Alien: Romulus review: This plot won't feel Alien...if you watched the last six!, writes LARUSHKA IVAN-ZADEH
Alien: Romulus (15, 119 mins)
Verdict: More drool, more screams
In a summer crawling with unremarkable blockbuster sequels, Alien: Romulus emerges as one of the better specimens.
Seventh in the sci-fi franchise about a sharp-toothed alien with some serious drool issues, Romulus bridges a gap that really didn’t need to be bridged, between Ridley Scott’s 1979 original and James Cameron’s highly acclaimed 1986 follow-up.
But while it can’t hold a wobbling torch to those genre-defining classics, it does provide more than satisfactory popcorn entertainment with some genuinely stand-out features.
Desperate to escape the gritty life on their doomed mining planet, a handful of believable young people — one of them, Rain, played by rising A-lister Cailee Spaeny (Priscilla, Civil War) — set out to scavenge a derelict space station. However, once aboard, you’ll never guess what they come across…
From a spectacular start that immerses us in the vast silence of space (do see this on an IMAX screen, if you can), Evil Dead director Fede Alvarez confidently ratchets up the pace.
Alien : Romulus the newest instalment in the sci-fi franchise was released in UK cinemas (pictured: Alien)
Cailee Spaeny as Rain Carradine and David Jonsson as Andy in the latest film in the wildly popular franchise
Tension builds nicely, with the ‘Run!’ button fully punched in at the one-hour mark, and effective jump-scares abound — my seat was repeatedly jolted by the terrified veteran critic behind me.
Be warned, the ick factor is sky-high. Unusually for this era, every creature was built for real (i.e. not CGI) and your brain can definitely tell the difference. The threat is just that much more vivid, and a freakish finale — which will likely divide Alien aficionados — is truly the stuff of Cronenbergian nightmares.
Distinctly less philosophical than the two other previous Scott-directed instalments, Prometheus and Covenant, the script bears every sign of multiple rewrites during which thematic coherence went AWOL.
What never falters, though, is the deft nuance of British actor David Jonsson (Rye Lane, TV’s Industry), who as an ‘artificial human’, Andy, finally gets a chance to flex his considerable talents on the big screen with a star-making performance. Alongside him a natural, understated Spaeny as Rain makes an appealing tick in the Alien franchise’s requisite Strong Female Character box, even if she’s no Sigourney Weaver.
Like so many other sequels/ prequels, Romulus simply did not need to be made. It’s essentially a greatest-hits replay, not a stand-alone movie.
But when the hits are this great, why not play them again?
The Union (12, 109 mins)
Verdict: Undemanding 007
‘A blue-collar James Bond’ is how Mark Wahlberg describes his character in spy/action/comedy/romance movie The Union — which will have 007 purists frothing, but you get the idea.
He plays to Wahlberg type as an average-Joe New Jersey construction worker, recruited by his high-school crush (Halle Berry) to be an agent for ‘The Union’, a top-secret US organisation that values ‘streetsmarts over booksmarts’, according to its grumpy boss, played by J.K. Simmons.
Halle Berry plays a spy who is reunited with an old school friend who previoulsy had a crush on her (played by Mark Wahlberg)
Mark Wahlberg describes his character in spy/action/comedy/romance movie The Union as a 'blue collar James Bond'
The resultant high-stakes mission to London is a typical Netflix production: a slick, star-led blend of expensively formulaic chases, espionage, exotic locations and the shooting of endless bad guys (no budget left for any big-name villains, alas), that isn’t out to reinvent the wheel but should buy Wahlberg a new beach house. Undemanding fodder to eat your TV dinner in front of, in other words. Most likely you’ll snooze off, too.
Lacking inspiration or spark between its leads, The Union’s seen-it-all-before factor is upped by former Bond girl Berry, who, aged 58, barely looks a wrinkle older than when she greeted Pierce Brosnan in her orange bikini in 2002’s Die Another Day.
Other Picks Of The Week
Actor (and activist) Leonardo DiCaprio co-produced kids’ cartoon Ozi: Voice Of The Forest (PG, 87 mins, ⭐⭐), so brace yourself, children, for some right-on eco-messaging.
Ozi is a plucky little orangutan (voiced by Amandla Stenberg) separated from her parents after evil capitalists burn down her rainforest sanctuary. That Ozi goes on to learn screen skills and become a social media influencer injects a weird, misguided dimension to this otherwise humdrum caper.
Still, the animation has a stylish edge and Leo clearly got his contacts book out: a superior voice cast includes Laura Dern, RuPaul and the late, great Donald Sutherland in his final film... as an obese mauve crocodile.
Voiced by Amandla Stenbury Ozi: Voice Of The Forest follows a young orangutan (pictured) who becomes separated from her parents because of evil capitalists tearing down her home
Ozi sets off on quite the adventure in the pursuit of finding his parents learning screen skills and more
A making-of doc about a new production of Swan Lake, mounted by The National Ballet Of Canada, Swan Song (15, 103 mins, ⭐⭐⭐⭐) admittedly sounds a tad niche, but I was utterly absorbed.
The dominant force is outgoing artistic director Karen Kain, a former principal who partnered Rudolf Nureyev and was thenceforth treasured as ‘the Princess Diana of Canada’.
Other remarkable characters are picked out too, such as principal Jurgita Dronina, a Russian-born veteran of ten Swan Lakes who nurses a hidden nerve injury; and chorus line wannabe Shaelynn Estrada, a fag-smoking, ‘near to white trash’ Texan with a punk-rock attitude to pointes.
Josh Hartnett as serial Cooper as he realises the FBI have set out an elaborate plan to host a fake concert in a bid to catch him
Elegantly capturing the screaming, sweating agony that goes into creating such exquisite beauty on stage, this is highly recommended for Strictly fans.
Critics were barred from seeing Trap (15, 105 mins,⭐⭐⭐) last week, which I, generously, attributed to a fear that we might reveal a spoiler for this cat-and-mouse thriller. Until I clocked that the trailer had already done that job.
A father (Josh Hartnett) takes his daughter (Ariel Donoghue) to a pop concert by Lady Raven (showcase for director M. Night Shyamalan’s singer daughter Saleka) only to find it’s an elaborate trap by a veteran FBI profiler (Hayley Mills!) to catch him. Because (spoiler, not spoiler) he’s a serial killer!
It’s less a movie than a thrill ride, the twists of which range from deliriously entertaining to silly. Flawed, but I was still hooked.
Hollywoodgate (12A, 92 mins)
Hollywoodgate takes its name from a former CIA base in Kabul, abandoned in 2021 after the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan, leaving behind more than $7.1 billion worth of military equipment.
This unusual documentary sees Egyptian filmmaker Ibrahim Nash’at permitted by the Taliban to follow their air force commander, Malawi Mansour, for a year.
It’s a perilous project. ‘If his intention is bad, he will die soon,’ observes one Taliban soldier.
Yet, within the strict, often banal, parameters of what he’s allowed to shoot, Nash’at reveals the Taliban forces as bungling amateurs, whose hilariously limited maths skills come straight out of the Four Lions comedy.
Hilarious, yet terrifying, once you are shown the fire power they now control.
This unusual documentary sees Egyptian filmmaker Ibrahim Nash’at permitted by the Taliban to follow air force commander Malawi Mansour, for a year
Only The River Flows (15, 102 mins)
Meandering thriller Only The River Flows is a Chinatown-esque film noir actually set in China.
Sometime in the 1990s, a woman’s body washes up on a riverbank, and provincial police chief Ma Zhe (Zhu Yilong) embarks on a tangled investigation that will push him to the edge of sanity.
Atmospherically shot on crackly 16mm celluloid, director Wei Shujun’s rain-lashed, cine-literate, existential mystery is seductive, but also muddy and disorientating.
For all its fine qualities you may struggle not to zone out.
