2012prometheus02pr180512

Ridley Scott's prequel to his own game-changing 'Alien' promises much but never quite delivers. It's a highly impressive epic, with special effects to make George Lucas' head turn, but it's badly hindered by an unfocused script, although no shortage of ideas. In the late 21st century archaeologists Noomi Rapace and Logan Marshall-Green discover what they determine to be prehistorical interstellar road maps, which suggest humanity's origins were extraterrestrial. A few short years later they awaken on the star ship Prometheus, heading to what they believe is the planet of said godly 'engineers', but what they find isn't quite what they anticipated. 

It's a great series of premises: what if everything you knew about the human race was wrong? What if you actually got to meet your maker? What if that maker was actually a monster? Scott loads his film up with concept after concept - why do children break away from their parents? Can belief survive the full knowledge of our origins? If this were a largely philosophical piece it could have easily stepped out of the ominous shadow cast by 'Alien', but Scott repeatedly breaks for averagely crafted horror, which only barely works given the average performances and every character's threadbare characterisation. There are numerous, tense set pieces, but they very rarely stand up to scrutiny: why does robot Fassbender infect Marshall-Green? Why do the human explorers so readily keep their helmets off in alien environments which they know have biological risks? It's an irony that the script is co-written by Damon Lindelof - as with his TV creation 'Lost' far more questions are posed than answered.

This makes it sound worse than it actually is. It looks incredible (the cinematography is genuinely amazing), and the sheer scope of what Scott tries to do drew me right in. But it never knows where the line needs to be drawn between philosophy and horror, the dialogue is invariably poor, and great actors are wasted: why give Idris Elba so little? Why make Noomi Rapace (who isn't a patch on Sigourney Weaver) British when her accent suggests otherwise? Why not give us a reason for caring about her boyfriend's death? For that matter why not keep the internal logic of the film stable? The origin of the bipedal Alien comes at the very end, but it's at odds with two different characters' infections earlier in proceedings. Thank goodness for Michael Fassbender, who with his robot David combines a childish, Lieutenant Data-like joy with a real sense of menace.

There's no doubt in my mind it's worth watching at the cinema, particularly in 3D, but a more decisive script and less attention to special effects would have made this a truly great film. It unsurprisingly sets up a sequel, and we can only hope that before embarking on it Scott notes the failings of this outing, given the scale of what he sets up. But at least now we know who engineered the Alien monsters, who the Space Jockey was 33 years ago, and we're treated once more to HR Giger's designs. It's far from perfect, but is highly entertaining, if not remotely emotionally engaging.