Cinema Sins list off all of Alien's missteps. Do you agree?

ALIEN doesn't have any flaws!

You could forgive their asinine definition of "sins" and laugh along with it if Cinema Sins was even remotely funny.  But it's not.  Ever.

I'm with S.M. on this. I've tried to watch Cinema Sins in the past but they're never funny and rarely clever. Most of the nitpicks feel forced. Simple things like "there's no air in space and therefore no need for aerodynamics" and "the characters make impulsive decisions because they're NOT scientists" are pretty simple rebuttals. Alien isn't perfect, since a perfect crew making entirely logical and safe decisions would make for an awfully boring movie. But it's certainly better in almost all respects than Prometheus.

To me, if the satire doesn't issue from RiffTrax, MST3k, or RedLetterMedia is generally not worth watching.

CHRIS PICARD - Cinema Sins has always, in my opinion, been nothing more than a vehicle for simply destroying films and the fond memories associated with them. The magic of a film exists in watching it - not in breaking it down step by step to show its flaws. I do not care about minor plot holes and what others deem to be impossible situations; I only care that I can step away from the real world for a few hours and let my imagination soar! In the end, I do not place stock in Cinema Sins or its apparent desire to crush imagination. That being said, I would be lying if I said I did not find some of their work somewhat humorous. :)

There's nothing wrong with breaking films down, and I could forgive Cinema Sins sheer laziness in going for cheap laughs - if they came off.

Chris- 

Agreed with everything you've said, I had several humorous conversations here way back when where obvious problems with Alien were glossed over by Prometheus' detractors. 

The thing is, for most everybody here Alien was a childhood experience, we weren't thinking critically, we were just embracing it with enthusiasm.

Prometheus comes around and we're all cynical adults hoping for magic of a very particular sort, that is near impossible to replicate with a story that's been told again and again. Our film makers knew this, and they walked a very tight rope trying to overcome it. Poor film makers.

Seems like cinemasins is the type of thing more appropriate for films you don't like, rather than playful jabs at favorites and evident by the comments it would seem.

@Alienfanatic; agreed!

That was pretty bad. Watched the first 2 minutes and was done.

Would have been better to do a MST3K version or not at all.

I've never found those kind of videos all that amusing, even with horrible movies. But yes, it is interesting that it's just as easy to nitpick Alien as it is Prometheus. Think Aorta nailed it.

I hate Cinema Sins, I also agree with Aorta. But yeah Cinema Sins is just terribad like I watched their video on RWBY volume 3 and I wanted to punch my Monitor screen because the Cinema Sins guy unfairly gave RWBY a lot of sin points for stupid reasons that has no baring on critiquing the show.

Cimena Sins ruined movies

Ok I watched it, and it is funny how many plot holes were lamented in Prometheus that are found in Alien as well, more than I had realized. Ah, well. Anything to appear to have an opinion, I guess. Can't wait for the fresh wave of hate that will accompany A:C *polishing sword*.

A movie has to have flaws to simply drive the Plot Device, people dont understand this sometimes

Movie Sin Guy makes perfect sense like we look at how Stupid Prometheus was, as far as deceptions.

So what would ALIEN be if it was done to not give the flaws they bring up.

The Nostromo picks up a SOS,  they arrive and wait to decipher the message first.. oh it looks like a Warning, ok lets keep away and call the Marines.. END of Alien and onto Aliens.

Or if they proceeded before they decoded the SOS...

And they managed to Land ok on the surface for having a better built ship and crew.

They go to explore the Derelict and see the Dead Space Jockey and then think, this is bad idea and back to the Ship take off and call the Marines for Aliens...

If movies where made to be more realistic we would not have as varied movies, this is Sci-Fi which means Fiction with some Scientific Elements, the Emphasis is still Fiction. 

Let the guy make a Sci-Fi movie i bet it would be boring as Hell...

Also i get impression he does not like Sci-Fi, any movie based on anything that does not actually exist and proven or anything not based on current and past History and Events he should avoid.

Also the way the Ship looks etc, is not great by todays standards and for those younger people who never seen Alien they may watch it and think that looks crap!

Like when they watch the old 60's, 70's and 80's Dr Whos compared to the newer series...

What they forget is that the Technology was not available at that time, to Movie makes just put all movie on Hold because Technology is not going to be as real?

Hey lets make ET... nope we need to wait for 40 years.

Lets make the interior of Space Ships, based in the year 2100+  Nope... best not as we dont know how advanced things would look in 50 years or 100 time and we would be laughed at...

If everyone took these kinds of stances... we would have missed out on Many Great Movies..

So the Movie Sin Guy can go Fudge Himself!

Mm... fudge..

@BigDave; You're absolutely spot on!

Flaws and all A L I E N is just hugely enjoyable. 

35+ years later, it still draws in new geeks! 

Even after all these years and thousands of viewings, it never bores me, and I often spot some cool little background detail that I missed.

Like Jonesy's food bowl, which has the Weyland wings, his name and a cat doodle, both drawn in black marker pen, wonder if Ridley drew that? :)

This is the way I see it: In ANY film, one of the most important elements is keeping the viewers attention inside the plot. Like a work of art, it is about guiding the viewer through the piece using certain tools like guiding lines and points of interest to tell a story.

What makes film slightly different to a painting on a canvas is; obviously obvious movement, sound and another element added by the scribe to formulate the plot.

Like BigDave articulated (in a very passionate way I might add.) A film has to have flaws in order to direct the viewer to the next paragraph or chapter.

We can't really view these guiding lines has faults! Can we?

One problem with Prometheus is that the viewer is forced to suspend their disbelief that the (other worldly) space jockey's race created mankind.

The intention and main focal point was established in ALIEN! Which was: - The crew of the starship Nostromo investigate what they think is an SOS signal on a remote planetoid. They investigate due to their "orders"  and the carnage begins.

It is really a texas chainsaw massacre in outer space scenario and fairly straight forward (so to speak.)

Prometheus on the other hand was attempting to ask the big questions but with the space jockey has the poster boy, without really giving him or the original intention much, if any, regard. Like I've said, ALIEN served it's purpose well. It was about a bunch of humans finding themselves in a "fight for survival" situation. It answered those questions.

Prometheus was asking the big, grandiose questions of life and death but never really answering those questions in an acceptable fashion (I don't buy the argument that these questions would be explained in the sequel; because they didn't even know if there would be a sequel at the time.)

One gripe with Prometheus is that it doesn't show the viewer where to focus (I'm using an artist's example.) The viewer is forced to believe that maybe they are stupid because they don't understand (just to clarify, I understood 2001.)

Prometheus' PLOT is a mess, with massive, gaping holes in the canvas.

Ridley got it so right with ALIEN. But with Prometheus, he neglected to show the guiding lines which would lead the viewer from one point to the next.

The script had a firm plan and good intentions but Ridley is an artist and wanted to leave out certain elements and add elements of his own into the mix which made it stray away from the original concept and turned it into a bit of a mess.

Bottom line is; ALIEN did it's job and told the story it was meant to tell. Prometheus (sadly) did not.

Just for the record, I don't hate Prometheus at all, I just think that it could have been a lot better.    

Regardless, Ridley is a master of his art and Prometheus is definitely a beautiful piece of art! It's just that on this particular occasion it appears that Ridley strayed away from the plan.

I think the script became almost like a second thought because his own vision was evolving during the proses which led to him changing certain elements which led to the final composition being a bit confusing.

yes Prometheus was a good idea, just not executed well.

And yes Alien had flaws, but if as with Prometheus everything was carried out Perfectly with Perfect Crew and Precautions then we would not have both movies.

Horror movies, have to have those people who do something stupid in order to get killed to drive the Plot.. we watch Horror movies and think.. "no dont go outside" "no dont split up"  and if they stuck to such things then well the movie would never worked. As no one gets killed lol

Alien had its few stupid moments but it was done well, Bret was Stupid going after a Alien on the loose, but he had no idea the Cat Sized or less Alien would now be 7ft tall.

Dallas maybe should been more cautious but its what drives the Plot....

Its hard to pull off a Horror without doing such things, i think Alien did a wonderful Job....  The 1982 Thing likewise. 

But a more better trained more common sense crew would not have fallen foul as much on both Alien or The Thing, as far as us the Viewers saying well if they had not done this, or been cautious with that...

But then with such precautions the movies would not had been the same.

@Necronom

Are you just trying to say that compared to Alien, Prometheus was far more ambitious and got in over its head?

I don't agree that it didn't succeed at telling its story. I think the story is there, there are just some unknown and ambiguous elements. To me it is just as successful as Alien if not more because those grand questions and themes make it more fun to ponder. Not to mention it builds on a growing science fiction mythology.

I wouldn't say it got in over its head. It's just that the scribes Lindolof and Spaihts had established a firm, coherent composition. They had a firm plan which explained certain inconsistencies in the plot.

However, I think Ridley strayed away from the plan because he's constantly changing certain elements because his vision is constantly evolving.

Therefor, because these changes are left unchecked, the plot becomes confusing.

Prometheus has ambiguous elements, which is a good thing as it forces you to use your brain (I'm not referring to those ambiguous elements.)

I'm referring to the UNINTENTIONAL ambiguity that was brought about by Ridley constantly changing things during the filming process. 

An example of good ambiguity verses unintentional ambiguity would be:

intentional ambiguity (good) - Not explaining the true purpose of the black stuff and why the engineers were preparing to destroy us.

Unintentional ambiguity (bad) - Not filming the part of the script which gives an acceptable explination as to why Milburn and Fifield get lost in the pyramid i.e each one thought that the other had the coordinates.

Just chiming in and note: I've only seen Prometheus 3 times fully since its release and the first two times I didn't really get a chance to analyze it, so I'm not in on all the small hints and nods and probably missed a lot of the subtle dialogue that tells the story better.

So from a somewhat ignorant viewer the movie just comes across as kind of pretentious. It seemed like it dove out to solve a lot of mysteries, some left ambiguous(luckily I totally love not knowing why we were created or why the engineers wanted to destroy us) but it didn't give us almost any good characters on the way. The only 1 I even thought interesting was David, and some of the plots just seemed to be there, because. Oh Weyland was on the ship the whole time looking for eternal life or something, ok? Did that really matter in the grand scheme of things?

Alien may have had stupid characters, but at least there was a point to it. Kane had to be dumb for the whole movie to work out. The two guys in Prometheus were just dumb to get an action scene.

Max Headroom disses Alien. I definitely got a few chuckles out of it, I think people are taking this way too seriously. They're just taking the piss, take it in the spirit it is intended and have a laugh.

Android turns into Ronald Reagan when punched in the head. You go and find the cat by yourself, we've got lots of not dying to do. This is some amazing and iconic visual brilliance. Let's hope no one ever tries to explain it with a backstory movie!

Jeez folks the world is rapidly going down the toilet thanks to corporate greed, political machinations and religious bullshit, why get upset over a bit of dumb satire? It definitely got me out of a bad mood and that's not a bad thing, I had a smile on my face after watching and will check out some more of their stuff.

@Lone, I never noticed Jonesy's cat dish had a Weyland-Yutani logo on it! Haha that's awesome. I bet the cat doodle is one of Ridley's, I wouldn't put it past him.

@Jamie, yeah I'm not worked up over it. Some parts like the Ronald Reagan comment were funny, but BigDave made some great points, without these plot holes we would've missed out on many great blockbusters. Common sense is rarely the driving force behind a good story, haha.

Some valid points and plot holes..... But I could really do without the comedy.

they did admit it's one of the best sci fi terror movies

"Unintentional ambiguity (bad) - Not filming the part of the script which gives an acceptable explination as to why Milburn and Fifield get lost in the pyramid i.e each one thought that the other had the coordinates."

Shooting that scene still wouldn't have made helped. They can reel off their co-ordinates as they do to Janek later when he picks up the life form reading. Additionally, Janek can see their locators dots on the holomap and all they need to do is ask him to guide them back to the entrance.  Which makes Janek's question about 'where's Millburn and Fifield' dumb when everyone arrives back during the storm.  He can see them perfectly well on the map.  That whole aspect was just lazy.