Just to give a bit of background, i lived and breathed this forum for the best part of a year till i saw Prometheus. Im a massive film fan but genuinely had never been so looking forward to a film ever. i was continually showing clips to my missus, trying to explain the plot, the god type ikplications, etc. She couldnt give two f**ks, and we ended up in a few arguments because i was so into it. i then went to see it and obviously it was never going to meet the massive expectations i placed on it. However i expected more. I watched it at the cinema, and im not the best at taking a film in first time. But thats it, ive not seen it since.
As we speak i have paused it about 10 minutes into my second watch at it. And it confirms what i thought on first viewing. Its a very poor intro. Dont get me wrong, the Jon Spaihts script isnt perfect, theres no doubt you could write a thousand better versions. However, the thing he did and i think its the main thing thats wrong with the movie, is theres no build up. Theres no suspense, we dont know who has wot agenda. It makes it less of a film. We should know more about the work of Watts and Holloway. Their attempts at getting funding for their project. Weyland and his agenda. It would have set the tone brilliantly. Instead he filled it up with shite dream scenes for no reason.
Character development wasnt a priority in Alien / Aliens, but we live in a different time with different expectations. And loads of wee things like why the f**k did they use Guy Pearce as Weyland
He just looks like someone in old guy make-up. Why not use an actual old person
Biggest annoyance to me was Holloway though. The guys meant to be some world authority on archeology. Found evidence of possible aliens who are our gods. Believed it enough to ask for funding. Then when he got there was an absolute cock who hit the drink. Annoys the hell out me how unreal that is. I tried to complain about that a while back and some daftys tried to argue the case that Holloways character wasnt unrealistic. Bad bad bad.
So, here i go with the 2nd watch. I'll hopefully update with something worth saying
I would like a real discussion on this one. You can approach any actor in the world. Why do we have who we have for Holloway. And why is he being directed to react this way
His whole approach is so lame. I mean, youve worked youre whole life on something so important, finally got the funding, are the first humans to land on a (possible) alien world, and youre so f**kin ham. landed on the planet, janek says 6 hours left dont go out, he says "its christmas and i want my presents" then calls david 'boy', come with me. piss poor
Same point again i suppose, but to take in the size of what is supposed to be happening here, ie the first human expedition to an alien world and the extremely interesting side story of the shady Weyland Corporation that is funding it, we need more time to build the story up. We are on the alien world within 25 minutes of the start of the film and know virtually nothing about anybody, and subsequently couldnt care less about any of them.
Not that im saying it was a brilliant film or anytjing, but i always felt the film Contact dealt with the human aspect of what this sort of thing would mean. Its problem was it didnt deal with the actual alien contact well. However, you could see what it meant to people, different agenda, etc. The speed of Prometheus negates all that. Vickers is lost, Holloway is a douche, etc.