Sci-fi, it’s not just for geeks anymore.

Science fiction as a genre has given audiences different views of the past that never existed, presents that are warped, and futures that can either give us hope or terrify us.    While much of the genre takes a look at where we are going others seem be reflections of the time.  The genre also mixes well with others.  Just about every variation of the formula has been tried with waves of success.

The several sci-fi movies that represent the past are usually put into the category of steampunk.  Some great examples of this are “The Golden Compass,” “The Prestige” and the anime “Howl’s Moving Castle.”  They give us a past where the technology is more advanced for the time period.  Some of these movies work well and others are incredibly weak like “Wild, Wild West,” and “Sucker Punch.”  

Movies that take a present look at the genre.  “Cloverfield” made a modern monster movie utilizing the P.O.V. camera craze.  Movies like “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “E.T. the Extra Terrestrial,” and “Back to the Future” while not modern by todays standards capture their time period like a snapshot of the time period.  Of course there are exceptions to the steampunk genre.  “Super 8” and “Cowboys and Aliens” are recent examples of sci-fi movies that take place in the past that are not steampunk.

Modern sci-fi has expanded by developing themes that are identifiable to a wider audience.  Take movies like “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” for example. It’s a story almost anyone can identify with in the way that almost all people have had that type of heartbreak where they wish they could forget the other person.  “Chronicle” is relatable to audiences because it takes a look at teenage angst through kids who have developed telekinetic powers.  

Futuristic sci-fi is now and has always been incredibly common.  It more often takes a look at where society is headed. Futuristic sci-fi uses a variety of themes, be it a dark Orwellian way like in movie “Brazil,” or a more upbeat fantastic universe like “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.” The views of this genre have given us fun new visions and hope of technology that is both promising and helpful.  Often these tales use stories that have been long told such as “Star Wars,” which is much like the Akira Kurosawa film “The Hidden Fortress.”  

Sci-fi movies play to our weakness as a species or our fears.  In the “Terminator” movies it was a fear of reliance on machines.  In “They Live” it becomes a fear of an over consuming society that is blind to the woes of the lower class.  In another John Carpenter movie, “The Thing,” the fear is created as the paranoia and isolation of the alien creature takes over human beings at the molecular level.

Sometimes writers use sci-fi to examine themes that are otherwise too deep for most audiences.  “Blade Runner,” for example, is at its core a story about the very nature of the human soul.  “Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Kahn” has a basic story with a wildly two-dimensional villain, yet what makes this movie poignant is the way the audience can relate to Captain Kirk’s aging. “District 9” is a more recent film that strongly uses the theme of apartheid.  Sci-fi has the ability to take taboo topics and make them more palatable and entertaining. 

Science fiction has mixed with many other genres as well.  These collaborations have made it so viewers who wouldn’t normally be a fan of the genre can now enjoy it.  Take children’s movies for example.  Movies like “The Iron Giant,” “Secret of Nimh,” and “Wall-E,” have allowed young children (as well as adults) to be exposed to themes that are both entertaining and advanced, while keeping in the genre of science fiction. 

The rise of comic book inspired movies has created many sci-fi superhero movies.  Movies like “X-Men,” “Iron Man,” and “Batman Begins” introduce people to worlds were mutants exist or where a person can create suits and weapons to defeat colorful villains.  This surge in popularity is bridging the gap between comic book fans and sci-fi fans. 

Of course sci-fi has worked well with horror as both of them look into a realm of the unknown.  This is seen as early back as the 1930s with “Frankenstein,” where Boris Karloff terrified audiences clumping about in pounds of makeup as a corpse brought to life by mad science. More recently, sci-fi and horror teamed up to create “Cloverfield.” The special effects of monsters have grown significantly since the days of the “Frankenstein.” 

Later came movies like “Alien” and “Predator” where the humans are no longer the apex animals compared to the creatures that hunt them.  Both versions of “The Blob” show a lot of interesting themes from the era they took place. In the 50s the theme is the boy who cried wolf, while in the 80s the theme is that humans shouldn’t trifle with things they don’t understand.    

Science fiction comedy is fairly common as well.  In the campy movie “Earth Girls are Easy,” three aliens crash land on Earth and hook up with women on Earth. It’s as silly as it sounds.  In “Ghostbusters,” a group of out-of-work parapsychologists find they have a knack for catching ghosts using proton packs they invent.  It’s a funny and inventive movie with a lot of great special effects for the time. 

One of the best combinations of movies I’ve seen with sci-fi comes from one of my favorite movies.  “Back to the Future” is a sci-fi, a comedy, a teen movie, and a romance; eventually its sequels even became a western.  This movie took the science of time travel and causality, and creates a plot that makes your head spin.  Marty McFly has to juggle getting back to 1985 along with getting his parents back together, all while avoiding the king of assholes Biff Tannen and warning Doc Brown of his imminent death by Libyans in the future. It’s a really smart movie that I enjoy every time I watch it. 

Two classics of the genre are famous Stanley Kubrick movies.  “A Clockwork Orange” is one of his best movies.   In it a young sadist, Alex, goes to prison for his horrendous crimes but finds a way to get paroled.  He signs up for a treatment that will supposedly cure him of his desire to kill and do violence on others.  The question is: Is it better to program a person to make a decision or for them to do it willingly?    “2001 A Space Odyssey” is one that confuses me to a great degree.  Some aspects are good and creepy such as H.A.L. the robot who decides that the humans are jeopardizing the mission and begins killing people off.  Then we get monoliths and star children, and frankly it’s too strange for me at times.  It’s made a lot like an art film.

On the topic of art house style movies I normally have never been a fan of David Lynch movies.  There are two exceptions: “The Elephant Man” and “Dune.”  “Dune” is a sci-fi movie that has a grand cast and an almost Shakespearean feel to it.  The story of households in a battle over the goods that make space travel possible becomes fascinating when it all comes together.  

Speaking of Shakespearean themes, one of the classics that takes it’s inspirations right from “The Tempest” is “Forbidden Planet.” It’s a wild and outlandish adventure that involves monsters and robots and yet it works.  It’s considered by many to be one of the best sci-fi movies of all time.  “The Day the Earth Stood Still” is better in my opinion.   It’s a plea for world peace brought from a man from beyond the stars.  Oddly enough, this story has been used as an allegory for Jesus Christ but still has a decent following.

I am a big fan of science fiction.  Some of my favorites of the genre are the movies “Blade Runner,” “Brazil,” “The Thing” and “Back to the Future.”  Many are very thought provoking and a lot of fun.  Luckily, like some of the worst horror movies the cheesiest sci-fi can be fun with the right group of friends.  Great shows like “Mystery Science Theater 3000” still continues to make many laugh watching some of the worst of this classic genre.

I brought up “Blade Runner” earlier, which is an amazing movie.  In it the villains are replicants, which are human-like robots that have a short lifespan. Deckard, the Blade Runner, is a cop whose purpose is to kill replicants after finding them.  Roy Batty is a replicant soldier who is killing people to find a way to prolong his life.  He questions the very nature of the human soul since the company that made him was able to create him with implanted memories.  Is it possible for any thing sentient to have a soul even if it is not human?

Another movie I brought up earlier was “Brazil”. It’s a dark, comedic, romantic movie that takes place in a dark Orwellian version of the world.  It involves a world full of inept bureaucrats, endless flawed paperwork, and police that arrest you for the stupidest crimes.  The fun thing is the hero is an imaginative romantic that sees the girl of his dream and fights the system to get to her.

Science fiction is a genre that truly is for everyone.  It is insightful and has crossed into so many other genres that it is hard to imagine that anyone could not appreciate that it has done so much for film.  It has influenced a great deal of moviemakers and it continues to get more and more interesting as long as the imaginations of folks are allowed to thrive. We are already looking forward to the remake of “Total Recall”, “Looper” and “Branded”. As long as there is fiction, there will be science fiction. 

The Dark Knight Rises-review

“The Dark Knight” is one of the best superhero movies I have ever seen.  It set the bar high with a bolder story and a more character driven arc.  When the news of the final chapter in Christopher Nolan’s Batman universe came out it excited many.  While it brings some fun new things to the table with new villains and some well shot action sequences, there are still aspects that make this the weakest in the Nolan Batman trilogy.  

Batman, played by Christian Bale, has retired the costume and is now a recluse in his mansion.  An encounter with a cat burglar, played by Anne Hathaway, gets Bruce Wayne back into his costume.  A new threat has emerged in the form of Bane, played by Tom Hardy.  He seems bent on destroying Gotham.  Can Batman stop this powerful new force?

The good thing is that the casting is still damn good. With the regulars from the past movies and the additions of Marion Cotillard, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and Tom Hardy, give the movie class.  The action scenes seem to be filmed a lot better in this film then they were in the others- you can actually tell what is happening for a change.  

The movie recalls events from the past movies, which is interesting to watch.  Even characters like Dr. Crane/Scarecrow is back for the third movie.  It comes off like fan service a bit but it’s also sort of fun to see more of the characters that we have seen in all the movies so far.  Tom Hardy does a good job at playing Bane but his voice is sort of bizarre.  It goes from an almost hard to hear, electronic voice to an English sounding dub at times.

On the other hand, if you are a comic fan the “twists” will be somewhat predictable.  The thing that really is irritating is that the twists don’t do much for the movie except weaken the character of Bane.  Nolan can at least be credited with making the characters in the Batman universe more realistic.  Catwoman is at lot more believable in this version. 

If anything, the problems with the movie are that it takes characters that in the comics are bold and have stories that are much more risqué and plays them too safe.  To end this trilogy I expected something new brought to the table.  The Joker was something new.  This movie rehashes a lot of the themes of the first movie.  While not the worst thing it was hard not to think that the end should try something bigger and bolder.

While not living up to the hype for me, “The Dark Knight Rises” is still a good movie.  It’s damn long though.  They could have helped things by cutting some of the time during the prison scenes.  There is a lot going for it and it’s certainly worth seeing especially if you liked the other movies.  If you are comic geek you’ll need to remember that the Nolan universe is a different from the one that you are used to reading about.

The Amazing Spider-man-Review

“The Amazing Spider-man” takes a refreshing new look at the friendly neighborhood Spider-man.  This reboot of the franchise adds a new cast, new effects, and a new origin story.   It is an okay movie and in many ways it’s better than the Sam Raimi version, but it’s not without it’s faults. 

Peter Parker, played by Andrew Garfield, is the geeky kid at school whose life is changed when bitten by a radioactive spider.  He gains the abilities of a spider and becomes the masked hero Spiderman.  His girlfriend Gwen Stacy, played by Emma Stone, gives him support while he goes off to face Doctor Connors, played by Rhys Ifans, who is half man half lizard.

The cast change is very welcome.  Andrew Garfield does a fine job as a Peter Parker.  Emma Stone is cute as a button and does a great job being a lovable Gwen Stacy.  The biggest change that I must note is the use of Martin Sheen and Sally Field as Uncle Ben and Aunt May. They both add a lot of class to the roles and seem much more believable as characters. The villain, Rhys Ifans, is over the top and really not that threatening.  As a whole he just seems like a CGI thug. I really would have loved if they chose a different antagonist than the Lizard. 

The two most distracting things go hand in hand.  For one, the movie is very long.  When I am watching a reboot movie and it’s 136 minutes long, is it really needed to tell the entire origin story over again? I am pretty sure that Americans are fully aware of the origins of Superman, Batman and Spiderman.  It seems really redundant to keep going over it again and again. It might save a lot more time to just start with him already having his powers or making it a narrated montage if they felt it was so important to re-cap it.

This brings me to the second issue.  The age of the main cast is way off for a re-boot.  If they want to make it more like the comics then they should pick younger actors.  While the actors are really good, they are clearly not in high school.  Finally (and this is a nitpick) why in the hell did they need a character named Flash?  I know that it’s in the comics but that character was a jock bully in the 1960s.  Who goes around with the nickname Flash? Couldn’t they update that a bit for a modern audience?

As a whole the movie is good. I’d say that it might even be better than the Sam Raimi version.  A lot of critics are saying that it’s much more dark but that is not entirely accurate.  Maybe if he turned into something like Brundlefly when he was bitten, that would have been a lot darker.  Effects are better and the actors seem to handle their dialogue more professionally.  It’s certainly worth a rental or a matinee if you like Spider-man. 

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter-review

Tongue in cheek historical fiction is nothing new.  This year, audiences got treated to the Poe murder mystery in “The Raven.”  Now we have a new movie based on a hit novel of the same name- a vision of Abraham Lincoln’s life as he goes from young adult to the “Great Emancipator” all the while hunting vampires.

As a boy, young Abraham Lincoln sees his mother killed by a vampire.  He vows vengeance against vampires and with the aid of a vampire ally, he learns their weaknesses. When he moves to Illinois, he spends his nights armed with his silver covered axe, killing vampires.  How can he find that he can fight better as a statesman then as a warrior?

The acting is pretty fun.  Benjamin Walker took the tongue in cheek job as Abraham Lincoln and made it work as a fun, dark, action role.  Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Mary Todd Lincoln does a good job playing the strong character.  There are other characters that are also very well cast.  I was a bit disappointed Robin McLeavy and Alan Tudyk have such short amounts of screen time.  They are better actors that deserved better. 

The plot is not bad.  At times it seems like it would be predictable.  Then you are sideswiped by over-the-top goofiness.  At the very least it’s something different.  The flaws are pretty minor.  The effects are so-so.  The CGI has a tendency to be blurry and choppy at times.  The villains are 2-dimensional and don’t really seem to have much motivation beyond cartoonish super villainy.

This is still an okay movie.  It’s certainly nothing amazing but it’s at the very least worth a rental or a matinee.  It’s a neat distraction where if you can allow suspense of the disbelief about the vampires, then you can relax on the gaping holes in the historical context.  So go give it a watch if you are in the mood for some mindless silliness.   

Lollipop Chainsaw- review

“Lollipop Chainsaw” should have its picture in the dictionary for tongue-in-cheek game.  It’s absolutely stupid at times and it can also be pretty funny at other times.  The music is killer and the voice actors do a really good job with their roles at least.  The biggest flaws come from the controls and the overall game length.

In “Lollipop Chainsaw” you play as Juliet Starling.  She is a bubbly cheerleader celebrating her 18^th birthday.  She also comes from a family of zombie hunters.  Her weapon of choice is her customized chainsaw which she wields to hack and slash at the undead that have taken over her town.  She carries around the still-living severed head of her boyfriend Nick. Together, they square off against the music-themed zombies that have arisen to raise hell.

This game is a button masher’s dream.  It tells you the combos to do to produce amazing results in zombie killing.  However, in the heat of the moment you won’t remember them and you will hit every button you can, only to produce roughly the same results.  In addition, the game is too short. There are 6 levels in total. The levels are long, but I was able to beat this game in the lesser parts of two days.  The only thing extra they seem to be offering is more outfits for Juliet.  The game pretty much wants you to ogle her.  You can even get a trophy/achievement for trying to get an up-skirt.  Stay classy game.

The game has an interesting plot and funny dialogue.  The writer is James Gunn who was the writer for the new version of “Dawn of the Dead” and the writer/director of “Slither”.  The voice actors do a good job and many of them are C-list celebrities such as Michael Rooker, Shawnee Smith, Michael Rosenbaum and Tara Strong. The music is really good.  Every stage is themed after a certain type of music: punk, metal, psychedelic, funk, rock and roll, and rockabilly.  The writer even has a few zombie fan references.  Juliet is a cheerleader for the San Romero Knights and there is an Arcade called the Fulci Fun Center.   

As a whole, “Lollipop Chainsaw” is okay.  It’s certainly one of those games that can be popped in if you want to just chill and kill zombies for a while mindlessly.  It’s a fun distraction really.  If you want to shut off your brain for a while, this is a great game.  What keeps this game from being bad is that it seems to be aware of its cheese factor. It expects others to at least enjoy the ride as well. If you are into the zombie genre and into tongue-in-cheek humor this game is really going to be up your alley.  If not then I’d wait till the price goes down or it’s available to rent.

Americana in Cinema.

A lot of movies hold the distinction of capturing the American spirit.  The holiday classics like “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “A Christmas Story” are well rooted with imagery of enough Americana that would make Norman Rockwell swell with pride.  How about other genres though?  Throughout every decade we get tastes of Americana in movies.  The cinema uses it to hold a mirror to society and in turn sometimes to see where we’ve come from and ask where we are going.  

As a whole, many movies with Americana in them seem to have common elements.  Take the protagonist for example.  Most are either one of two archetypes or a combination of both.  They are underdogs who come from humble beginnings. A perfect example of this is Rocky Balboa of the “Rocky” series. He is a loser with a heart of gold that just wants to prove that he can go the distance.  The other archetype is the antihero. This is currently becoming more and more popular as audiences seem to enjoy more morally flawed heroes.  The example of this could be Inspector Harry Callahan of the “Dirty Harry” series.  Here is a character that believes in justice so much, that he is violent and sometimes murderous with suspects in order to avenge the victims.

Many movies that are considered classics of Americana have colorful secondary characters.  Many of the Cohen Brother films have memorable side characters, like Jesus from “The Big Lebowski,” or from “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” the character Big Dan.  “Back to the Future” and even the Romero movies “Night of the Living Dead,” “Dawn of the Dead,” and “Day of the Dead” have side characters that are all colorful and often times just as quotable as the main cast.  It shows a lot of care when you can watch one of these films and the clever writing has let it unfold into an entire ensemble of life as we know it (or knew it as the case may be).

With the exception of a few movies, the typical movie defined as your Americana film has adversaries that are really well defined.  In “Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark” it’s the Nazis.  In “The Good the Bad and The Ugly,” it’s Angel Eyes.  Even if the adversary is more of a concept, it tends to at least attempt to be well defined.  “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” was a search for the American dream despite the roadblocks that would slow down the strung-out narrator on his path.  In “Scarface” one could argue that his true adversary is himself and since it’s a story of the rise and fall of a criminal immigrant, it truly encapsulated his greed, fear, and wanton destruction to the very end.

Americana has to be like a time capsule for a time period.  It has to capture what America feels like.  “Rocky” does that for a lot of people.  Ask anyone in Philadelphia why so many folks have their pictures taken running up the same stairs Rocky Balboa does in his movies.  “The Gangs of New York” felt like a bit of Americana in that worked in a big way.  This movie was released after September 11^th. A movie incorporating the draft riots during the Civil War seemed topical.  It was a colorful setting to a dark time in history and it worked very well.

Many movies under the classification of Americana films attempt to challenge the status quo.  They want people to think about something in a new way or to see a new side to American life.  The movies of Clint Eastwood do this often.  One of the prime examples is “Gran Torino.” In it the Hmong people befriend a man with many racist tendencies in his neighborhood.  He comes to understand and eventually love and respect them.  On the other side we have movies like “Harold and Maude,” a love story about a young man and a much older woman.  With that, the movie’s theme is all about embracing life and love during an age when things were much more cynical and self-centered.

Americana films also reflect our own fears and views on the past and present.  “Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” has a filthy urbanoia to it that makes it quite terrifying.  “Super 8” recently came out and is a big call out to the days of Spielberg style movies.  It’s about personal loss and the fear of loss as well in a very fun setting.  Even movies like “The Godfather” come from our view of how the mafia worked. You can thank Mario Puzo’s book every time you watch a mafia movie and it starts with a poor family of immigrants that start a criminal empire.

While I mentioned “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” another movie in the same genre has changed the way we see horror today. “Halloween” took the slasher, Michael Myers, into the suburbs and had him attacking a babysitter and her friends.  Many who grew up in neighborhoods similar to Haddonfield, Illinois could see similarities to their own homes and that made it all the more terrifying.   They saw a faceless killer stalking a person and that person screaming for help at a neighbors’ door only to get no answer.   It was a nightmare that could be a reality in their hometown.  The third movie of the series “Halloween 3:Season of the Witch” did something completely different and yet incorporated fear of corporate greed, and mass media consumption into the narrative.

As I mentioned earlier there is a lot of Americana in the movies “A Christmas Story” and “It’s a Wonderful Life.”  “A Christmas Story” is filmed in a way that it comes off almost timeless. It could be told from the perspective of any little boy anxiously awaiting Christmas.  It is like a Norman Rockwell painting and yet the humor is still fairly timeless for the most part.  “It’s a Wonderful Life” does something somewhat different.  Through its description of George Bailey’s life we come to know his WHOLE town of Bedford Falls.  The town itself becomes a character and that makes it more of a loss when, in the nightmarish reality, it’s turned into Potterville.  It becomes a story about a man and his town and that is almost the spirit of Americana.

Much like “It’s a Wonderful Life,” “Back to the Future” does this trick as well on a much grander scale because they are doing it through various time periods and realities.  It also had three movies to help build an entire universe around it.  The town Hill Valley and its residence become very well known by the end of the third film. It’s one of the few movies that goes into various genres (romance, sci-fi, comedy, teen movie and at the end even western) and still retain that home town charm.  

Arguably, the truly American style movie belongs to the western.  While the spaghetti western may have perfected the genre, the western seems to capture a lot of what was important during an age of rough and tumble individualism.  Despite their individualism, classics like “The Magnificent Seven” and even “A Fistful of Dollars” owe much gratitude to Japanese cinema. At the time, works of directors such as Akira Kurosawa were making films that would inspire filmmakers for generations to come. 

On a darker level, the films of John Waters take a look into a dark and deviant spin on Americana.  He has the ability to come up with characters that are average people with uncommon circumstances that make them unique, dark, and disturbing. His characters intrigue audiences, while making them uncomfortable at the same time.  “Polyester,” “A Dirty Shame,” and “Serial Mom” are all great examples of his vision of Americana. All involve characters that you would not expect to be anything extraordinary, and make them into something dynamic through unforeseen circumstances.

The Kevin Smith movies in his New Jersey trilogy are excellent examples of slices of 1990 American life.  “Clerks” is the story of the underachieving working man.  “Mallrats” became the ode to the slacker with no direction and no idea of where to go.  Finally “Chasing Amy” was the tale of woe of love and coming to terms with your own boundaries in relationships.  Kevin Smith has since grown as a filmmaker, making some good movies and some stinkers. There was a time when, as an indie-filmmaker, he made a mark on the films of Americana.

For the most part I am barely scratching the surface.  As long as Americans make movies they will add their special touches to them to give them the feeling of home.  Some give us an almost jingoistic look at America like “Red Dawn.” Others spoof the news at the time with satire such as, “Team America: World Police.”  You can honestly find out a lot more about the state of the country by looking at older satire in movies.  Movies like “Doctor Strangelove: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb” is the best example.  Here is a movie about the total devastation of the world in a nuclear war because of a lunatic General.  It’s played as a comedy of all things.

Still, as long as we have free speech and a marketplace of ideas we can be proud to know that there is such a plethora of Americana to choose from at the multiplex.  Art will always mirror society.  As a country we have had a lot of great movies that show us who we are and where we come from and in many ways what we value as a nation.  Many futuristic movies seem to be post-apocalyptic films or ones where society dystopian and on the brink of collapse.  I wonder if folks truly believe that is where we are headed or if people are only entertained by the concepts as outlandish flights of fancy.

Prometheus-review

The 1979 movie “Alien,” directed by Ridley Scott, was a smart horror movie.  After several other movies in the franchise, he returned to the helm to produce and direct the prequel to a movie loved by so many people.  The movie was good but not without a lot of things that weighed it down.  I am not sure why it needed to even consider itself part of the Alien franchise.  Maybe Scott should have moved away from it entirely and tried something new.  Then at least it would have been heralded as something new and original. On its own merits the movie has great acting, good effects and an interesting narrative.

In 2089, archaeologists Elizabeth, played by Noomi Rapace, and Charlie, discover a star map among several unconnected ancient cultures. They believe this as an invitation from humanity’s "Engineers". They board the space vessel Prometheus (funded by the Weyland Corporation as an IN joke to the fans) to follow the map to a distant moon. The ship's crew travels in stasis pods while the android David, played by Michael Fassbender, monitors their voyage. They arrive and they are informed of their mission to find the Engineers. The Prometheus lands near an artificial structure and a team is sent to explore.

The acting is damn good in this movie.  Charlize Theron as Mission Director Vickers is played as aloof and cold, but begins to thaw as the movie progresses. Noomi Rapace is great as Elizabeth and she seems to be able to capture the fear that is in the heat of the moment on screen.  Michael Fassbender is the android David, is who steals the show.  He is intelligent and cold and models himself on Peter O'Toole in “Lawrence of Arabia”. He also manages to walk the line between good and bad where you are not quite sure his intentions at any given moment.

The sets and the special effects are really cool.  Watching it in 3-D impressed me a lot with this movie.  There were amazing landscape shows on Earth as well as on the alien planet and both were so stunning that at times, it felt it belonged on a documentary.  The creatures are stylized and very alien. The designs of H.R.Giger are looking great on screen using modern CGI.

The problems of this movie stem a lot from multiple plot threads branching off the main one and becoming a convoluted mess.  There are a lot of unanswered questions as well as problems of continuity between this and the first “Alien” film. Many of the minor characters are really forgettable with a few exceptions.  When I see this in a movie you may as well just write “Dead Man Walking” on their chest. The movie is also really big on religious overtones to the point that it beats that theme over your head with its not-too-subtle-symbolism. 

For the most part, “Prometheus” is a good movie.  If it didn’t have the baggage of being attached to the “Aliens” franchise, it could have had a lot more going for it too.  Still, it’s a good movie with decent acting and good effects- not scary at all though.  I’d recommend it as a matinee or rental if you want to catch some new science fiction.