(Contains spoilers about a certain cameo.)

A case could be made that Fede Alvarez’s Alien: Romulus
is the third-best film of the nine movies to feature the infamous xenomorphs (with
the prequel Prometheus being the only one not to name-check them in the
title). Romulus, which is positioned as a “side-quel” set in between Alien
and Aliens, eschews some of the more ambitious plotting that
characterized the least-popular franchise entries in favor of a straightforward
narrative. Alvarez, obviously an Alien devotee, opts for an Alien/Aliens
“greatest hits” approach replete with Easter Eggs and instances of fan service.
It mostly works although the tension never quite escalates to the levels
reached by Ridley Scott’s original and James Cameron’s even-better direct
follow-up.

The time-frame is 20 years after the xenomorph rampaged
through the Nostromo before being blown out the airlock by Ripley. (This
event is explicitly referenced although Ripley is not named.) The body of the
alien is retrieved and brought on board the space station Romulus/Remus
for experimentation. Shortly thereafter, we are introduced to several workers
toiling away terraforming a rather inhospitable planet. Rain (Cailee Spaeny),
who has been harboring dreams of escaping the dreary world for someplace where
the sun shines, discovers that the Wayland-Yutani Corporation has unilaterally
changed her quota, pushing back her date-of-freedom for at least a half-dozen
years. Following this betrayal, she and her synthetic surrogate brother Andy
(David Jonsson) decide to join a small group of friends – her ex-boyfriend
Tyler (Archie Renaux), his sister Kay (Isabela Merced), her cousin Bjorn (Spike
Fern), and Bjorn’s girlfriend Navarro (Aileen Wu) – in an audacious scheme to
free themselves of Wayland-Yutani’s yoke.

Tyler and Bjorn have discovered the derelict Romulus/Remus
in high orbit above the planet and intend to take a small spacecraft to the
space station to salvage the cryostasis chambers that will allow them to travel
to a distant colony. Initially, things go as planned but, once the group boards
the station, it becomes clear that things did not go well for the previous
crew. The only “survivor” is the partially destroyed synthetic, Rook (which
uses the voice and image likeness of Ian Holm), who serves the Prime Directive
dictated by the Company. When an accident triggers the revival of a group of
facehuggers from their stasis pods, the stage is set for an impregnation and,
as always happens in an Alien movie, the subsequent “birth” results in a
fight-or-flight struggle for life between disadvantaged humans and the “perfect”
killing machine. In this case, as in Aliens, there’s more than one.

Some of the best bits of Romulus are direct
references to the beloved first two Alien films (although Alvarez also provides
more obscure callbacks to Prometheus, Alien: Covenant, and even the two
other sequels). Alvarez, a horror director by trade (having previously made Don’t
Breathe and the Evil Dead remake), knows how to set up a tensely
creepy scene (there are several of these, some involving facehuggers and/or the
mature alien) but isn’t as good when it comes to character development. One
area where both Alien and Aliens succeeded was in fleshing-out
secondary characters that would eventually become xenomorph-fodder. In Romulus,
the four supporting humans are paper-thin with one or two recognizable traits
each. Only Rain and Andy (and the relationship between them) seem worth the
screenplay’s time.

Set design establishes the divided space station Romulus/Remus
as another consistent module in the universe established by Scott and
embellished by Cameron. Everything here feels “lived-in” and borrows its aesthetic
not only from the previous Alien films but from the TV science fiction
series The Expanse. Creature appearance is faithful to that of
H.R. Giger’s original monsters with one new design. The decision to use Ian Holm’s
likeness (made with the agreement and cooperation of the actor’s family) is a
mixed bag. The way it’s used, for a half-destroyed android, diminishes some of
the downfalls of a CGI image recreation but it remains a distraction.

Cailee Spaeny, the young actress blazing a trail through Hollywood
(recent credits include Civil War and the title role in Priscilla),
fashions a character who’s more than a “poor man’s Ripley” but less than a
force of nature. It’s impossible not to compare her to Sigourney Weaver but
that feels unfair. (Ripley, for example, received most of her development in Aliens
– for the majority of Alien, she was part of the ensemble.) Spaeny does
what she needs to do in providing viewers with a port of entry into this world.
Her relationship with Andy, a glitchy synthetic refurbished by her father, is
more touching than any of the human/human pairings in Romulus.

Is Alien: Romulus the Alien film fans have
been craving since Ripley, Hicks, and Newt entered their cryo-sleep in 1986? Perhaps.
It contains most of the requisite elements and, if it doesn’t measure up to the
high standard established by Scott (who has a producer credit) and Cameron (who
provided suggestions to Alvarez), that’s only to be expected. It’s a good
showcase for the xenomorph in its various permutations and a solid horror/suspense
movie in its own right. The open question is whether it will reinvigorate the franchise
after numerous misfires and cash-grabs. Only time (and the box office) will
tell.

Alien: Romulus (United States, 2024)

I just watched We Are Zombies , the latest release from Screambox. The film starts by closing in on a zombie walking down the street. Sound familiar? Do the similarities end there?

Check out the trailer below, then read on for my thoughts.

Synopsis

When the dead are back, what do we do with them? RKSS (Turbo Kid, Summer of ’84) offers a fresh take on the undead in the SCREAMBOX Original We Are Zombies, streaming everywhere August 13.

In a city infested with the living-impaired — also known as non-cannibal zombies — three slackers after easy money must fight small-time crooks and an evil megacorporation to save their kidnapped grandma.

The directing team RKSS —  François Simard, Anouk Whissell, and Yoann-Karl Whissell — wrote and directed the film. The story is based on the comic book series The Zombies That Ate the World.

It stars Alexandre Nachi (1991), Derek Johns (The Boys), Megan Peta Hill (Riverdale), Vincent Leclerc (The Revenant), Benz Antoine (Death Race), and Carlo Mestroni (Assassin’s Creed II) star.

Here’s a look at the poster art!

My Thoughts

What i loved about this movie was the storyline and how it stayed consistent. I love the characters and the zombies. I love the music and the way they used historical figures like Mother Theresa. What I didn’t like about the film was the amount of gore. I felt there should have been more gore and more blood. Yes, there were a couple of scenes, but for my money, I could have used some additional. I also wish they would have explored more of the girls storyline.

Final Thoughts

In closing, I would recommend this movie to anyone who likes action, horror and zombie flicks. Also fair warning it is raunchy, so might not want to show kids unless they are teens.

If I get the chance to watch it again, I will.

We are Zombies is streaming on ScreamBox as of August 13th.

The mean girls of your average Hollywood teen movie wouldn’t last a morning in the ruthless adolescent playground of “Toxic,” where economic exploitation and unforgiving body image standards rule the bullies and their prey alike. Set in an industrial Lithuanian town where even the asphalt has seen better days, Saulė Bliuvaitė‘s impressively tough-minded debut feature is uncompromising in its depiction of the punishment and self-abuse endured by girls enrolled at a fly-by-night modeling academy — where the vague promise of an escape to pretty much anywhere is enough to motivate frightening extremes of disordered eating and body modification. Sobering but not without glimmers of tenderness and humor as female friendship takes root in a hopeless place, this Locarno competition entry can expect a healthy festival run, with interest from edgier arthouse distributors.

“Toxic” promises something severe from its opening shot, as 13-year-old Marija (Vesta Matulytė) stands alone, tensely quivering in a bathing suit, in a high school changing room while her classmates verbally attack her — picking most cruelly on the limp she’s had from birth. The high angle of DP Vytautas Katkus’ camera has the effect of pinning this already vulnerable figure like a specimen in a petri dish, though Bliuvaitė won’t always favor such forensic detachment. The film’s alternation between chilly composure and kinetic movement roughly corresponds with Marija’s wavering sense of self, while occasional segues into the heightened, languid mise-en-scène of music videos feel reflective of a future she and her peers have imagined for themselves.

Marija is new to this unnamed town, a dead-end assortment of graveled lots, concrete blocks and prefab houses, where her flighty mom has sent her to live with her unassuming florist grandmother. Friendless and bored, she has few social options but to confront her tormentors in the hope of making their grade. After one brutal brawl over a stolen pair of jeans, she finally finds an ally in small, spiky blonde hellion Kristina (Ieva Rupeikaitė), who can acknowledge what the other, appearance-fixated bullies are loath to admit about Marija: She’s tall and physically striking, in a way that can open doors for working-class girls without obvious prospects. Inner beauty counts for little in this scene, but a simple observation that she’s pretty is about as warm a gesture as Marija has ever known.

Kristina is already enrolled at a local modeling school, the squat gray premises of which belie their claims of sending successful graduates to catwalks in Paris and Tokyo. Given her disability, Marija hasn’t ever considered modeling, but in an effort to stay close to her new sort-of-friend, she follows suit — only to swiftly be singled out as an especially promising candidate. The education on offer, such as it is, is a soul-sapping routine of endless walking instruction and daily body measuring, with gold stars for weight loss. This priority is so all-consuming that even the already reed-like Kristina seeks dangerous extra credit, dumping her dinners outside her bedroom window, and procuring a black-market tapeworm to further hollow out her insides.

It’s an unnerving reminder of the punishing physical standards to which young women are still held, even as body positivity has superficially taken hold in popular culture. Marija’s rising social stock as a potential supermodel gets the two girls increased attention from older local boys, though they’re unprepared for the intricacies of sex as currency — while Kristina naively attempts to barter her body for money, as the modeling school’s financial demands predictably and extortionately spiral.

Bliuvaitė’s script doesn’t go deep into the corrupt specifics of an industry everyone already knows is rotten. She’s more interested in the fraught, complex relationship between two girls who become emotionally dependent on each other, even as they stoke each other’s most damaging insecurities — leading the audience to consider for themselves whether a possibly toxic friendship is better than none. An extraordinary pair of performances by the two leads (Matulytė achingly recessive and physically tranquil, Rupeikaitė a pinwheel of belligerent, fretful energy) gradually suggest two halves of one more collected being. It’s hard not to be moved as Marija and Kristina’s regard for each other evolves from a kind of conditional mutual exploitation into something more candid and wounded: no sparkly friendship bracelets here, just fragile, hard-earned care.