knew nothing about it, we had no idea how dangerous it might be or what it might take to defeat it.
"OMG, Angry Bears...LOTS of really Angry Bears!!" is definitely an Exciting Problem for Our Heroes to Deal With, but it's a problem whose dimensions are pretty stable and predictable.
posted by yoink at 9:57 AM on March 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
Also, while Aliens could be considered a little violent and dark for 11 year olds, that's exactly the kind of movie you're supposed to watch at that age.
posted by madajb at 10:00 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by madajb at 10:00 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
I always thought the Aliens motion tracker was a great invention: it lets Cameron ratchet up the tension [....]
I completely agree, if by "invention" you mean "homage to a practically identical scene in the original film. "
posted by webmutant at 10:03 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
I completely agree, if by "invention" you mean "homage to a practically identical scene in the original film. "
posted by webmutant at 10:03 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
I think the modern equivalent of faces of death is 4chan.
posted by idiopath at 10:03 AM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by idiopath at 10:03 AM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
I meant to add: Aliens also makes a bit of a mockery of the larger narrative of the Alien franchise, that the reason the Company is trying to bring the aliens back is to somehow harness them as super military forces. What Aliens shows us is that uncountable swarms of Aliens basically fight to a draw against a handful of humans. Might as well go back to Plan A of strapping lasers and body armor to Grizzly Bears.
posted by yoink at 10:08 AM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by yoink at 10:08 AM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
GallonOfAlan: "11 is kind of young for a non-TV edit of Aliens."
I find this an ongoing problem because when I was my kids' age, there were lots of edited-for-TV PG-13 (and sometimes even R) movies on TBS and TNT all the time, so I saw LOTS of these movies, with the swears and nudity removed, and got to fall in love with them young.
Then I think, "Oh man, my kid would LOVE Apollo 13" (for example) and I prewatch and there's a few too many swear words to show it to him because he's not old enough yet to remember his filters at school. I never thought I would MISS expurgated-for-TV movies, but we're cord-cutters and I do!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 10:19 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
I find this an ongoing problem because when I was my kids' age, there were lots of edited-for-TV PG-13 (and sometimes even R) movies on TBS and TNT all the time, so I saw LOTS of these movies, with the swears and nudity removed, and got to fall in love with them young.
Then I think, "Oh man, my kid would LOVE Apollo 13" (for example) and I prewatch and there's a few too many swear words to show it to him because he's not old enough yet to remember his filters at school. I never thought I would MISS expurgated-for-TV movies, but we're cord-cutters and I do!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 10:19 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
yoink: What Aliens shows us is that uncountable swarms of Aliens basically fight to a draw against a handful of humans.
But one of those humans is Ripley. Without her there would have been no survivors. As is there were only four, two of whom were badly wounded.
posted by brundlefly at 10:26 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
But one of those humans is Ripley. Without her there would have been no survivors. As is there were only four, two of whom were badly wounded.
posted by brundlefly at 10:26 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
Eyebrows McGee: "I never thought I would MISS expurgated-for-TV movies, but we're cord-cutters and I do!"
If you had the time to put in you could rip the movie, open the soundtrack in audacity, and deposit your own bleeps and honks over the swears. (Or substitute your own "melonfarmer"-type exclamations!)
posted by these are science wands at 10:28 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
If you had the time to put in you could rip the movie, open the soundtrack in audacity, and deposit your own bleeps and honks over the swears. (Or substitute your own "melonfarmer"-type exclamations!)
posted by these are science wands at 10:28 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
Also, while Aliens could be considered a little violent and dark for 11 year olds, that's exactly the kind of movie you're supposed to watch at that age.
Those kinds of cultural expectations of what boys are "supposed" to want at a certain age are bullshit.
posted by straight at 10:38 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
Those kinds of cultural expectations of what boys are "supposed" to want at a certain age are bullshit.
posted by straight at 10:38 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
Those kinds of cultural expectations of what boys are "supposed" to want at a certain age are bullshit
the desire certainly isn't bullshit. That is, I very much desired more intense stuff by the time I was eleven, and so it seems did most of my friends. We wanted to get freaked out etc.
the question is, should parents/guardians enable such or should they impose their better judgment and deny access? Which leads to the next question. Is it realistic to think that access can be denied? I don't think it can. Even back in my pre-internet, pre-megachannel cable TV, pre-VHS rental day we still managed to get to the forbidden stuff (some of it anyway).
So what's the gain in denying access beyond pretty much ensuring that the eleven year old will go looking for ways to bypass the adult filter?
posted by philip-random at 10:56 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
the desire certainly isn't bullshit. That is, I very much desired more intense stuff by the time I was eleven, and so it seems did most of my friends. We wanted to get freaked out etc.
the question is, should parents/guardians enable such or should they impose their better judgment and deny access? Which leads to the next question. Is it realistic to think that access can be denied? I don't think it can. Even back in my pre-internet, pre-megachannel cable TV, pre-VHS rental day we still managed to get to the forbidden stuff (some of it anyway).
So what's the gain in denying access beyond pretty much ensuring that the eleven year old will go looking for ways to bypass the adult filter?
posted by philip-random at 10:56 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
yoink: What Aliens shows us is that uncountable swarms of Aliens basically fight to a draw against a handful of humans.
brundlefly: But one of those humans is Ripley.
Any human with Ripley's prior experience could have beat the aliens if Paul Reiser would listen to them. The janitor could have said "Nah, boss, too dangerous. Nuke 'em from orbit". And that would have been that if the Corporation wasn't trying to make a super solider.
This means that the real villain in Aliens, just like in almost every Cameron movie, is human greed. That's realistic and certainly true, but it's not the near eldritch horror of Alien. It's a tidy little morality play, with good action sequences.
It totally blows up the Alien theme this way; the problem isn't that something is too alien, the problem is that we're too human. It's a good movie, but it's thematically boring as hell. And, as we see in Aliens, if we can beat the aliens just by not being stupid, the alien just isn't that scary.
The only real military use of the xenomorphs would be as some sort of single-use assassin, chaos behind enemy lines stuff. They clearly aren't impressive as front-line soldiers for the reason yoink pointed out. One platoon with little idea of what it was walking into fought them to a draw.
posted by spaltavian at 11:03 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
brundlefly: But one of those humans is Ripley.
Any human with Ripley's prior experience could have beat the aliens if Paul Reiser would listen to them. The janitor could have said "Nah, boss, too dangerous. Nuke 'em from orbit". And that would have been that if the Corporation wasn't trying to make a super solider.
This means that the real villain in Aliens, just like in almost every Cameron movie, is human greed. That's realistic and certainly true, but it's not the near eldritch horror of Alien. It's a tidy little morality play, with good action sequences.
It totally blows up the Alien theme this way; the problem isn't that something is too alien, the problem is that we're too human. It's a good movie, but it's thematically boring as hell. And, as we see in Aliens, if we can beat the aliens just by not being stupid, the alien just isn't that scary.
The only real military use of the xenomorphs would be as some sort of single-use assassin, chaos behind enemy lines stuff. They clearly aren't impressive as front-line soldiers for the reason yoink pointed out. One platoon with little idea of what it was walking into fought them to a draw.
posted by spaltavian at 11:03 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
if by "invention" you mean "homage to a practically identical scene in the original film."
Heh; well that really reveals how much I've watched Aliens and how little I've watched Alien. I admire Alien but don't actually find it particularly re-watchable: it always feels to me very cold, distant. But Aliens is a thrill-ride movie. (Also, the dialog: like Jurassic Park, almost every line spoken in Aliens is quotable.)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:09 AM on March 2, 2015
Heh; well that really reveals how much I've watched Aliens and how little I've watched Alien. I admire Alien but don't actually find it particularly re-watchable: it always feels to me very cold, distant. But Aliens is a thrill-ride movie. (Also, the dialog: like Jurassic Park, almost every line spoken in Aliens is quotable.)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:09 AM on March 2, 2015
We had a deal, Kyle: “(Also, the dialog: like Jurassic Park, almost every line spoken in Aliens is quotable.)”
Not always in the best way. Cameron's most subtle innovation was to make the xenomorph a female – a "bitch," as his Ripley calls the xenomorph, quite memorably. I feel like I rehearsed this argument rather thoroughly the last time we talked about Aliens, so I'm not going to do it again; suffice it to say I found that more than a little distasteful. And if anything would make me uncomfortable about showing this movie to 11-year-old boys, it's that.
posted by koeselitz at 11:23 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
Not always in the best way. Cameron's most subtle innovation was to make the xenomorph a female – a "bitch," as his Ripley calls the xenomorph, quite memorably. I feel like I rehearsed this argument rather thoroughly the last time we talked about Aliens, so I'm not going to do it again; suffice it to say I found that more than a little distasteful. And if anything would make me uncomfortable about showing this movie to 11-year-old boys, it's that.
posted by koeselitz at 11:23 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
Last year someone in a job interview asked me what my favorite movie was as a "fun" question and I said Aliens. Because, I love Aliens.
It's sweet how all the boys are totally fine identifying with and/or cheering for Ripley, Vasquez and Newt. It makes me slightly less terrified of having a kid one day.
I watched lots of fucked up stuff when I was eleven! That is literally the best time.
posted by stoneandstar at 11:27 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
It's sweet how all the boys are totally fine identifying with and/or cheering for Ripley, Vasquez and Newt. It makes me slightly less terrified of having a kid one day.
I watched lots of fucked up stuff when I was eleven! That is literally the best time.
posted by stoneandstar at 11:27 AM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
This means that the real villain in Aliens, just like in almost every Cameron movie, is human greed. That's realistic and certainly true, but it's not the near eldritch horror of Alien.
It certainly isn't, but that's what we have Alien for. Certainly we could have had an Alien 2 that follows the same thematic path and maybe it could have even done something interesting with it. But Alien is so efficient and self-contained that I suspect the eldritch horror would probably have just been diluted by elaboration.
So Cameron took Alien's seed and did something completely different with it. Yeah, if you go into Aliens expecting more of Alien you'll be let down. But one of the things I like about the franchise (even the awful Alien: Resurrection) is that each film is a different filmmaker doing a different thing.* For what it's worth, this is one of the reasons I'm a bit cynical about Blomkamp's plan to make a direct sequel to Aliens. I worry that we'll have a Superman Returns-style nostalgic retread.
*I'll take this opportunity to yet again pitch my idea for a new Evil Dead franchise. Every couple of years hire some up and coming filmmaker and let them go wild. Tell them they have to included certain elements (the cabin, the book, chainsaws) but otherwise they can do whatever they want. Different characters, different tones, different structures, etc. No continuity between the films. A franchise of remakes.
posted by brundlefly at 11:29 AM on March 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
It certainly isn't, but that's what we have Alien for. Certainly we could have had an Alien 2 that follows the same thematic path and maybe it could have even done something interesting with it. But Alien is so efficient and self-contained that I suspect the eldritch horror would probably have just been diluted by elaboration.
So Cameron took Alien's seed and did something completely different with it. Yeah, if you go into Aliens expecting more of Alien you'll be let down. But one of the things I like about the franchise (even the awful Alien: Resurrection) is that each film is a different filmmaker doing a different thing.* For what it's worth, this is one of the reasons I'm a bit cynical about Blomkamp's plan to make a direct sequel to Aliens. I worry that we'll have a Superman Returns-style nostalgic retread.
*I'll take this opportunity to yet again pitch my idea for a new Evil Dead franchise. Every couple of years hire some up and coming filmmaker and let them go wild. Tell them they have to included certain elements (the cabin, the book, chainsaws) but otherwise they can do whatever they want. Different characters, different tones, different structures, etc. No continuity between the films. A franchise of remakes.
posted by brundlefly at 11:29 AM on March 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
The original Alien was terrifying precisely because it was alien in every sense. We knew nothing about it, we had no idea how dangerous it might be or what it might take to defeat it.
I don't dispute that that's how you experienced it, but I have to think that's a reaction to tone and pace and such, and that really considered thinking about the movie, even sans sequels, doesn't bear that out. At least, not to the audience, though maybe to the characters.
I mean, the (adult) alien is a bitey predator. We know how dangerous it can be -- it's a man-sized critter that has a big bitey mouth. We never see the adult do anything weird or inexplicable or ineffable -- it grabs people and bites them. If we stop and think about it, we know what it takes to defeat it -- if we make enough holes in it all its fluids will leak out and it will die, or if we separate it into enough pieces, it will die or at least be rendered harmless. In this case you'd want to do that in a part of the ship you don't care about very much. Or if we raise its temperature high enough, its biochemistry will cease to function and it will die, because it's an organism that's made of matter.
Hell, even the crew in the movie (except for Ash who gets all mystical about it, which is kinda silly for an android) talk about it like it's a large, dangerous animal instead of an unknowable nightmare. And they talk about killing it the same ways you might talk about killing an unwanted animal on a spaceship, by carefully-applied fire or by exposure to vacuum. The crew -- unlike the Marines -- just has essentially no weapons and no training in how to exterminate large, dangerous animals that have taken up residence on their ship.
It was always an angry bear, and the crew always treated it like an angry bear. Scott, and the people working with and for him, were just really good at making the angry bear scary. And the script correctly focuses less on the monster and much more on the conflicts among the crew, so much of the horror and tension is sustained by the tension between crew about what to do and whose fault the ongoing disaster is.
It's really important to the power of the movie that we hardly ever get a good look at the beast
It's really important because it's a tall skinny dude in a rubber suit, and it looks like a tall skinny dude in a rubber suit. Best not to show it too much because if you do, it's as scary as a tall skinny dude in a rubber suit. But by the time you're making Aliens, that ship has long sailed. There are action figures of the thing out there and the primary audience for the movie already knows that it looks like a tall skinny dude in a rubber suit.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 11:32 AM on March 2, 2015 [9 favorites]
I don't dispute that that's how you experienced it, but I have to think that's a reaction to tone and pace and such, and that really considered thinking about the movie, even sans sequels, doesn't bear that out. At least, not to the audience, though maybe to the characters.
I mean, the (adult) alien is a bitey predator. We know how dangerous it can be -- it's a man-sized critter that has a big bitey mouth. We never see the adult do anything weird or inexplicable or ineffable -- it grabs people and bites them. If we stop and think about it, we know what it takes to defeat it -- if we make enough holes in it all its fluids will leak out and it will die, or if we separate it into enough pieces, it will die or at least be rendered harmless. In this case you'd want to do that in a part of the ship you don't care about very much. Or if we raise its temperature high enough, its biochemistry will cease to function and it will die, because it's an organism that's made of matter.
Hell, even the crew in the movie (except for Ash who gets all mystical about it, which is kinda silly for an android) talk about it like it's a large, dangerous animal instead of an unknowable nightmare. And they talk about killing it the same ways you might talk about killing an unwanted animal on a spaceship, by carefully-applied fire or by exposure to vacuum. The crew -- unlike the Marines -- just has essentially no weapons and no training in how to exterminate large, dangerous animals that have taken up residence on their ship.
It was always an angry bear, and the crew always treated it like an angry bear. Scott, and the people working with and for him, were just really good at making the angry bear scary. And the script correctly focuses less on the monster and much more on the conflicts among the crew, so much of the horror and tension is sustained by the tension between crew about what to do and whose fault the ongoing disaster is.
It's really important to the power of the movie that we hardly ever get a good look at the beast
It's really important because it's a tall skinny dude in a rubber suit, and it looks like a tall skinny dude in a rubber suit. Best not to show it too much because if you do, it's as scary as a tall skinny dude in a rubber suit. But by the time you're making Aliens, that ship has long sailed. There are action figures of the thing out there and the primary audience for the movie already knows that it looks like a tall skinny dude in a rubber suit.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 11:32 AM on March 2, 2015 [9 favorites]
Those kinds of cultural expectations of what boys are "supposed" to want at a certain age are bullshit.
As a girl, "boy" has nothing to do with it.
posted by stoneandstar at 11:35 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
As a girl, "boy" has nothing to do with it.
posted by stoneandstar at 11:35 AM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
If we stop and think about it, we know what it takes to defeat it -- if we make enough holes in it all its fluids will leak out and it will die, or if we separate it into enough pieces, it will die or at least be rendered harmless. In this case you'd want to do that in a part of the ship you don't care about very much. Or if we raise its temperature high enough, its biochemistry will cease to function and it will die, because it's an organism that's made of matter.
Um, no. Nothing in the movie tells us that these things would definitely work. Obviously they're what people try (what else are we going to try?) but we don't know if any of them will be successful. Maybe you cut it in half and you get two aliens? Maybe you shoot it full of holes and you just make more outlets for it to spray you with acid?
In fact, your confidence that it was always just an "angry bear" is a perfect demonstration of the damage done by Aliens to the original film's mythos. It's only after seeing alien after alien after alien get shot, torched, squelched etc. in Aliens that we come to think "oh, it's just a big predator beasty, much like an angry bear!" When we watched Alien back in the day, we just had no way of knowing what would or wouldn't work against it. Ripley ends by shooting it into space--so far as we know, it continues to live after that, just waiting to land on a passing planet or spaceship or whatever.
posted by yoink at 11:45 AM on March 2, 2015 [7 favorites]
Um, no. Nothing in the movie tells us that these things would definitely work. Obviously they're what people try (what else are we going to try?) but we don't know if any of them will be successful. Maybe you cut it in half and you get two aliens? Maybe you shoot it full of holes and you just make more outlets for it to spray you with acid?
In fact, your confidence that it was always just an "angry bear" is a perfect demonstration of the damage done by Aliens to the original film's mythos. It's only after seeing alien after alien after alien get shot, torched, squelched etc. in Aliens that we come to think "oh, it's just a big predator beasty, much like an angry bear!" When we watched Alien back in the day, we just had no way of knowing what would or wouldn't work against it. Ripley ends by shooting it into space--so far as we know, it continues to live after that, just waiting to land on a passing planet or spaceship or whatever.
posted by yoink at 11:45 AM on March 2, 2015 [7 favorites]
the desire certainly isn't bullshit. That is, I very much desired more intense stuff by the time I was eleven, and so it seems did most of my friends. We wanted to get freaked out etc.
the question is, should parents/guardians enable such or should they impose their better judgment and deny access? Which leads to the next question. Is it realistic to think that access can be denied? I don't think it can. Even back in my pre-internet, pre-megachannel cable TV, pre-VHS rental day we still managed to get to the forbidden stuff (some of it anyway).
So what's the gain in denying access beyond pretty much ensuring that the eleven year old will go looking for ways to bypass the adult filter?
I have no issue with an individual 11 year old saying they want to watch a scary movie, and a parent judging them old enough to watch it. I have an issue with an adult who is not a parent decide that a group of eleven year olds of differing levels of maturity should watch Aliens, including one who clearly did not want to watch it.
posted by Cannon Fodder at 11:45 AM on March 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
the question is, should parents/guardians enable such or should they impose their better judgment and deny access? Which leads to the next question. Is it realistic to think that access can be denied? I don't think it can. Even back in my pre-internet, pre-megachannel cable TV, pre-VHS rental day we still managed to get to the forbidden stuff (some of it anyway).
So what's the gain in denying access beyond pretty much ensuring that the eleven year old will go looking for ways to bypass the adult filter?
I have no issue with an individual 11 year old saying they want to watch a scary movie, and a parent judging them old enough to watch it. I have an issue with an adult who is not a parent decide that a group of eleven year olds of differing levels of maturity should watch Aliens, including one who clearly did not want to watch it.
posted by Cannon Fodder at 11:45 AM on March 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
ROU_Xenophobe: “But by the time you're making Aliens, that ship has long sailed. There are action figures of the thing out there...”
Curiously enough, not really. They never went into production; Alien wasn't the Star Wars–level hit everybody was hoping it'd be.
posted by koeselitz at 11:50 AM on March 2, 2015
Curiously enough, not really. They never went into production; Alien wasn't the Star Wars–level hit everybody was hoping it'd be.
posted by koeselitz at 11:50 AM on March 2, 2015
ROU_Xenophobe: "But by the time you're making Aliens, that ship has long sailed. There are action figures of the thing out there and the primary audience for the movie already knows that it looks like a tall skinny dude in a rubber suit."
Eh. I mentioned it before in this thread (and in basically every other Alien thread I've dropped in to) but Alien Isolation takes the single terrifying xenomorph from the first film and gives it the run of a space station, and very effectively so. Everyone playing it already knows what the xenomorph looks like, and it doesn't stop them crapping themselves when it creeps past at the end of the corridor, or when they hear it in the ventilation shaft above them. Cameron made the choice to turn a fetishistic murderer into a swarming bug, and that's fine, but as for the Alien, there was plenty of mystery left in the old perv.
posted by these are science wands at 11:50 AM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
Eh. I mentioned it before in this thread (and in basically every other Alien thread I've dropped in to) but Alien Isolation takes the single terrifying xenomorph from the first film and gives it the run of a space station, and very effectively so. Everyone playing it already knows what the xenomorph looks like, and it doesn't stop them crapping themselves when it creeps past at the end of the corridor, or when they hear it in the ventilation shaft above them. Cameron made the choice to turn a fetishistic murderer into a swarming bug, and that's fine, but as for the Alien, there was plenty of mystery left in the old perv.
posted by these are science wands at 11:50 AM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
koeselitz: Curiously enough, not really. They never went into production; Alien wasn't the Star Wars–level hit everybody was hoping it'd be.
I bought one of those xenomorph figures. Pretty neat.
posted by brundlefly at 11:56 AM on March 2, 2015
I bought one of those xenomorph figures. Pretty neat.
posted by brundlefly at 11:56 AM on March 2, 2015
In fact, your confidence that it was always just an "angry bear" is a perfect demonstration of the damage done by Aliens to the original film's mythos.
The crew of Nostromo treats it like an angry bear. They're dealing with it, and they think it's an angry bear.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 11:56 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
The crew of Nostromo treats it like an angry bear. They're dealing with it, and they think it's an angry bear.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 11:56 AM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
I first saw Aliens when I was 8. I got a VHS tape from a friend with Transformers the Movie on it, and inexplicably Aliens was recorded right before it. Inexplicably because my friend was younger than me and there was no one else in his household who would be watching Aliens, parents included. I watched the hell out of the second half of that tape that summer but didn't touch Aliens because I knew it was going to be scary. I could tell that just from the music to the ending credits, which I would end up watching as I overshot rewinding the tape back to the beginning of Transformers.
This being summer there were tons of sleepovers with my older brother's friends and with our older cousins, and they, being 12+ would have no problem watching a scary movie like Aliens, and they watched the hell out of the first half of that tape. Over the course of the summer I would join in and watch more and more of the movie and at some point saw the whole thing from start to finish. It was neat seeing actors like Paul Reiser and Lance Henriksen show up in TV shows later on because I was pretty sure I had seen them in Aliens, but not 100% sure because a kid's memory isn't the most reliable of things, and there wasn't any IMDB to help out with things at the time.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:09 PM on March 2, 2015
This being summer there were tons of sleepovers with my older brother's friends and with our older cousins, and they, being 12+ would have no problem watching a scary movie like Aliens, and they watched the hell out of the first half of that tape. Over the course of the summer I would join in and watch more and more of the movie and at some point saw the whole thing from start to finish. It was neat seeing actors like Paul Reiser and Lance Henriksen show up in TV shows later on because I was pretty sure I had seen them in Aliens, but not 100% sure because a kid's memory isn't the most reliable of things, and there wasn't any IMDB to help out with things at the time.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:09 PM on March 2, 2015
I have no issue with an individual 11 year old saying they want to watch a scary movie, and a parent judging them old enough to watch it. I have an issue with an adult who is not a parent decide that a group of eleven year olds of differing levels of maturity should watch Aliens, including one who clearly did not want to watch it.
which leads to the compromise of watching some milquetoast (for 11 year olds anyway) option (Shrek for the umpteenth time or whatever) that leads to the "sensitive" kid getting scapegoated as spoilsport. Kid-politix can be very ugly.
posted by philip-random at 12:44 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
True, but it's worth noting that Aliens is an R-rated movie. I wouldn't really have a problem with my 11-year-old watching it if he were interested, and I understand that kids are going to watch inappropriate movies at their friends' parties, but there's definitely something a little problematic about a bunch of 11-year-olds watching an R-rated movie at the urging of the one kid's *dad*.
Not worth being outraged, of course, but he could have been a little more sensitive to the fact that parents have differing levels of comfort about what to show their kids and when.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 12:51 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
Not worth being outraged, of course, but he could have been a little more sensitive to the fact that parents have differing levels of comfort about what to show their kids and when.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 12:51 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
It's perhaps not a good assumption that he didn't know the kids' parents and their general opinions on what was suitable for the kids in question. Also, quoted from the article: "some of them had seen the first one anyway, and nearly all had seen at least one film with a xenomorph in it"
posted by rifflesby at 1:59 PM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by rifflesby at 1:59 PM on March 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
I watched a bunch of scary R stuff when I was 12, because I had a friend whose mom let him do whatever he wanted and he was the only person I knew with a VCR. I have mixed feelings about it, but some of the worse images from them still pop into my head at random times and freak me out. The current plan with my own kids is to tend towards the cautious side of the spectrum with showing them stuff like that, and if they test the boundaries without me around, so be it. I see a lot of dads these days who want their young kids to be their "buddy" instead of their son, which leads to shit like watching the new super dark Batman movies or playing Call of Duty together or whatever when the kids are 8. It's tempting in a way but I don't really feel that's my role as a dad. Who knows, it may all backfire though ...
posted by freecellwizard at 2:04 PM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by freecellwizard at 2:04 PM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
Ratings are so interesting to me. Typically R rating in the US is equivalent to 14A in English Canada, and sometimes PG-13 (or lower!) in Quebec.
Here is how Aliens rates according to IMDB (As usual, Canadians can't agree!):
Argentina:13 / Australia:M / Australia:MA (Cable TV rating) / Brazil:14 / Canada:14A (British Columbia) / Canada:14A (Manitoba) / Canada:R (Nova Scotia/Ontario) (Director's Cut) / Canada:R (Nova Scotia/Ontario) (original rating) / Canada:13+ (Quebec) / Chile:14 / Finland:K-16 / Finland:K-18 (director's cut) (DVD rating) / France:12 / Germany:16 / Hong Kong:IIB / Iceland:16 / India:A / Ireland:18 / Italy:T / Japan:PG-12 / Mexico:B / Netherlands:16 / New Zealand:M / Norway:18 / Peru:14 / Philippines:R-18 / Portugal:M/16 / Singapore:M18 / Singapore:PG13 (edited TV version) / South Korea:12 / South Korea:15 (DVD rating) / Spain:13 / Sweden:15 / UK:15 (re-rating) (2010) / UK:18 (1986-present) / USA:R (Certificate #27850) / West Germany:16 (nf)
That said, I went to a sleepover at 12 that included watching a series of violent thrillers that scarred me for life. I puked and called my dad for a ride home at 1 am.
posted by chapps at 3:08 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
Here is how Aliens rates according to IMDB (As usual, Canadians can't agree!):
Argentina:13 / Australia:M / Australia:MA (Cable TV rating) / Brazil:14 / Canada:14A (British Columbia) / Canada:14A (Manitoba) / Canada:R (Nova Scotia/Ontario) (Director's Cut) / Canada:R (Nova Scotia/Ontario) (original rating) / Canada:13+ (Quebec) / Chile:14 / Finland:K-16 / Finland:K-18 (director's cut) (DVD rating) / France:12 / Germany:16 / Hong Kong:IIB / Iceland:16 / India:A / Ireland:18 / Italy:T / Japan:PG-12 / Mexico:B / Netherlands:16 / New Zealand:M / Norway:18 / Peru:14 / Philippines:R-18 / Portugal:M/16 / Singapore:M18 / Singapore:PG13 (edited TV version) / South Korea:12 / South Korea:15 (DVD rating) / Spain:13 / Sweden:15 / UK:15 (re-rating) (2010) / UK:18 (1986-present) / USA:R (Certificate #27850) / West Germany:16 (nf)
That said, I went to a sleepover at 12 that included watching a series of violent thrillers that scarred me for life. I puked and called my dad for a ride home at 1 am.
posted by chapps at 3:08 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
*I'll take this opportunity to yet again pitch my idea for a new Evil Dead franchise. Every couple of years hire some up and coming filmmaker and let them go wild. Tell them they have to included certain elements (the cabin, the book, chainsaws) but otherwise they can do whatever they want. Different characters, different tones, different structures, etc. No continuity between the films. A franchise of remakes.
posted by brundlefly
Much like Bring It On.
posted by ZeusHumms at 3:40 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by brundlefly
Much like Bring It On.
posted by ZeusHumms at 3:40 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
...... Now I *really* want to see some kind of Evil Dead/Bring It On crossover.
posted by webmutant at 4:08 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by webmutant at 4:08 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
these are science wands: "Alien Isolation takes the single terrifying xenomorph from the first film and gives it the run of a space station, and very effectively so"
Holy shit, this game. I can only play maybe one mission at a time, because it gets my heart racing and my hands sweaty and shaking.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 4:48 PM on March 2, 2015
Holy shit, this game. I can only play maybe one mission at a time, because it gets my heart racing and my hands sweaty and shaking.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 4:48 PM on March 2, 2015
It is a superb game in many ways, surprisingly so, given lackluster past game offerings in that world. I recommend it to anyone who enjoys the Alien universe, even if they're not video-game fans otherwise.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 5:05 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 5:05 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
It wasn't half-bad at twenty-seven.
Thirty-six here: funny coincidence that I just saw it for the first time about a week ago (at the BF's insistence). And yeah, it's good and effective and everything, but perhaps because I have seen so many action and horror movies in the interim, it doesn't really feel like the massive, singular achievement everyone's made it out to be.
posted by psoas at 5:09 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
Thirty-six here: funny coincidence that I just saw it for the first time about a week ago (at the BF's insistence). And yeah, it's good and effective and everything, but perhaps because I have seen so many action and horror movies in the interim, it doesn't really feel like the massive, singular achievement everyone's made it out to be.
posted by psoas at 5:09 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
I've heard great things about Isolation. It's too bad I can't deal with horror games. It's been years since a horror film actually scared me but horror games leave me a quivering mass.
posted by brundlefly at 5:30 PM on March 2, 2015
posted by brundlefly at 5:30 PM on March 2, 2015
If you don't feel up to playing it I would definitely recommend at least flicking through a YouTube playthrough. The recreation of the feel of Alien's sets is incredible.
posted by these are science wands at 5:39 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by these are science wands at 5:39 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
Any fan should play Isolation. It's an Alien fan's absolute dream. A lot of Alien love was put into it and the visuals are stunning, at the least. So many scenes (even subtle ones) are designed to poke at these iconic images in your memory, and I've even seen a Bladerunner reference in it. I'm constantly taking screenshots for how beautiful the sets are. And somehow there's a very movie-like filter over all the textures. I can't describe it; you need to look up some pictures.
posted by Sayuri. at 5:42 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Sayuri. at 5:42 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
I've heard great things about Isolation. It's too bad I can't deal with horror games. It's been years since a horror film actually scared me but horror games leave me a quivering mass.
I've played F.E.A.R. and Dead Space and Isolation is not as jump-scary as those, at least. YMMV but I don't, uh, do great at horror games and yet have enjoyed Isolation.
posted by Sayuri. at 5:50 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
I've played F.E.A.R. and Dead Space and Isolation is not as jump-scary as those, at least. YMMV but I don't, uh, do great at horror games and yet have enjoyed Isolation.
posted by Sayuri. at 5:50 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
...idea for a new Evil Dead franchise. Every couple of years hire some up and coming filmmaker and let them go wild. Tell them they have to included certain elements (the cabin, the book, chainsaws) but otherwise they can do whatever they want.
Much like Bring It On.
And the Mission Impossible franchise. Same elements, different director for each film, wildly different results.
That said, I'd rather see Evil Dead take on this role, because one of the elements is Tom Cruise, and eventually he won't be able to play Ethan Hawk anymore. But a variable Ash? That could work so well.
Just so long as every single version ends with Bruce Campbell, as the very last shot after the credits have rolled, coming out of the shadows and saying "Groovy".
posted by quin at 6:07 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
Much like Bring It On.
And the Mission Impossible franchise. Same elements, different director for each film, wildly different results.
That said, I'd rather see Evil Dead take on this role, because one of the elements is Tom Cruise, and eventually he won't be able to play Ethan Hawk anymore. But a variable Ash? That could work so well.
Just so long as every single version ends with Bruce Campbell, as the very last shot after the credits have rolled, coming out of the shadows and saying "Groovy".
posted by quin at 6:07 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
As I think about the specific needs for an Evil Dead franchise, I would say the requirements would need to be;
The Necronomicon
The Chainsaw
The Double Barreled Shotgun
(yes, these all get capitalized.)
Then,
The trapdoor
The thing under the trapdoor
at least one Raimi syle demon-cam shot
I was going to say a character called Ash, but I think that could spoil the movie unless it wasn't revealed until after it was clear who Ash was going to be from among the group.
I was also going to say the cabin in the woods, but I actually think someone could do a really interesting urban version of this using a minority cast in a really desolate part of some place like Detroit. Maybe a bunch of kids exploring a big old abandoned factory or something.
As a bonus for that last one, having the Oldsmobile in a shot would seem weird at all.
posted by quin at 6:17 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
The Necronomicon
The Chainsaw
The Double Barreled Shotgun
(yes, these all get capitalized.)
Then,
The trapdoor
The thing under the trapdoor
at least one Raimi syle demon-cam shot
I was going to say a character called Ash, but I think that could spoil the movie unless it wasn't revealed until after it was clear who Ash was going to be from among the group.
I was also going to say the cabin in the woods, but I actually think someone could do a really interesting urban version of this using a minority cast in a really desolate part of some place like Detroit. Maybe a bunch of kids exploring a big old abandoned factory or something.
As a bonus for that last one, having the Oldsmobile in a shot would seem weird at all.
posted by quin at 6:17 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
Although that last one has sort of already been done, and it was called Attack The Block.
posted by quin at 6:21 PM on March 2, 2015
posted by quin at 6:21 PM on March 2, 2015
The original Alien was terrifying precisely because it was alien in every sense. We knew nothing about it, we had no idea how dangerous it might be or what it might take to defeat it.
By the end of that movie, we knew plenty about it. We knew that it wasn't the kind of alien that can change shape to imitate its surroundings or one of the crew, or the kind that can project illusions, or the kind that can leap tall buildings in a single bound. We knew that it was smart enough to wait for the crew to split up before attacking (and that the crew was dumb enough to split up, in which case the alien didn't even really have to be as quick or deadly as it was, just smart enough to pick up a wrench). For a while, we don't know these things, and it's scary for the same reason that Jason Voorhees is scary for an installment or two of Friday the 13th, and becomes unscary for the same reason--overexposure; by the end of the movie, we've gotten a pretty good look at it, and ROU_Xenophobe is right: it's just a bear, albeit a really gnarly, H.R. Giger-designed phallic-headed bear. Smart enough to hide in Ripley's escape shuttle, not smart enough to take her out before she can get her spacesuit on.
Oh, and something else that Cameron isn't responsible for? There being a whole bunch of xenomorphs in the sequel, because Scott put all those eggs in the scene in the alien starship in the first film. Whether or not anyone had to use them in the second film, they were there from the beginning.
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:05 PM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
By the end of that movie, we knew plenty about it. We knew that it wasn't the kind of alien that can change shape to imitate its surroundings or one of the crew, or the kind that can project illusions, or the kind that can leap tall buildings in a single bound. We knew that it was smart enough to wait for the crew to split up before attacking (and that the crew was dumb enough to split up, in which case the alien didn't even really have to be as quick or deadly as it was, just smart enough to pick up a wrench). For a while, we don't know these things, and it's scary for the same reason that Jason Voorhees is scary for an installment or two of Friday the 13th, and becomes unscary for the same reason--overexposure; by the end of the movie, we've gotten a pretty good look at it, and ROU_Xenophobe is right: it's just a bear, albeit a really gnarly, H.R. Giger-designed phallic-headed bear. Smart enough to hide in Ripley's escape shuttle, not smart enough to take her out before she can get her spacesuit on.
Oh, and something else that Cameron isn't responsible for? There being a whole bunch of xenomorphs in the sequel, because Scott put all those eggs in the scene in the alien starship in the first film. Whether or not anyone had to use them in the second film, they were there from the beginning.
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:05 PM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
Smart enough to hide in Ripley's escape shuttle, not smart enough to take her out before she can get her spacesuit on.
Man can't a dude get some shuteye in after all that killing?
posted by Sayuri. at 7:14 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
Man can't a dude get some shuteye in after all that killing?
posted by Sayuri. at 7:14 PM on March 2, 2015 [2 favorites]
ROU_Xenophobe is right
It is Rapid Offensive Unit Xenophobe's area of expertise.
posted by quin at 7:41 PM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
It is Rapid Offensive Unit Xenophobe's area of expertise.
posted by quin at 7:41 PM on March 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
Sayuri.: "I've played F.E.A.R. and Dead Space and Isolation is not as jump-scary as those, at least. YMMV but I don't, uh, do great at horror games and yet have enjoyed Isolation."
It's true that, for the most part, Alien Isolation doesn't rely on jump scares. It's more of a creeping-dread, did-I-leave-the-gas-on? kind of game. Because if you did leave the gas on, you'll have to go back down the hallway to the medical bay again to turn it off, and there's a whole stretch of corridor where there's nowhere to hide, and you can hear it in the walls and in the vents and it's hunting you, and just when you think you're safe you realise it's right there around the next corner so you hide under a surgical bay and you have to watch it stalk past, slowly, deliberately, and in your hiding place you hope against hope that some other poor sucker will make a noise so the horrible black monster will go murder them instead and leave you alone, alive, for another few minutes.
posted by these are science wands at 8:36 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
It's true that, for the most part, Alien Isolation doesn't rely on jump scares. It's more of a creeping-dread, did-I-leave-the-gas-on? kind of game. Because if you did leave the gas on, you'll have to go back down the hallway to the medical bay again to turn it off, and there's a whole stretch of corridor where there's nowhere to hide, and you can hear it in the walls and in the vents and it's hunting you, and just when you think you're safe you realise it's right there around the next corner so you hide under a surgical bay and you have to watch it stalk past, slowly, deliberately, and in your hiding place you hope against hope that some other poor sucker will make a noise so the horrible black monster will go murder them instead and leave you alone, alive, for another few minutes.
posted by these are science wands at 8:36 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
It is Rapid Offensive Unit Xenophobe's area of expertise.
You're saying he's not a Rodent Of Unusual Xenophobe?
posted by JHarris at 10:16 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
You're saying he's not a Rodent Of Unusual Xenophobe?
posted by JHarris at 10:16 PM on March 2, 2015 [1 favorite]
I went to see Flash Gordon, prefaced with a Q&A with the director as part of an SF retrospective last Autumn and our was rammed with people who couldn't have been alive for its 1980 release. It seemed to go down pretty well though they were laughing in the wrong places a bit.
A former housemate of mine once went off to the video shop, but wasn't really paying attention and didn't realise until he was opening the case to put the tape (yes tape) in the VCR that he had actually picked up Flesh Gordon.
There is no wrong place to laugh in that film, particularly when everyone watching it is fairly well baked.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 11:31 AM on March 3, 2015
A former housemate of mine once went off to the video shop, but wasn't really paying attention and didn't realise until he was opening the case to put the tape (yes tape) in the VCR that he had actually picked up Flesh Gordon.
There is no wrong place to laugh in that film, particularly when everyone watching it is fairly well baked.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 11:31 AM on March 3, 2015
In contrast, Robotech yt first aired in Japan in '82.
HOLY HELLS!!, a high-def re-imagining of the Robotech intro yt .
posted by porpoise at 7:08 PM on March 1 [3 favorites −] Favorite added! [!]
Awesome! I loved loved loved Robotech which from memory was shown on Australian TV on weekday mornings when I was 7-9 or so, so later part of the 80s. I remember being insanely jealous of the kid in my class who had a largish and fully transformable Veritech Fighter, particularly as he wouldn't let anyone play with it as the damn thing was so fragile.
I might also have set my phone ringtone as the Robotech Theme several years back. I might also let my phone ring for a bit before answering it at times.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 11:39 AM on March 3, 2015
HOLY HELLS!!, a high-def re-imagining of the Robotech intro yt .
posted by porpoise at 7:08 PM on March 1 [3 favorites −] Favorite added! [!]
Awesome! I loved loved loved Robotech which from memory was shown on Australian TV on weekday mornings when I was 7-9 or so, so later part of the 80s. I remember being insanely jealous of the kid in my class who had a largish and fully transformable Veritech Fighter, particularly as he wouldn't let anyone play with it as the damn thing was so fragile.
I might also have set my phone ringtone as the Robotech Theme several years back. I might also let my phone ring for a bit before answering it at times.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 11:39 AM on March 3, 2015
There's a good piece that just went up on The Dissolve about whether or not there's such a thing as a universal "too young" for a movie.
posted by sparkletone at 2:08 PM on March 3, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by sparkletone at 2:08 PM on March 3, 2015 [3 favorites]
From that piece:
posted by brundlefly at 2:42 PM on March 3, 2015 [4 favorites]
“This is definitely not an appropriate movie for 11 year olds, and neither are the Indiana Jones movies,” one RogerEbert.com commenter griped.Holy crap. I can kinda sorta understand, if not agree with, the idea that 11 is too young for Aliens. But the Indiana Jones films? My god, I am glad this person was not my parent.
posted by brundlefly at 2:42 PM on March 3, 2015 [4 favorites]
Temple of Doom skews the overall Indy appropriateness by being (a) quite scary in parts, and (b) terrible.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 3:12 PM on March 3, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 3:12 PM on March 3, 2015 [1 favorite]
sparkletone: "There's a good piece that just went up on The Dissolve about whether or not there's such a thing as a universal "too young" for a movie."
That is a good piece.
The movie that terrified the crap out of me was E.T., which is rated PG -- because of that scene where he's in biohazard isolation. I was so scared I started sobbing and didn't actually see the end of the movie because I had to turn it off. One of my kids was so upset by Toy Story 3 that we had to REMOVE THE DVD FROM THE HOUSE before he would calm down and he didn't sleep through the night for DAYS. As an adult, I was so terrified by the Battlestar Galactica movie/miniseries reboot that I have never seen an episode of the show and I have to leave the house when my husband watches them. Ugggggh, so upsetting.
Indiana Jones didn't really bother me at all, and I probably saw "Doom" right about the same age as I saw ET (i.e., the year my family acquired a VCR). It really is idiosyncratic!
I have never actually seen Aliens, it seems too scary.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 3:29 PM on March 3, 2015
That is a good piece.
The movie that terrified the crap out of me was E.T., which is rated PG -- because of that scene where he's in biohazard isolation. I was so scared I started sobbing and didn't actually see the end of the movie because I had to turn it off. One of my kids was so upset by Toy Story 3 that we had to REMOVE THE DVD FROM THE HOUSE before he would calm down and he didn't sleep through the night for DAYS. As an adult, I was so terrified by the Battlestar Galactica movie/miniseries reboot that I have never seen an episode of the show and I have to leave the house when my husband watches them. Ugggggh, so upsetting.
Indiana Jones didn't really bother me at all, and I probably saw "Doom" right about the same age as I saw ET (i.e., the year my family acquired a VCR). It really is idiosyncratic!
I have never actually seen Aliens, it seems too scary.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 3:29 PM on March 3, 2015
By "Robotech" you of course mean "Macross."
I once told a German that "Macross" was what we called soda in the midwest.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 3:41 PM on March 3, 2015 [1 favorite]
I once told a German that "Macross" was what we called soda in the midwest.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 3:41 PM on March 3, 2015 [1 favorite]
We had a deal, Kyle: Temple of Doom skews the overall Indy appropriateness by being (a) quite scary in parts, and (b) terrible.
While it's certainly the least of the three films (There are THREE films! THREE films damn it!) I think Doom has gotten a bad rap. I like FILM CRIT HULK's defense of it.
posted by brundlefly at 5:21 PM on March 3, 2015 [2 favorites]
While it's certainly the least of the three films (There are THREE films! THREE films damn it!) I think Doom has gotten a bad rap. I like FILM CRIT HULK's defense of it.
posted by brundlefly at 5:21 PM on March 3, 2015 [2 favorites]
It's a good piece by Tasha Robinson. I am a fan of hers. Ultimately she is right that it is up to the parents to take it up with Seltzer, but that was kind of my reaction as well: that is, he decided that he would introduce this film to a bunch of kids without consulting their parents first. Will this be a life ruining moment for them? Absolutely not. Some will look back on nightmares and regret seeing it so early, some put off scary movies for life, some will have a love of cinema awakened by the film. All of them will go on being healthy human beings. I just... it's not the move I would have made in that situation, but then I am feeling overly protective of children at the moment, having a little 18 month old. I can't help but project my own feelings into that situation.
posted by Cannon Fodder at 12:05 AM on March 4, 2015
posted by Cannon Fodder at 12:05 AM on March 4, 2015
I dunno, I see all sides of this! I am definitely one of these Robinson mentions: "Over at Criticwire, a poll asking critics about their first age-inappropriate movie has a lot of the industry tracing their love of cinema to their first R-rated feature." Maybe it wasn't my first R, I'm not positive, but I was transformed by The Silence of the Lambs at 11. I felt like it was the smartest thing ever, I got really into psychological thrillers for a while after that, and here I am getting a Film PhD. But I still haven't watched Nightmare on Elm Street, and frequently had to remove myself from situations as a younger kid where horror films were the social activity, which made me feel pretty uncool. I was sure Nightmare on Elm Street was the scariest thing ever, and it still has that cachet, hanging just on the music, the concept, and the image of Freddy, plus the promise of nightmares that could be meta-nightmares.
A sleepover would with mandatory horror movie would have been a bad scene for me. So, I don't like that the dad was helping construct a situation where a kid could feel trapped, scared, or uncool. But, then again, by age 11, I think I had, and hopefully many kids have, the social savvy to get real emotional support from their friends if they're in that kind of distress, help laughing it off, approval to stay up or keep a light on or whatever. Is the expectation that sleepovers be spaces safe from bullying off-base?
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 12:25 AM on March 4, 2015 [1 favorite]
A sleepover would with mandatory horror movie would have been a bad scene for me. So, I don't like that the dad was helping construct a situation where a kid could feel trapped, scared, or uncool. But, then again, by age 11, I think I had, and hopefully many kids have, the social savvy to get real emotional support from their friends if they're in that kind of distress, help laughing it off, approval to stay up or keep a light on or whatever. Is the expectation that sleepovers be spaces safe from bullying off-base?
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 12:25 AM on March 4, 2015 [1 favorite]
There's a good piece that just went up on The Dissolve about
very good piece. This part in particular speaks to many of the points raised in this thread:
He picked a movie he’d already seen multiple times, so he knew what to expect. He talked to the children about what films they’d already seen—in this case, virtually all of them had already seen Alien or an Aliens franchise movie. (Frankly, any kid who’s seen the suspenseful, graphically bloody, mildly risqué Alien should be automatically vetted for the much more action-oriented Aliens.) He stayed with them while they watched the film, and guided them through it. He monitored their reactions individually to see how they were responding, and was clearly aware of the behavior of the meekest one of the crew. Here’s the MPAA’s explanation of what constitutes an R-rated movie: “Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian. Contains some adult material. Parents are urged to learn more about the film before taking their young children with them.” Seitz followed every aspect of that description fully and responsibly: He accompanied the kids in watching a film he knew well, and he helped contextualize it for them.
In the end, all kids are different as are all parents. I do recall being horrified by fairly benign stuff when I was six or seven. I also recall that by the time was eleven, I was very, very tired of kid's stuff. Not that I was that conscious of it. It took getting dragged along by a friend to Little Big Man which was showing at the twin cinemas down at the mall. We paid for the kid movie that was showing (I've long forgotten what it was), snuck into the adult movie ... and wow!!! Like Ambrosia Voyeur just said, "I felt like it was the smartest thing ever". And thus what the hell had I been doing with the hours of my life, wasting them on truly inane stuff like Charlie the Lonesome Cougar, The Love Bug, The Boatniks, The Million Dollar Duck?
I was so ready for MORE. Who cares what my parents thought, what society thought? Little Big Man and then very quickly, the likes of Billy Jack, the Godfather*, Dirty Harry, Easy Rider, Diamonds Are Forever (any James Bond I could find really) launched me into a universe that I guess I knew existed, but not having ever been there, I had no idea how rich it was, sophisticated, wild, scary, raunchy, challenging, cool.
I do get that some kids aren't ready to make this leap when they're as young as I was. I also know that some do it when they're quite a bit younger. What I do know is that at some point, the leap must be taken, else we end up with adults who've never learned the value of taking leaps every now and then into realms of expanded boundaries, enriched possibilities, more complex colors and shades. And flavors. They resign themselves to neutered realities and, too often I think, seek to impose such on the rest of us.
* To be honest, The Godfather mostly bored me when I first saw it (twelve by now). Though I did enjoy the violence and the few bits of proper sex.
posted by philip-random at 10:41 AM on March 4, 2015 [1 favorite]
very good piece. This part in particular speaks to many of the points raised in this thread:
He picked a movie he’d already seen multiple times, so he knew what to expect. He talked to the children about what films they’d already seen—in this case, virtually all of them had already seen Alien or an Aliens franchise movie. (Frankly, any kid who’s seen the suspenseful, graphically bloody, mildly risqué Alien should be automatically vetted for the much more action-oriented Aliens.) He stayed with them while they watched the film, and guided them through it. He monitored their reactions individually to see how they were responding, and was clearly aware of the behavior of the meekest one of the crew. Here’s the MPAA’s explanation of what constitutes an R-rated movie: “Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian. Contains some adult material. Parents are urged to learn more about the film before taking their young children with them.” Seitz followed every aspect of that description fully and responsibly: He accompanied the kids in watching a film he knew well, and he helped contextualize it for them.
In the end, all kids are different as are all parents. I do recall being horrified by fairly benign stuff when I was six or seven. I also recall that by the time was eleven, I was very, very tired of kid's stuff. Not that I was that conscious of it. It took getting dragged along by a friend to Little Big Man which was showing at the twin cinemas down at the mall. We paid for the kid movie that was showing (I've long forgotten what it was), snuck into the adult movie ... and wow!!! Like Ambrosia Voyeur just said, "I felt like it was the smartest thing ever". And thus what the hell had I been doing with the hours of my life, wasting them on truly inane stuff like Charlie the Lonesome Cougar, The Love Bug, The Boatniks, The Million Dollar Duck?
I was so ready for MORE. Who cares what my parents thought, what society thought? Little Big Man and then very quickly, the likes of Billy Jack, the Godfather*, Dirty Harry, Easy Rider, Diamonds Are Forever (any James Bond I could find really) launched me into a universe that I guess I knew existed, but not having ever been there, I had no idea how rich it was, sophisticated, wild, scary, raunchy, challenging, cool.
I do get that some kids aren't ready to make this leap when they're as young as I was. I also know that some do it when they're quite a bit younger. What I do know is that at some point, the leap must be taken, else we end up with adults who've never learned the value of taking leaps every now and then into realms of expanded boundaries, enriched possibilities, more complex colors and shades. And flavors. They resign themselves to neutered realities and, too often I think, seek to impose such on the rest of us.
* To be honest, The Godfather mostly bored me when I first saw it (twelve by now). Though I did enjoy the violence and the few bits of proper sex.
posted by philip-random at 10:41 AM on March 4, 2015 [1 favorite]
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posted by Ruki at 4:37 PM on March 1, 2015 [18 favorites]