"Get Away from Her, You Bitch!": Revisiting the Alien Saga

By Spencer Coile 

The tagline for the first Alien film, short and deeply frightening, reads "In space no one can hear you scream." Written in tiny font, it is placed on the poster for Ridley Scott's first venture into the Alien-universe beneath what we soon learn is the egg from which the menacing title creature is born. The image is simple but punchy, rather like the power and artistry emerging from Alien, in very much the same way the monsters pop out of humans' chests. On paper, the series is simple. But only on paper. Revisiting the world of Ellen Ripley and co. as a lead-up to the release of Alien: Covenant this weekend, one thought kept running through my mind: these films are disurbing, because they get at the root of what it means to be a human, to be a monster, and to make sacrifices that benefit oursevles, but also the greater good. What may have started out as a cut-and-paste psychological horror from 1979 soon became a story that is deeply compelling and worthy of examination.

So let's put on our space helmets, grab our flame-throwers, and start exploring the storytelling of the Alien saga...  

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Beauty Break: Happy 90th Birthday to the Grauman's Chinese!

One of my favorite places in Hollywood turned 90 years old today. The Grauman's Chinese Theater, which often houses premieres and events, opened on this day in 1927, so its centennial is just ten years away. It's currently known as the TCL Theater and was called the Mann Theater before that but it's still popularly known as Grauman's. You can rename something as perks for modern corporations but sometimes the original name hangs around (as well as it should). Don't even get me started on beautiful Broadway theaters chucking their iconic stage giant names for "American Airlines Theater" or whatnot. DO NOT GET ME STARTED. 

The Grauman's most familiar pop culture aspect is its large collection of cement tiles out front bearing the handprints of movie stars from all eras. So it's time for a Beauty Break. Which of these ceremonies after the jump do you most wish you had been at? 

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Stage Door: "Six Degrees of Separation" Revived

Stage Door bringing you intermittent theater reviews when we manage to get there. Here's Nathaniel R

It's so basic to binge plays during Tony season as opposed to a more sensible and committed once-a-month diet of live theater. Alas, just as the more familiar mainstream obsession of the Oscar circus encourages studios to backload their releases to the last quarter of the year, most of the "big" theater shows open as late as they can for Tony consideration. This makes April and May a madhouse of theater-going for those who care about such things. Because most of the musicals are too expensive, I've been catching up with the plays. We've already covered The Little Foxes (a must see) and the Pulitzer-winning economic tragedy Sweat. So let's talk Six Degrees of Separation nominated for 2 Tonys: Best Revival of a Play and Best Leading Actor (Corey Hawkins).

"Chaos, control. Chaos, control. You like, you like?"

That's Stockard Channing's most sweetly funny line reading (among thousands of exquisite ones) in the 1993 movie adaptation of this stage classic. That was also, roughly, my reaction to the Broadway revival with Allison Janney, John Benjamin Hickey, and Corey Hawkins (Straight Outta Compton), taking over the roles Channing, Donald Sutherland, and Will Smith played onscreen...

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Today's 4: Auntie Mame, The Breakfast Club, In the Realm of the Senses, and Laika

Another day, another chance to boost your spirits by celebrating showbiz history whilst you go about your here and now. Only four today since we decided the fifth would be better off in a beauty break style post later today. 

May 18th Showbiz History

2018 Okay this is future history but Laika has claimed this date for their next movie. We don't know what it is yet but who cares, it's Laika!

In their honor today: Rank Laika's releases thus far in the comments. They are in chronological order Coraline (2009), Paranorman (2012), The Boxtrolls (2014), and Kubo and the Two Strings (2016)

Blockbusters of 1985, Auntie Mame and more after the jump...

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Cannes Day 1: The Netflix Battle and "Ishmael's Ghost"

by Nathaniel R

Maren Ade, Will Smith, Agnes Jaoui, and Pedro Almodóvar at the Jury Press Conference today

Though we aren't in the South of France we'll try to keep an eye on the proceedings across the pond there these next two weeks. If you're relatively new to movie obsessing (We keep hoping more young people will tune in to TFE. We used to attract baby cinephiles... not sure where they congregate now!) Vox has a terrific heavily expository overview of why Cannes is so important, how to pronounce it ("can" not "cans" or "cahn"), why so many famous people go, why everyone is so dressed up, and some other myths and mysteries that surround the festival.

Jury Press Conference & the Netflix Divide
Because juicy click-bait headlines drive traffic most websites are framing the Jury Press Conference as a bloody war between the president Pedro Almodóvar and his most famous juror Will Smith. They may well eventually come to artistic blows in jury deliberations (who knows) but this is already grossly overstated. They merely have different feelings about Netflix, a famous "disruptor" as a company. Will Smith is very pro Netflix (basically because he has kids who like it). Almodóvar is very pro theatrical exhibition, because you know, he's a filmmaker who cares about movies. That's about the extent of the "war"...

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