On the 25th May 1979, then phenomenal and terrifying Alien had its debut screening! There's an absolute fuck load that can be said about the Alien film, with so many twists and turns to its production story, arguments and fallings out behind the camera, and incredible changes that seem miles apart from the film that was eventually presented to audiences, but here's some of my all-time favourite facts from the history of this movie.
Though the film is seen as a hugely unique and original idea unlike anything else of its time, many films were influential in the conception of Alien, with the writer, director, and producers all having a different film that helped them fully visualise the film they wanted to make. Ridley Scott cites The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Star Wars as influences for the look of the film and the atmosphere he wished to create, and critics have claimed the film Planet of the Vampires may have also had an affect on the film, given some similar visuals and narrative. Scriptwriter Dan O'Bannon meanwhile was influenced by John Carpenter's sci-fi comedy Dark Star which he had also worked on the script for, and "readers" (people in charge of reading scripts then giving a short and snappy synopsis to film execs) sold it to the studios as "Jaws, but in space".
The original title for the film was Star Beast and handled a lot more like a B-Movie, however it was during O'Bannon's time on Dark Star that he realised he wanted to move away from B-Movie territory and play it as a straight up horror film in space. To achieve this, he called upon the help of H.R. Giger, an artist he had met on a film set in Paris some years ago, where he had instantly offered him opium. Giger's paintings and designs whilst working on the movie led to him having run-ins with customs officers in the Netherlands and LA, when on two occasions they discovered his designs and feared they'd stumbled upon evidence of some deranged, sex-obsessed murderer.
All of the characters were originally written as men, and constantly had their names changed due to the original names being so bland and, well, shit. The script did however outline that the roles were all "unisex and interchangeable", with Ripley's character taking advantage of this by becoming a woman after her male version was deemed "boring", along with the fact female heroines were on a popularity rise at the time. Scott later wrote biographies for the characters to get the actors off his back asking for guidance on their roles, which led to some revelations such as Kane being a drug addict, and Lambert being born a male but having a sex change at a young age. Ash's character was bare bones given his true identity, however Ash was also a very late addition to the crew pushed by the producers, a character of whom O'Bannon was not a fan.
Ripley was almost played by Sigourney Weaver's college buddy from Yale, Meryl Streep. However Scott invited female staff from the production office to watch screen-tests for Ripley , and they unanimously sided with Weaver. Given that Star Wars and its success were so crucial in Fox green-lighting the movie, it is then no surprise that Han and Chewie actors Harrison Ford and Peter Mayhew were considered for roles, specially those of Dallas and the xenomorph. Both actors turned down the roles. The xenomorph role eventually went to a graphic design student from Nigeria named Bolaji Badejo, a slim and 6'10" dude who was spotted by a scout in a London pub. It was first and last film role.
The xenomorph was originally a pale white colour with translucent skin showing off its skeletal structure and organs, however budgetary constraints left it a much darker colour. The facehugger meanwhile was supposed to be green, however when O'Bannon saw the unpainted sculpture he demanded the lighter skin-tone colour be used. The chestburster also had a few design changes, with one huge change coming when Giger revealed an early prototype which was laughed off as resembling a "mutant Thanksgiving turkey". Incidentally, the concept of a chestburster was inspired by intense indigestion that O'Bannon was often stricken by. Oh shit and guess what, that scene with all the eggs inside the crashed ship with the layer of light over them? You can thank The Who for that, as they were experimenting with lasers in the lot next to where Alien was being shot, and offered to lend the lasers for the scene after someone noted how dope they looked.
By now most people get the whole "its just fannies and willies" thing when discussing the design of the alien, but the crew went that extra length when working on the practical effects. The tendons on the xeno's jaw are actually made up of shredded condoms, and it is constantly drooling KY Jelly lube all over the place. Meanwhile the alien eggs were originally supposed to feature an opening modelled after a vagina, however Fox were not happy with this design as they thought this would be too much an upset Christian cinema-goers, so Giger remodelled it as a hybrid of a vagina and the cross, as a dig at the Church for ruining his fanny egg.
Other sex-based antics and visuals cut from the film include a sex scene between Ripley and Dallas, which was cut after Dallas' actor Tom Skerritt discussed how he felt it unnecessary and ruined the flow of the film, which Scott agreed with. The scene, along with a couple others addressing the issue, was written in to explain to audiences that the crew were all partaking in casual sex frequently on their long and exhausting mission, but all traces of this sort've ship life were entirely removed from the final product - though Scott clearly loved the idea of his crews just shagging through space so much so that he brought back the concept in Prometheus and Alien Covenant. Y'know, the bad Alien films.
Other ideas cut from the final film was the original life cycle of the xenomorph, which was far different from what later instalments introduced. Originally the alien was supposed to only have a short life cycle, and upon reaching the end of this cycle it would simply turn itself back into an egg, waiting to be birthed into the face of another victim down the line. This is also why the alien seems so docile towards the end of the film, as it was reaching this point and was seemingly losing its taste for blood in the process. As seen in the director's cut, the alien was also capable of cocooning humans to transform them into eggs also, a far cry from the concept of an Alien Queen popping them out around the clock. And seeing as this film is rampant with sexy sex, there was also a point in the script in which the alien became sexually aroused by Ripley, touching itself upon seeing her undressing aboard the escape craft.
So the final film, unlike this article which was supposed to just be "a few quick facts" when I started writing it, was heavily edited down as you may have guessed from all of these omissions of scenes, but how long was it and what were some of the reasons for these cuts? Well the main issue Fox had with it is, as you may have guessed, the sexual imagery and the violence. The original cut, which was over 3 hours long (fucking hell, Scott) was far more violent and had extended death scenes of many characters, most notably Kane and Brett. A lot of Fox's demands for toned down violence came during the script stage, however upon seeing the final 3 hour version more demands for reigning it in came up. Years after its release Scott was approached and asked to make a director's cut, which he was unhappy with at first as it was simply an excuse for the studios to re-release the film with additional scenes, but as he'd cut a number of these scenes for pacing back in the day, he simply took other scenes out to make up for these new ones, resulting in a director's cut a minute shorter than the original film.
Amazingly though throughout all these edits, cuts, and conflicting opinions, the film managed to stay incredibly coherent, an impressive feat when you think of many recent films narratives that have suffered due to studio meddling. In fact minus perhaps the seemingly "lazy" alien towards the end of the film, the only explainable scene in the movie is during Ripley's run-in with Ash, her nose starts bleeding seemingly at random. This scene would have made more sense of course with an earlier scene that was cut - in which the crew attempts to blast the xenomorph out of the airlock, only to face decompression when its blood melts through the ship, resulting in nosebleeds from the crew. Since Alien, Ripley has had a nose bleed in every single one of her film appearances, for some reason. You know what's even more amazing than this film pulling it off though? Throughout the entire movie, the xenomorph only gets about 4 minutes of screen time in total, and it doesn't even appear until an hour in, about the half way point.
Well shit, there's some pretty hefty Alien facts for yas. There's still plenty more I'd love to share but I'm sure you've had your fill by now. But fuck it, I'll live you with a few more little ones:
- Ripley singing You Are My Lucky Star was Weaver's idea, and almost didn't make the cut due to high costs of obtaining the rights.
- At the start of Aliens, when the rescue crew are cutting their way into Ripley's craft you can see the harpoon gun Ripley used to blast the alien out of the shuttle, still lodged under the door.
- The film never had a year it was based, however a non-canon companion book for Aliens notes that a transmission date in the film is 2179, and as it is stated the events of Alien took place 57 years prior, Alien is now officially set in the far off future of 2122.
- The Space Jockey was originally just a member of an alien exploration crew who stumbled across the eggs on LV-246, and after becoming trapped on the planet due to a xenomorph damaging their ship, they sent out a distress signal for all to avoid the planet, all of which was made void by the introduction of the Engineers in Prometheus.
- The star system Lambert claims they are just short of following hyper-sleep is a real star system named Zeta Reticuli, which is also steeped in UFO lore. Infamous abductees Barney and Betty Hill claimed that The Greys that abducted them actually came from this system.
- Fox's attempts to appease Christian audiences clearly wasn't enough, as Christian activists set fire to the original Space Jockey prop that was being displayed at the premiere for the film.
- The names Space Jockey, Facehugger, and Chestburster were all just nicknames the props got from the production team, yet all ended up becoming canon with the series.
And that's ye lot!
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