BEARABLE

SPOILERS DOWN THE PATH; THE DISCUSSION BELOW WILL NOT BE COMPREHENSIVE WITHOUT IT.

TREAD CAREFULLY. YOU'VE BEEN WARNED.

In Ridley Scott's library of films, Prometheus is guaranteed to be one of the best looking entries ever! Your eyeballs will pop out for Dariusz Wolski's wide-scope aesthetic cinematography! The sceneries & glaciers are beyond wonderful, and these are just tips of the many icebergs the rest of the picture has to offer as visual treats! To catch a glimpse of the foreign goo on a fingerprint close-up that exhibits excruciatingly intricate details tells you about the Maestro enough!

One thing to keep in mind is that, this is the movie's biggest strength. Its breathtaking visuals, not only in terms of the kind of photography it exhibits, but the sophisticated production & creative design as well! Head-statue tomb, stone cylinders, cryo-sleep pods, spaceships and Xenomorph mural are samples of greatness! Props such as the mapping pups and vile of tubes are elegant! Make-up effects & prosthetics for the Engineers are outstanding! Unknown form of creature beings & shifting grounds for spaceship to take off are great practical effects! Visual effects wise, DNA strands mixing in water, star map, silicate storm, pupil infection of worm, holographic reading and technology are marvellous but attacks by the non-native species and Engineer's body losing cohesion can clearly be seen as CGI. Lastly, Prometheus also showcases cool astronaut suits.

Setting all these aside, let's talk about the one element that matters the most - the writing, how is it? The plot & premise is intriguing, truly! A bunch of scientists & explorers are on their way to a solar system much alike Milky Way, into a planet much alike Earth with hopes of meeting the creators of human beings - The Engineers. The dining scene after waking up from a hyper-sleep will remind you of the director's own Alien. Even the title reveal does. We've heard about the Weyland-Yutani Corporation from previous films of the franchise, but now it's our chance to meet the founder himself and where all these scientific expedition ideas came from. So to start off, yes, the plot and motivations are clear.

On surface, Prometheus may seem like an everyday science fiction. But, it prompts us to rewind, think deeper the proceedings watched & connect the dots yourself after it ends, as any good film does. Time to tackle it one by one. All this film is doing is setting up events chronologically:

  • The opening sequence of an Engineer sacrificing himself is simply a process of the race generating life by disintegrating themselves using the black goo and raising new life forms through combinations on the planet itself, regardless of which planet it actually is taking place, as David (Michael Fassbender) says: "Sometimes to create, one must first destroy." This quote is very relevant to the actions taken by him also, which will be discussed after this. We see carvings on walls discovered & initial opening speech stating the same archaeological fact too. So yes, it's all connected through a chronological timeline.

  • Abiding strictly in fulfilling instructions assigned to him by Weyland (Guy Pearce), David has been having an ulterior motive throughout the film by riding on the same goal as the lead archaeologist pair. He is on a quest to seek solution(s) that would aid in extending Weyland's life through meeting the Engineers.

  • When the news of all Engineers found dead is brought to his boss, he's instructed to "Try harder." With the little clue he has gathered from visiting the altar, David seeks to find the iridescent fluid's purpose. He wants to know what happened to the Engineers. He taints Holloway's (Logan Marshall-Green) drink with the latter's unknowing consent to test the actual outcomes of the mysterious black goo. Once he sees the result of it turning Holloway into an indescribable monster, he cancels that off as a potential elixir for long life. It is only a bonus for him that Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace) got pregnant. He decides to put her in cryo-sleep, so that the specimen growing inside could be used for further study by the company on Earth. It is here we know the sex scene does have a purpose actually.

  • David figures out that one of the Engineers is still alive, and is in hyper-sleep. It is here we see the canisters that contain the black goo are attached to the spaceship that was initially routed to head Earth. It is at this point we know that the Engineers are aiming to terminate their creation; humans. And, David's dramatic need is reached finally.

If you do notice, David also has an affinity for Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace). He has been studying her dreams & background, which helped revealed a little about her to us. As opposed to what the crew may feel about him, he can feel. There's a hint he doesn't want to do what he is doing, when he says he can't wait to kill his maker. Even in the ending, he expresses fear if Shaw's dead. From the alleged animosity between him and Holloway; Shaw's love interest, it justifies and gives more reasons on why he would spike the man's drink. There definitely isn't a clear moment on film to show Elizabeth knowing for sure that Holloway's death is caused by the black goo. Therefore, her question to the waken Engineer is partially invalid. We say partially because she is aware that the black goo is dangerous according to the information provided by Janek.

The most intense scene in the picture is the Med-Pod surgery! It's so well shot, and Shaw's struggle during the entire segment is felt! Visual storytelling employed by the scriptwriter and filmmaker is genius, as it navigates the story forward with cues for smooth understanding. Peter Weyland precisely revives Shaw's initial purpose of arriving to LV-223 even though she's almost lost it after Holloway's gone. Engineer's DNA proved predating humans, android asking a similar question man is planning to ask the Engineers, holographic events resembling markings and writings on walls in our planet to let finders know what transpired precedingly and David's plugged off head still speaking in function are fantastic ideas & scenes! Marc Streitenfeld's score is arousing & amazing by the way!

To consider the flaws, the script didn't flesh out the main characters as well as it should have. There are elaborations on traits, but aren't enough to make us show much care. These are why when most of the deaths happened, we count it as disposable. There's nothing heartfelt there. The entire purpose and salary of the crew is to discover the Engineers and investigate everything that's along the way. It just doesn't make sense for the geologist & biologist to just leave the venue on their own. The former possesses a mapping tool device and the technology provided in Prometheus is advanced, thus it's not believable for the duo to get lost. This is a forced story point. Janek (Idris Elba) being called into Vickers' (Charlize Theron) room is also a coincidingly forced story point. The biologist's interactions with the worms infected by the black goo and the geologist's appearance at the doorstep of Prometheus are plain silly. The quest for truth by the crew dissipates easily halfway too. Coupled with the half-cooked set up and conflicts that do not tie-in quite well with the main dramatic thrust, we know why at the end of the show, we feel the whole point of coming to LV-223 ends up being hollow.

Rescue process from storm havoc could have been captured better. Vickers could have ran sideways to avoid the crashing spaceship, right? David detaching himself from the others and wandering alone in the cave seems abrupt. It is not convincing why Janek (Idris Elba) and his drivers would sacrifice themselves. By the way, the conclusion achieved by him that the area is a biological weapon arena is too quick. How does he even know? By just an attack? Weyland's presence in the ship and his motivation to prolong life is too predictable. Although the sequence of reviving a dead head is fun to watch, it doesn't convince at all that one could trick the nerves in making the corpse believe that it is alive. If that's the case, Shaw could do the same to her demised boyfriend too, right? More development on clarity should have been given. Taking off the isolation helmet in a foreign atmosphere is dumb due to possible contagion, which is addressed in a question by Shaw too. Scientists should know better. If the indicator tool is that advanced & accurate, again, more development on clarity should have been given.

Casting is near perfect! Michael Fassbender plays an android as though he's born for it. That creepy look is unforgettable! Peter Weyland's makeup looks like a mutated alien rather than that of an old man. But, his short performance is terrific. Idris Elba as Janek is extremely charismatic and lovable! Charlize Theron as Meredith Vickers displays leadership, jealousy and 'Daddy' issues, but sometimes her interests contradict the crews'. In short, this character is unimpactful. Performances by actors in the background are served vivid attention too.

The resolution is open-ended on purpose as the motion picture establishes for sequels evidently. Not sequels, but story continuations precisely, as these are parts of one big event. There are cliff-hangers and questions to be answered:

  • What actually happened in the spacecraft cave? How did the Engineers die? Could it be the rest of the crew who were supposed to take off in the spaceship headed to Earth didn't arrive on time for departure, leaving the one member permanently on hyper-sleep?

  • Was there another far more progressive creature like Xenomorph who wiped off the Engineers? Or did their 'biological weapon' infected one of their own members during the process of loading the spaceship with the canisters, giving birth to a Deacon; an earlier draft species of the Xenomorph we know today, much like the ending shows? It is to fathom that the Xenomorph is an alien species which evolves according to time and the host it impregnates. We've seen the effects of the black goo on a human being. We've seen the product coming out of that human being, before it grows into a Trilobite, penetrates an Engineer and bursts out as a Deacon. We will see how that Deacon turns into the Xenomorph we are familiar with in the Alien Quadrilogy.

  • Why was the black goo created? Or, was it found somewhere else by the Engineers? The opening sequence shows that one of the Engineers sacrificing himself using the same goo to create life forms on a distant planet, with a hovering spacecraft leaving him in sight. So, were there two clans of Engineers? One who believed to create good (Humans), and another who believed to manufacture evil (Aliens)?

These are the driving forces and wild speculations that will keep our curiosity on fire throughout the course of this prequel franchise. Movie-goers shouldn't have anything to complain about on this regards. What we must understand is that, we are looking at a set of momentous jigsaw puzzle being assembled on its way to bridge and meet the original films, and answer the query of how one of the Engineers ended up in LV-426; the planet where the story in Alien starts from. Elizabeth Shaw is religious, and she desperately wants to find her maker. Although she is holding on to the theory that Engineers made man, she is grasping on the idea of God too. She wants to know why and how as much as we want to. We are wondering as how she is. As she leaves to the Engineer's homeland with David, let's follow her to quench our thirst for answers.

One large flaw the franchise is responsible to answer is the dated technology in Alien. We understand that Alien's made in 1979 and there are limitations to technology during the time. But, Prometheus is a prequel that unrolls in the past. It can't possibly have a far cutting-edge technology than the future, can it?

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