Alien (1979) on Netflix
The commercial tug Nostromo is returning to Earth when a signal wakes its crew, who land to investigate. Kane enters a chamber of eggs, and something inside fastens onto his face.
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Trailer
Plot summary
The commercial space tug Nostromo is heading home with a crew of seven, plus the ship's cat, Jones: Dallas, the captain, Kane, Ripley, Lambert, Ash, Parker and Brett. The computer, Mother, detects a signal coming from a nearby planet and rouses them. Company policy says the crew must look into transmissions that suggest intelligent life, so they leave their payload in orbit and set down, damaging the ship. Dallas, Kane and Lambert follow the signal to a derelict vessel holding a giant, fossilized corpse. Ripley determines the message is a warning, not a distress call. Kane finds a chamber full of large eggs; touching one, he is attacked by a creature that fastens onto his face, and Ripley cites quarantine rules to keep the landing party outside.
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Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Alien (1979)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
SPOILER
The chestburster scene was shot in one take with the cast unaware that fake blood would spray from high-pressure pumps, and Veronica Cartwright was hit directly and fell into hysterics; Tom Skerritt said her reaction on camera was real.- John Hurt was Ridley Scott's first choice for Kane, but a South African film commitment forced the casting of Jon Finch, who fell ill with type 1 diabetes on the first day of shooting; Hurt, then in London after his project collapsed, replaced him.
- The actors' space suits had no cooling systems and initially no venting for exhaled carbon dioxide, and combined with a heat wave the conditions nearly made them pass out, so nurses stood by with oxygen tanks.
- Ridley Scott had his two young sons and the son of cinematographer Derek Vanlint wear smaller space suits to stand in for the actors, making the 58 ft Nostromo landing leg look larger; the children nearly collapsed from the heat.
- The facehugger's proboscis was made from a sheep's intestine and fired from the egg with high-pressure air hoses; the shot was reversed and slowed in editing to prolong the effect.
- The adult alien's head had about 900 moving parts and points of articulation, built by Carlo Rambaldi with a system of hinges and cables for the tongue and inner mouth; part of a human skull was hidden under its translucent cover.
- The Nostromo model was originally yellow and the team filmed it for six weeks before Ridley Scott ordered it changed to gray, forcing them to reshoot from scratch; Scott also took a hammer and chisel to the refinery, knocking off spires modelmaker Martin Bower had spent weeks creating.
