Ridley Scott has high praise for the new “Alien” film
(Left) Director Ridley Scott on the set of “Black Hawk Down.” Photo: Oscars.com. (Right) A scene from 2012’s “Prometheus.”
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- Director Fede Alvarez has been working on a new “Alien” film that is scheduled to be released next year.
- Original “Alien” director Ridley Scott, who is also producing, saw the film and declared it “great.”
- The new film from Alvarez, director of “Evil Dead” and “Don’t Breathe,” is said to be a standalone story.
If you’re filmmaker Fede Álvarez, you’re feeling pretty good right now.
The Uruguay-born writer and director of the 2013 “Evil Dead” remake and the 2016 sleeper horror hit “Don’t Breathe” has been quietly working on a new “Alien” film for 20th Century Studios, but little has been heard about it since it was first announced in early 2022.
In conversation with Guillermo del Toro DGA Latino Summit 2023 (above deadline), Alvarez noted that he showed the film, titled Alien: Romulus, to legendary director Ridley Scott, who serves as the film’s producer.
What Ridley Scott said about Alien: Romulus
Ridley Scott on the set of 1979’s Alien.
Scott was of course also behind the camera on the original “Alien” and two later installments in the series, “Prometheus” and “Alien: Covenant”. His reaction to the new film?
According to Alvarez:
“…he said, ‘Fede, what can I say? It’s fucking awesome.’ For me it was like… My family knows that it was one of the best moments of my life, having a master like him, who I admired so much, even watching a movie that I made, but especially something like that… and I talked to him for an hour about what he liked about it.”
Alvarez noted that Scott is notoriously harsh on films, both his own and those of others, and apparently even “Top Gun: Maverick,” the 1986 sequel to his late brother Tony Scott’s “Top Gun,” was a “meh.” gave.
The new film, the first in the series since “Alien: Covenant,” is set to feature a group of young colonists on a distant planet and is unrelated to the previous eight installments in the series (including the two “Alien vs. Predator”). spin-offs).
The cast is said to include “Priscilla” star Cailee Spaeny, Isabela Merced, David Jonsson, Aileen Wu and Spike Fearn The Hollywood Reporter.
Related Article: Cailee Spaeny in Talks to Star in Fede Álvarez’s New Alien Movie
What happened to the “Alien” franchise? the last few years?
“Prometheus” from 2012.
“Alien: Romulus” will be the first film in the series since Disney acquired 20th Century Fox (now 20th Century Studios) in 2019.
After the success of the Alien vs. Predator films declined in the mid-2000s, the studio put the series on hold until Scott returned to direct 2012’s Prometheus, a prequel set in the same universe as its predecessor . Alien films.
Although “Prometheus” wasn’t a box office hit, it did well enough for Scott to move on, directing 2017’s “Alien: Covenant” and promising two more films for an entirely new trilogy.
But a lukewarm response from moviegoers to “Covenant” as well as the studio’s impending sale to the Mouse House seemingly put those plans on hold permanently – along with another planned sequel from director Neill Blomkamp.
The only other activity since then, before the announcement of Alvarez’s film, was the development of an “Alien” TV series from Noah Hawley (“Fargo,” “Legion”), set decades before the first film and streaming on FX should be on Hulu. Filming began last summer but ended stopped by the SAG-AFTRA strike.
According to Variety“Alien: Romulus” was also originally scheduled for a Hulu debut, but will now hit theaters on August 18, 2024.
Director Fede Alvarez.