The Lone Survivor

After finishing Alien in class, I was very impressed by the cinematography and suspenseful plot. I expected the movie to be very mediocre visually because it was filmed in 1979, but surprisingly, I found myself flinching and shifting in my seat during multiple scenes. The plot was unpredictable and kept me on the edge of my seat. There was absolutely no point in the film in which I was bored. The two aspects of the film that resonated with the most were Ripley's integrity and leadership, and the conflict of human morality v. biological perfection.

As I have described in my previous post, from the beginning, Ripley showcased a strong sense of intuitiveness and leadership by fervidly trying to prevent Kane from going back into the spaceship with the alien attached to him.  Although her protests were futile, she was dead-on in predicting the chaos that would eventually ensue on the ship, leading to the deaths of every crew member except herself and Jones the cat. The ending scene of the movie was a testament to Ripley's intelligence and bravery. With the horrifying realization that the alien had hidden aboard the shuttle, Ripley put on a space suit and  opened the shuttle's airlock, forcing the alien into the open doorway. Ripley propelled the alien out into space by shooting it with a grappling hook, but the hook caught in the closing the door, allowing the alien to hold on to the shuttle. In a life-saving move, Ripley activated the engine, subsequently blasting the alien into space.

Although the ending of Alien is triumphant, there is still a significant amount of unfinished business. Earlier in the film after Ash brutally attacked Ripley and the entire crew, it was revealed that he was a robot created to ensure that the alien was returned to Earth by all costs. Ripley found out that Ash was acing upon secret orders to, "Bring back alien life form. Crew expendable." This revelation shifted the entire dynamic of the movie from just "human v. alien" to "human v. human." Not only was the alien trying to destroy the crew, but a larger, more powerful outside force was as well. But, this outside force is never revealed and leaves myself and surely other viewers, wondering what will happen, if and when, Ripley returns to Earth.

After this startling revelation, I was wondering why it was so important to bring the alien back to Earth. The conflict of human morality v. biological perfection that I mentioned above ties right into this question. After the crew members finally put down Ash's attacks and dismantled his body seeking information, Ash talked in a stoic, yet subtly reverent tone about the alien, saying, "I admire its purity... A survivor unclouded by conscience, remorse, or delusions abut morality." This quote was profound because it raised a powerful question about whether or not the human conscious is an advantage or severe detriment. In my personal opinion, the answer falls somewhere in between. Yes, logic is intrinsic to making prudent decisions and achieving important goals. But, a sense of compassion is just as important to connecting with other individuals, and feeling in touch with one's self.