In subsequent years,Alien was critically reassessed and described as one of the greatest and most influential science fiction and horror films of all time. In 2002,Alien was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by theLibrary of Congress and was selected for preservation in the United StatesNational Film Registry. In 2008, it was ranked by theAmerican Film Institute as the seventh-best film in the science fiction genre, and as the 33rd-greatest film of all time byEmpire. The success ofAlien spawneda media franchise of films, books, video games, and toys, and propelled Weaver's acting career. The story ofher character's encounters with the alien creatures became the thematic and narrative core of the sequelsAliens (1986),Alien 3 (1992), andAlien Resurrection (1997). A crossover with thePredator franchise produced theAlien vs. Predator films, while atwo-film prequel series was directed by Scott beforeAlien: Romulus (2024), a standalone sequel, was released. A television prequel written byNoah Hawley and produced by Scott,Alien: Earth, was released onFX on Hulu on August 12, 2025.
The commercial space tugNostromo is returning to Earth with a seven-member crew in"stasis": captain Dallas, executive officer Kane, warrant officerRipley, navigator Lambert, science officerAsh, and engineers Parker and Brett, along with the ship cat,Jones. The ship's computer,"Mother", detects a transmission from a nearby planetoid and wakes the crew. Following company policy to investigate transmissions indicating intelligent life, they leave their payload in orbit and land on the surface, but the ship is damaged. Dallas, Kane, and Lambert discover the transmission comes from a derelict alien vessel. Inside is a giant, fossilized alien corpse with a hole in its torso. Meanwhile, Mother partially deciphers the transmission, which Ripley determines is a warning beacon and not anSOS as first thought.
Kane enters a chamber containing hundreds of large eggs. When he touches one, anarthropod-likelifeform springs out, penetrates his helmet, and attaches to his face. Back at theNostromo, Ripley refuses to allow them aboard, citing quarantine regulations, but Ash disobeys her. While the engineers work on ship repairs, Ash attempts to extricate the creature from Kane's face; he stops when he discovers that its highly corrosive acidic blood could harm Kane and damage the ship's hull. The creature eventually detaches itself and dies. After the crew returns to space, Kane awakens and seems well. During a final crew meal before returning to stasis, he suddenly chokes and convulses as asmall alien creature bursts from his chest and escapes into the ship.
After ejecting Kane's body into space, the crew usestracking devices to try to locate and kill the creature. Encountering Jones, Brett follows him into a landing leg compartment,[10] where the now fully-grown alien kills him. The crew determines that the alien is moving around the ship with theair ducts, and Dallas devises a plan to force the creature off the ship with anairlock. Dallas asks Mother about alternative plans to kill the alien, but the computer ominously refuses to answer his questions. Dallas then enters the ducts with aflamethrower, but is ambushed and killed by the alien.
A hysterical Lambert believes that they will all die and suggests abandoning the ship in theescape pod. Ripley, now in command, rejects the plan because the escape pod cannot support the remaining four crew members. Ripley decides they will try Dallas's plan again. She accesses Mother herself and discovers a secret company directive: Ash must return with the alien for study, regardless of risk to the crew. Ash attempts to kill her when confronted, and Parker attacks and incapacitates Ash, only to realize that he is anandroid. Ash states that the alien cannot be killed and expresses admiration for it. Parker incinerates Ash's remains.
With no hope of defeating the alien, Ripley decides to initiate theself-destruct sequence and go ahead with Lambert's plan to abandon the ship. While they are gathering supplies, the alien kills both Parker and Lambert. Now alone, Ripley starts the self-destruct process, but the alien blocks her route to the escape shuttle. Ripley narrowly escapes and turns back to abort the sequence, but fails to return before the override option expires. With only a few minutes left to evacuate, Ripley frantically returns to the shuttle and finds that the alien is gone. She takes Jones, boards the shuttle and launches it seconds before theNostromo explodes.
As Ripley prepares for stasis, she discovers that the alien has stowed itself in a narrow compartment. She dons a spacesuit, loads agrappling hook gun, and straps herself to a chair before she begins discharging gases to drive the alien from its hiding place. It tries to attack her but she opens the shuttle door. Thedepressurization blast leaves the alien clinging to the door frame. Ripley shoots it with the gun, knocking it out, but the door closes on the grapple line, leaving the alien tethered to the ship. As it swings behind anengine nacelle, Ripley fires the engines to sever the line and blast the alien into space. After recording her log entry, she places Jones and herself into stasis to start their return journey to Earth.
Tom Skerritt as Dallas, captain of theNostromo. Skerritt had been approached early in the film's development, but declined as it did not yet have a director and had a very low budget. Later, when Scott was attached as director and the budget had been doubled, Skerritt accepted the role.[11][12]
Sigourney Weaver asRipley, thewarrant officer aboard theNostromo.Meryl Streep was considered for the role, but she was not contacted as her partnerJohn Cazale had recently died.[13]Helen Mirren also auditioned.[14] Weaver, who had Broadway experience but was relatively unknown in film, impressed Scott, Giler, and Hill with her audition. She was the last actor to be cast for the film and performed most of herscreen tests in-studio as the sets were being built.[12][15] The role of Ripley was Weaver's first leading role in a motion picture and earned her nominations for aSaturn Award for Best Actress and aBAFTA award for Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Role.[16]
Veronica Cartwright as Lambert, theNostromo'snavigator. Cartwright had experience in horror and science-fiction films, having acted as a child inThe Birds (1963), and more recently inInvasion of the Body Snatchers (1978).[17] She originally read for the role of Ripley and was not informed that she had instead been cast as Lambert until she arrived in London for wardrobe.[12][18] She disliked the character's emotional weakness,[15] but nevertheless accepted the role: "They convinced me that I was the audience's fears; I was a reflection of what the audience is feeling."[12] Cartwright won aSaturn Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance.[19]
Harry Dean Stanton as Brett, the engineering technician. Stanton's first words to Scott during his audition were, "I don't like sci fi or monster movies".[11] Scott was amused, and convinced Stanton to take the role after reassuring him thatAlien would actually be athriller more akin toTen Little Indians.[11]
John Hurt as Kane, theexecutive officer who becomes the host for the alien. Hurt was Scott's first choice for the role, but he was contracted on a film in South Africa duringAlien's filming dates, soJon Finch was cast as Kane, instead.[15] However, Finch became ill during the first day of shooting and was diagnosed with type 1diabetes, which had also exacerbated a case ofbronchitis.[20] Hurt was in London by this time, his South African project having fallen through, and he quickly replaced Finch.[12][20] His performance earned him a nomination for aBAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.[21]
Ian Holm asAsh, the ship's science officer who is revealed to be anandroid. Holm was acharacter actor, who, by 1979, had already been in 20 films.[22]
Yaphet Kotto as Parker, the chief engineer.[12] Kotto was sent a script off the back of his recent success as villain Dr. Kananga in theJames Bond filmLive and Let Die (1973), and said he rejected a lucrative film offer in the hope of being cast inAlien.[23]
Bolaji Badejo asthe alien. Badejo, a 26-year-old design student, was discovered in a bar by a member of the casting team, who put him in touch with Scott.[15][24] Scott believed that Badejo, at 6 feet 10 inches (208 cm) — 7 feet (210 cm) inside the costume — and with a slender frame,[25] could portray the alien and look as if his arms and legs were too long to be real, creating the illusion that a human being could not possibly be inside the costume.[15][24][26]StuntmenEddie Powell andRoy Scammell also portrayed the alien in some scenes.[26][27]
While studying cinema at theUniversity of Southern California,Dan O'Bannon had made a science-fiction comedy film,Dark Star, with directorJohn Carpenter andconcept artistRon Cobb, with production beginning in late 1970.[29] The film featured an alien (created by spray-painting abeach ball and adding rubber "claws"), which was played for the comedic effect. The experience left O'Bannon "really wanting to do an alien that lookedreal."[29][30] A "couple of years" later he began work on a similar story that would focus more on horror. "I knew I wanted to do a scary movie on a spaceship with a small number of astronauts", he later recalled, "Dark Star as a horror movie instead of a comedy."[29]Ronald Shusett, meanwhile, was working on an early version of what would eventually becomeTotal Recall.[29][30] Impressed byDark Star, he contacted O'Bannon and the two agreed to collaborate on their projects, choosing to work on O'Bannon's film first, as they believed it would be less costly to produce.[29][30]
O'Bannon had written 29 pages of a script titledMemory, containing what would become the opening scenes ofAlien: a crew of astronauts awakens to find that their voyage has been interrupted because they are receiving a signal from a mysterious planetoid. They investigate and their ship breaks down on the surface.[26][30] He did not yet have a clear idea as to what the alien antagonist of the story would be.[29]
O'Bannon soon accepted an offer to work onAlejandro Jodorowsky's adaptation ofDune, a project that took him to Paris for six months.[29][31] Though the project ultimately fell through, it introduced him to several artists whose work gave him ideas for his science-fiction story includingChris Foss,H. R. Giger, andJean "Moebius" Giraud.[26] O'Bannon was impressed by Foss's covers for science-fiction books, while he found Giger's work "disturbing":[29] "His paintings had a profound effect on me. I had never seen anything that was quite as horrible and at the same time as beautiful as his work. And so I ended up writing a script about a Giger monster."[26] After theDune project collapsed, O'Bannon found himself homeless and broke, and returned to Los Angeles where he would borrow Shusett's couch. In need of money he decided to write aspec script the studios would buy,[32] and the two revived hisMemory script. Shusett suggested that O'Bannon use one of his other film ideas, aboutgremlins infiltrating aB-17 bomber duringWorld War II, and set it on the spaceship as the second half of the story.[26][31] Theworking title of the project was nowStar Beast, but O'Bannon disliked this and changed it toAlien after noting the number of times that the word appeared in the script. O'Bannon and Shusett liked the new title's simplicity and its double meaning as both anoun and anadjective.[26][29][33] Shusett came up with the idea that one of the crew members could be implanted with an alien embryo that would burst out of him; he thought this would be an interestingplot device by which the alien could board the ship.[29][31]
Dan [O'Bannon] put his finger on the problem: what has to happen next is the creature has to get on the ship in an interesting way. I have no idea how, but if we could solve that, if it can't be that it just snuck in, then I think the whole movie will come into place. In the middle of the night, I woke up and I said, "Dan I think I have an idea: the alien screws one of them [...] it jumps on his face and plants its seed!" And Dan says, oh my god, we've got it, we've got the whole movie.
O'Bannon drew inspiration from many works of science fiction and horror. He later said: "I didn't stealAlien from anybody. I stole it fromeverybody!"[36]The Thing from Another World (1951) inspired the idea of professional men being pursued by a deadly alien creature through a claustrophobic environment.[36]Forbidden Planet (1956) gave O'Bannon the idea of a ship being warned not to land, and then the crew being killed one by one by a mysterious creature when they defy the warning.[36]Planet of the Vampires (1965) contains a scene in which the heroes discover a giant alienskeleton; this influenced theNostromo crew's discovery of the alien creature in the derelict spacecraft.[36] O'Bannon has also noted the influence of "Junkyard" (1953), a short story byClifford D. Simak in which a crew lands on an asteroid and discovers a chamber full of eggs.[30] He has also cited as influencesStrange Relations byPhilip José Farmer (1960), which covers alien reproduction and variousEC Comics horror titles carrying stories in which monsters eat their way out of people.[30]
With most of the plot in place, Shusett and O'Bannon presented their script to several studios,[29] pitching it as "Jaws in space".[37] They were on the verge of signing a deal withRoger Corman's studio when a friend offered to find them a better deal and passed the script on to Gordon Carroll, David Giler, and Walter Hill, who had formed a production company called Brandywine with ties to20th Century-Fox.[29][38] O'Bannon and Shusett signed a deal with Brandywine, but Hill and Giler were not satisfied with the script and made numerous rewrites and revisions.[29][39] This caused tension with O'Bannon and Shusett, since Hill and Giler had very little experience with science fiction; according to Shusett, "They weren't good at making it better, or, in fact, at not making it even worse."[29] O'Bannon believed that Hill and Giler were attempting to justify taking his name off the script and claiming Shusett's and his work as their own.[29] Hill and Giler did add some substantial elements to the story, including theandroid character Ash, which O'Bannon felt was an unnecessary subplot[22] but which Shusett later described as "one of the best things in the movie...That whole idea and scenario was theirs."[29] Hill and Giler went through eight drafts of the script in total, concentrating largely on the Ash subplot, but also making the dialogue more natural and trimming some sequences set on the planetoid.[40] Despite the fact that the final shooting script was written by Hill and Giler, theWriters Guild of America awarded O'Bannon sole credit for the screenplay.[41]
20th Century-Fox did not express confidence in financing a science-fiction film. However, after the success ofStar Wars in 1977, its interest in the genre rose substantially. According to Carroll: "WhenStar Wars came out and was the extraordinary hit that it was, suddenly science fiction became the hot genre." O'Bannon recalled that "They wanted to follow through onStar Wars, and they wanted to follow through fast, and the only spaceship script they had sitting on their desk wasAlien".[29]Alien wasgreenlit by 20th Century-Fox, with an initial budget of $4.2 million.[29][40] It was funded by North Americans, but made by 20th Century-Fox's British production subsidiary.[42]
O'Bannon had originally assumed that he would directAlien, but 20th Century-Fox instead asked Hill to direct.[40][43] Hill declined due to other film commitments, as well as not being comfortable with the level of visual effects that would be required.[44]Peter Yates,John Boorman,[45]Jack Clayton,Robert Aldrich, andRobert Altman were considered for the task, but O'Bannon, Shusett, and the Brandywine team felt that these directors would not take the film seriously and would instead treat it as aB monster movie.[43][46][47] According to Cobb,Steven Spielberg was also considered to direct the film and was interested but prior obligations prevented him from directing the film.[48] Giler, Hill, and Carroll had been impressed by Ridley Scott's debut feature filmThe Duellists (1977) and made an offer to him to directAlien, which Scott quickly accepted.[26][46] Scott created detailedstoryboards for the film in London, which impressed Fox enough to double the film's budget.[11][43] His storyboards included designs for the spaceship andspace suits, drawing on such films as2001: A Space Odyssey andStar Wars.[11][49] However, he was keen on emphasizing horror inAlien rather than fantasy, describing the film as "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre of science fiction".[43][46]
Casting calls andauditions were held in New York City and London.[11] With only seven human characters in the story, Scott sought to hire strong actors so he could focus most of his energy on the film's visual style.[11] He employed casting directorMary Selway, who had worked with him onThe Duellists, to head the casting in the United Kingdom, while Mary Goldberg handled casting in the United States.[12][50] In developing the story, O'Bannon had focused on writing the alien first, putting off developing the other characters.[43] Scott initially envisioned Ripley to be a male, but he later changed the character to be a female after Ladd said "why can't Ripley be a woman".[51] Shusett and he had intentionally written all the roles generically; they made a note in the script that explicitly states, "The crew is unisex and all parts are interchangeable for men or women."[12][52] This freed Scott, Selway, and Goldberg to interpret the characters as they pleased, and to cast accordingly. They wanted theNostromo's crew to resemble working astronauts in a realistic environment, a concept summarized as "truckers in space".[11][12] According to Scott, this concept was inspired partly byStar Wars, which deviated from the pristine future often depicted in science-fiction films of the time.[53]
To assist the actors in preparing for their roles, Scott wrote several pages of backstory for each character explaining their histories.[40][54] He filmed many of their rehearsals to capture spontaneity and improvisation, and tensions between some of the cast members, particularly towards the less-experienced Weaver; this translated convincingly to film as tension between the characters.[54]Roger Ebert notes that the actors inAlien were older than was typical inthriller films at the time, which helped make the characters more convincing:
None of them were particularly young. Tom Skerritt, the captain, was 46, Hurt was 39 but looked older, Holm was 48, Harry Dean Stanton was 53, Yaphet Kotto was 42, and only Veronica Cartwright at 30 and Weaver at 28 were in the age range of the usual thriller cast. Many recent action pictures have improbably young actors cast as key roles or sidekicks, but by skewing older,Alien achieves a certain texture without even making a point of it: These are not adventurers but workers, hired by a company to return 20 million tons of ore to Earth.[55]
David A. McIntee, the author ofBeautiful Monsters: The Unofficial and Unauthorized Guide to the Alien and Predator Films, asserts that part of the film's effectiveness in frightening viewers "comes from the fact that the audience can all identify with the characters...Everyone aboard theNostromo is a normal, everyday, working Joe just like the rest of us. They just happen to live and work in the future."[56]
Ridley Scott filmed model shots of theNostromo and its attached ore refinery. He made slow passes filming at2+1⁄2 frames per second to give the models the appearance of motion.[26]
Alien was filmed over 14 weeks from July 5 to October 21, 1978.[57] Principal photography took place atPinewood Studios andShepperton Studios near London, while model and miniature filming was done atBray Studios inWater Oakley,Berkshire.[50] The production schedule was short due to the film's low budget and pressure from 20th Century-Fox to finish on time.[54]
A crew of over 200 craftspeople and technicians constructed the three principal sets: the surface of the alien planetoid, and the interiors of theNostromo and the derelict spacecraft.[26] Art director Les Dilley created1⁄24-scale miniatures of the planetoid's surface and derelict spacecraft based on Giger's designs, then mademoulds andcasts and scaled them up as diagrams for the wood andfiberglass forms of the sets.[11] Tons of sand, plaster, fiberglass, rock, and gravel were shipped into the studio to sculpt a desert landscape for the planetoid's surface, which the actors would walk across wearing space-suit costumes.[26] The suits were thick, bulky, and lined withnylon, had no cooling systems, and initially, no venting for their exhaledcarbon dioxide to escape.[58] Combined with aheat wave, these conditions nearly caused the actors to pass out; nurses had to be kept on-hand with oxygen tanks.[54][58]
All of the visuals on the computer screens on theNostromo's bridge arecomputer-generated imagery (CGI). The staff used CGI because it was easier than any alternative.[59]
For scenes showing the exterior of theNostromo, a 58-foot (18 m) landing leg was constructed to give a sense of the ship's size. Scott was not convinced that it looked large enough, so he had his two young sons and the son ofDerek Vanlint (the film's cinematographer) stand in for the regular actors, wearing smaller space suits to make the set pieces seem larger.[58][60] The same technique was used for the scene in which the crew members encounter the dead alien creature in the derelict spacecraft. The children nearly collapsed due to the heat of the suits; oxygen systems were eventually added to help the actors breathe.[54][58] Four identical cats were used to portray Jones, the crew's pet.[50] During filming, Weaver discovered that she wasallergic to the combination of cat hair and theglycerin placed on the actors' skin to make them appear sweaty. By removing the glycerin she was able to continue working with the cats.[20][54]
Alien originally was to conclude with the destruction of theNostromo while Ripley escapes in the shuttleNarcissus. However, Scott conceived of a "fourth act" in which Ripley is forced to confront the alien on the shuttle. He pitched the idea to 20th Century-Fox and negotiated an increase in the budget to film it over several extra days.[22][61] Scott had wanted the alien to bite off Ripley's head and make the final log entry in her voice, but the producers vetoed this idea, because they believed the alien should die at the end of the film.[61]
Editing and post-production took roughly 20 weeks and concluded in late January 1979.[62] The sound effects editor, Terry Rawlings, had previously collaborated with Scott on sound effects editing forThe Duellists.[62] Scott and Rawlings edited much ofAlien to have a slow pace to build suspense for the more tense and frightening moments. According to Rawlings: "I think the way we did get it right was by keeping it slow, funny enough, which is completely different from what they do today. And I think the slowness of it made the moments that you wanted people to be sort of scared...then we could go as fast as we liked because you've sucked people into a corner and then attacked them, so to speak. And I think that's how it worked."[62] The first cut of the film was over three hours long; the final version is just under two hours.[62][63]
One scene that was cut from the film occurred during Ripley's final escape from theNostromo; she encounters Dallas and Brett, who have been partiallycocooned by the alien. O'Bannon had intended the scene to indicate that Brett was becoming an alien egg, while Dallas was held nearby to be implanted by the resulting facehugger.[38] Production designer Michael Seymour later suggested that Dallas had "become sort of food for the alien creature",[60] while Ivor Powell suggested that "Dallas is found in the ship as an egg, still alive."[62] Scott remarked, "they're morphing,metamorphosing, they are changing into...being consumed, I guess, by whatever the alien's organism is...into an egg."[22] The scene was cut partly because it did not look realistic enough, but also because it slowed the pace of the escape sequence.[38][61] Tom Skerritt remarked that "The picture had to have that pace. Her trying to get the hell out of there, we're all rooting for her to get out of there, and for her to slow up and have a conversation with Dallas was not appropriate."[62] The footage was included with other deleted scenes as a special feature on the 1992 Collector's EditionLaserDisc release ofAlien, and a shortened version of it was reinserted into the 2003 Director's Cut, which was re-released in theaters and onDVD.[38][64]
The musical score was composed byJerry Goldsmith, conducted byLionel Newman, and performed by theNational Philharmonic Orchestra. Scott had originally wanted the film to be scored byIsao Tomita, but Fox wanted a more familiar composer and Goldsmith was recommended by then-president of FoxAlan Ladd Jr.[65] Goldsmith wanted to create a sense of romanticism and lyrical mystery in the film's opening scenes, which would build throughout the film to suspense and fear.[62] Scott did not like Goldsmith's original main title piece, however, so Goldsmith rewrote it as "the obvious thing: weird and strange, and which everybody loved."[62][65] Another source of tension was editorTerry Rawlings' choice to use pieces of Goldsmith's music from previous films, including a piece fromFreud: The Secret Passion, and to use an excerpt fromHoward Hanson's Symphony No. 2 ("Romantic") for the end credits.[62][65][66][67]
Scott and Rawlings had also become attached to several of the musical cues they had used for the temporary score while editing the film, and re-edited some of Goldsmith's cues and rescored several sequences to match these cues and even left the temporary score in place in some parts of the finished film.[62] Goldsmith later said, "You can see that I was sort of like going at opposite ends of the pole with the filmmakers."[62] Nevertheless, Scott praised Goldsmith's score as "full of dark beauty"[65] and "seriously threatening, but beautiful".[62] It was nominated for aGolden Globe Award for Best Original Score, aGrammy Award for Best Soundtrack Album, and it won aBAFTA Award for Best Film Music.[68][69][70] The score has been released as asoundtrack album in several versions with different tracks and sequences.[71]
The "facehugger" was the first creature Giger designed for the film, giving it human-like fingers and a long tail.[24][72]
The "chestburster" was shoved up through the table and a false torso by a puppeteer.[24] The scene has been recognized as one of the film's most memorable.
O'Bannon introduced Scott to the artwork ofH. R. Giger; both of them felt that his paintingNecronom IV was the type of representation they wanted for the film's antagonist and began asking the studio to hire him as a designer.[43][46] Fox initially believed Giger's work was too ghastly for audiences, but the Brandywine team were persistent and eventually won out.[46] According to Gordon Carroll: "The first second that Ridley saw Giger's work, he knew that the biggest single design problem, maybe the biggest problem in the film, had been solved."[43] Scott flew toZürich to meet Giger and recruited him to work on all aspects of the alien and its environment including the surface of the planetoid, the derelict spacecraft, and all four forms of the alien from the egg to the adult.[43][46]
The scene of Kane inspecting the egg was shot in post-production. Afiberglass egg was used so that actor John Hurt could shine his light on it and see movement inside, which was provided by Scott fluttering his hands inside the egg while wearing rubber gloves.[73] The top of the egg was hydraulic, and the innards were a cow's stomach andtripe.[24][73] Test shots of the eggs were filmed using hen's eggs, and this footage was used in early teaser trailers. For this reason, the image of a hen's egg was used on the poster and has become emblematic of the franchise as a whole—as opposed to the alien egg that appears in the finished film.[73]
The "facehugger" and itsproboscis, which was made of a sheep'sintestine, were shot out of the egg using high-pressure air hoses. The shot was reversed and slowed down in editing to prolong the effect and reveal more detail.[24][73] The facehugger itself was the first creature that H.R. Giger designed for the film, going through several versions in different sizes before deciding on a small creature with human-like fingers and a long tail.[24][72] Dan O'Bannon, with help from Ron Cobb, drew his own version based on Giger's design, which became the final version.[22][72] Cobb came up with the idea that the creature could have a powerful acid for blood, a characteristic that would carry over to the adult Alien and would make it impossible for the crew to kill it by conventional means, such as guns or explosives, since the acid would burn through the ship's hull.[22][31] For the scene in which the dead facehugger is examined, Scott used pieces of fish andshellfish to create itsviscera.[24][73]
For the filming of the chestburster scene, the cast members knew that the creature would be bursting out of Hurt, and had seen the chestburster puppet, but they had not been told that fake blood would also be bursting out in every direction from high-pressure pumps andsquibs.[20][75] The scene was shot in one take using an artificial torso filled with blood and viscera, with Hurt's head and arms coming up from underneath the table. The chestburster was shoved up through the torso by a puppeteer who held it on a stick. When the creature burst through the chest, a stream of blood shot directly at Cartwright, shocking her enough that she fell over and went into hysterics.[20][24][26] According to Tom Skerritt, "What you saw on camera was the real response. She had no idea what the hell happened. All of a sudden this thing just came up."[24] The creature then runs off-camera, an effect accomplished by cutting a slit in the table for the puppeteer's stick to go through and passing an air hose through the puppet's tail to make it whip about.[24]
The real-life surprise of the actors gave the scene an intense sense of realism and made it one of the film's most memorable moments. During preview screenings, the crew noticed that some viewers would move towards the back of the theater so as not to be too close to the screen during the sequence.[63] The scene has frequently been called one of the most memorable moments in cinema history.[76] In 2007,Empire named it as the greatest18-rated moment in film, ranking it above thedecapitation scene inThe Omen (1976) and the transformation sequence inAn American Werewolf in London (1981).[77]IGN ranked it the 10th-best film moment of all time.[78]
For the scene in which Ash is revealed to be an android, a puppet was created of his torso and upper body, which was operated from underneath.[54] During a preview screening, this scene caused an usher to faint.[63][79] In the following scene, Ash's head is placed on a table and reactivated; for portions of this scene, ananimatronic head was made using a face cast of Holm.[61] However, the latex of the head shrank while curing and the result was not entirely convincing.[54] For the bulk of the scene, Holm knelt under the table with his head through a hole. Milk, caviar, pasta,fiber optics, andFoley urinary catheters were combined to form the android innards.[54][61]
Giger made several conceptual paintings of the adult alien before settling on the final version. He sculpted the body usingplasticine, incorporating pieces such asvertebrae from snakes and cooling tubes from aRolls-Royce.[15][24] The head was manufactured separately byCarlo Rambaldi, who had worked on the aliens inClose Encounters of the Third Kind.[80] Rambaldi followed Giger's designs closely, making some modifications to incorporate the moving parts that would animate the jaw and inner mouth.[24] A system of hinges and cables was used to operate the rigid tongue, which protruded from the mouth and featured a second mouth at its tip with its own set of movable teeth.[24] The final head had about 900 moving parts and points of articulation.[24] Part of ahuman skull was used as the "face", and was hidden under the smooth, translucent cover of the head.[15] Rambaldi's original alien jaw is now on display in theSmithsonian Institution.[61] In April 2007, the original alien suit was sold at auction.[81] Copious amounts ofK-Y Jelly were used to simulatesaliva and give the alien a slimy appearance.[24][72] The alien vocalizations were provided byPercy Edwards, avoice artist who had provided bird sounds for British television throughout the 1960s and 1970s and the whale sounds forOrca: Killer Whale (1977).[65][82]
In most scenes, the alien was portrayed by Bolaji Badejo. A latex costume was made to fit Badejo's slender 6-foot-10-inch (208 cm) frame by taking a full-body plaster cast.[24][26] Scott later said that the alien "takes on elements of the host – in this case, a man".[46] Badejo attendedtai chi andmime classes to create convincing movements.[15][24] For some scenes, such as when the alien lowers itself from the ceiling to kill Brett, it was portrayed by stuntmen Eddie Powell and Roy Scammell.[26][27] Powell, in costume, was suspended on wires and then lowered in an unfurling motion.[24][73]
Scott chose not to show the full alien for most of the film, keeping most of its body in shadow to create a sense of terror and heighten suspense. The audience could thus project their own fears into imagining what the rest of the creature might look like:[24] "Every movement is going to be very slow, very graceful, and the alien will alter shape so you never really know exactly what he looks like."[26] Scott said: "I've never liked horror films before, because in the end it's always been a man in a rubber suit. Well, there's one way to deal with that. The most important thing in a film of this type is not what you see, but the effect of what youthink you saw."[26]
The alien has been referred to as "one of the most iconic movie monsters", and its biomechanical appearance and sexual overtones have been frequently noted.[83]Roger Ebert wrote that "Alien uses a tricky device to keep the alien fresh throughout the movie: it evolves the nature and appearance of the creature, so we never know quite what it looks like or what it can do... The first time we get a good look at the alien, as it bursts from the chest of poor Kane (John Hurt). It is unmistakably phallic in shape, and the critic Tim Dirks mentions its 'open, dripping vaginal mouth'."[55]
The sets of theNostromo's three decks were each created almost entirely in one piece, with each deck occupying a separate stage. The actors had to navigate through the hallways that connected the stages, adding to the sense ofclaustrophobia and realism.[26][54][72] The sets used largetransistors and low-resolution computer screens to give the ship a "used", industrial look and make it appear as though it was constructed of "retrofitted old technology".[60]Ron Cobb created industrial-style symbols and color-coded signs for various areas and aspects. The symbols, which Cobb calledSemiotic Standard, aimed to give theNostromo "a standardized, multi-lingual, industrial look"[84] and to create a sense of being lost in machines, to aid Scott's metaphor of the ship as aGothic castle or World War II submarine.[60]
The company that owns theNostromo is not named in the film, and is referred to by the characters as "the company". However, the name and logo of the company appears on several set pieces and props such as computer monitors and beer cans as "Weylan-Yutani".[85] Cobb created the name to imply a business alliance between Britain and Japan, deriving "Weylan" from theBritish Leyland Motor Corporation and "Yutani" from the name of his Japanese neighbor.[86][87] The 1986 sequel,Aliens, named the company "Weyland-Yutani",[86][88] and it has remained a central aspect of the franchise.
Art directorRoger Christian used scrap metal and parts to create set pieces and props to save money, a technique he employed while working onStar Wars.[60][89] For example, some of theNostromo's corridors were created from portions of scrappedCanberra bomber aircraft, and a mirror was used to create the illusion of longer corridors in the below-deck area.[60] Special-effects supervisorsBrian Johnson and Nick Allder made many of the set pieces and props function, including moving chairs, computer monitors, motion trackers, and flamethrowers.[20][26]
Giger designed and worked on all the alien aspects, which he designed to appear organic andbiomechanical in contrast to the industrial look of theNostromo and its human elements.[26][60] For the interior of the derelict spacecraft and egg chamber, he used dried bones withplaster to sculpt the scenery and elements.[26][60] Veronica Cartwright described Giger's sets as "so erotic...it's big vaginas and penises...the whole thing is like you're going inside of some sort of womb or whatever...it's sort of visceral."[60] The set with the deceased alien creature, which the production team nicknamed the "space jockey", proved problematic, as 20th Century-Fox did not want to spend the money for such an expensive set that would only be used for one scene. Scott described the set as thecockpit or driving deck of the mysterious ship, and the production team convinced the studio that the scene was important to impress the audience and make them aware that this was not aB movie.[60][73] To save money, only one wall of the set was created, and the "space jockey" sat atop a disc that could be rotated to facilitate shots from different angles in relation to the actors.[26][73] Gigerairbrushed the entire set and the "space jockey" by hand.[60][73]
The origin of the jockey creature is not explored, but Scott later theorized that it might have been the ship's pilot, and that the ship might have been a weapons-carrier capable of dropping alien eggs onto a planet so that the aliens could use the local lifeforms as hosts.[22] In early versions of the script, the eggs were to be located in a separate pyramid structure, which would be found later by theNostromo crew and would contain statues andhieroglyphs depicting the alien reproductive cycle, contrasting the human, alien, and space-jockey cultures.[31] Cobb, Foss, and Giger each created concept artwork for these sequences, but they were discarded due to budgetary concerns and the need to shorten the film.[26] Instead, the egg chamber was set inside the derelict ship and was filmed on the same set as the space-jockey scene; the entire disc piece supporting the jockey and its chair was removed and the set was redressed to create the egg chamber.[26] Light effects in the egg chamber were created by lasers borrowed from English rock bandthe Who. The band was testing the lasers for use in their stage show on the sound stage next door.[90]
I resent films that are so shallow they rely entirely on their visual effects, and of course science-fiction films are notorious for this. I've always felt that there's another way to do it: a lot of effort should be expended toward rendering the environment of the spaceship, or space travel, whatever the fantastic setting of your story should be–as convincingly as possible, but always in the background. That way the story and the characters emerge andthey become more real.
O'Bannon brought in artists Ron Cobb and Chris Foss, with whom he had worked onDark Star andDune respectively, to work on designs for the human aspects such as the spaceship and space suits.[43][86] Cobb created hundreds of preliminary sketches of the interiors and exteriors of the ship, which went through many design concepts and possible names such asLeviathan andSnark as the script developed. The final name was derived from the title ofJoseph Conrad's 1904 novelNostromo, while the escape shuttle, calledNarcissus in the script, was named after Conrad's 1897novellaThe Nigger of the 'Narcissus'.[85] The production team particularly praised Cobb's ability to depict the interior settings of the ship in a realistic and believable manner. Under Scott's direction, the design of theNostromo shifted towards an 800-foot-long (240 m) tug towing a refining platform 2 miles (3.2 km) long and 1.5 miles (2.4 km) wide.[26] Cobb also created some conceptual drawings of the alien, which went unused.[43][86] Moebius was attached to the project for a few days and his costume renderings were the basis for the final space suits created by costume designer John Mollo.[26][86]
The spaceships and planets were shot using models and miniatures. These included models of theNostromo, its attached mineral refinery, the escape shuttleNarcissus, the alien planetoid, and the exterior and interior of the derelict spacecraft. Visual-effects supervisor Brian Johnson and supervising modelmakerMartin Bower and their team worked at Bray Studios, roughly 25 miles (40 km) from Shepperton Studios.[91][92] The designs of theNostromo and its attachments were based on combinations of Scott's storyboards and Ron Cobb's conceptual drawings.[91] The basic outlines of the models were made of wood and plastic, and most of the fine details were added frommodel kits of warships, tanks, and World War II bombers.[citation needed]
Three models of theNostromo were made: a 12-inch (30 cm) version for medium and long shots, a 4-foot (1.2 m) version for rear shots, and a 12-foot (3.7 m), 7-short-ton (6.4 t) rig for the undocking and planetoid surface sequences.[26][92] Scott insisted on numerous changes to the models even as filming was taking place, leading to conflicts with the modeling and filming teams. TheNostromo was originally yellow, and the team filmed shots of the models for six weeks before Johnson left to work onThe Empire Strikes Back. Scott then ordered it changed to gray, and the team had to begin shooting again from scratch.[91][92] He asked that more and more pieces be added to the model such that the final version (with the refinery) required a metal framework so that it could be hoisted by a forklift. He also took a hammer and chisel to sections of the refinery, knocking off many of the spires that Bower had spent weeks creating. Scott also had disagreements with miniature-effects cinematographerDennis Ayling over how to light the models.[91]
A separate model, about 40 feet (12 m) long, was created for theNostromo's underside from which theNarcissus would detach and from which Kane's body would be launched during the funeral scene. Bower carved Kane's burialshroud out of wood; it was launched through the hatch using a smallcatapult and filmed at high speed. The footage was slowed down in editing.[91][80] Only one shot was filmed usingblue-screen compositing – that of the shuttle racing past theNostromo. The other shots were simply filmed against black backdrops, with stars added bydouble exposure.[92] Thoughmotion control photography technology was available at the time, the budget would not allow for it. Instead, the team used a camera with wide-angle lenses mounted on a drive mechanism to make slow passes over and around the models filming at2+1⁄2 frames per second,[26] giving them the appearance of motion. Scott added smoke and wind effects to enhance the illusion.[91] For the scene in which theNostromo detaches from the refinery, a 30-foot (9.1 m) docking arm was created using pieces from model railway kits. TheNostromo was pushed away from the refinery by a forklift covered in black velvet, causing the arm to extend out from the refinery. This created the illusion that the arm was pushing the ship forward.[91][92] Shots of the ship's exterior in which characters are seen moving around inside were filmed using larger models, which contained projection screens displaying pre-recorded footage.[91]
A separate model was created for the exterior of the derelict alien spacecraft.Matte paintings were used to fill in areas of the ship's interior, as well as exterior shots of the planetoid's surface.[91] The surface as seen from space during the landing sequence was created by painting a globe white, then mixing chemicals and dyes ontotransparencies and projecting them onto it.[26][92] The planetoid was not named in the film, but some drafts of the script gave it the name Acheron[15] afterthe river which inGreek mythology is described as the "stream of woe"; it is a branch of the riverStyx, and forms the border ofHell inDante'sInferno. The 1986 sequelAliens named the planetoid as "LV-426",[88] and both names have been used for it in subsequentexpanded-universe media such as comic books and video games.
The title sequence was developed byR/Greenberg Associates "to instill a sense of foreboding, the letters broken into pieces, the space between them unsettling."[93] It is referenced as one of the most iconic opening sequences of all time.[94]
"It was the most incredible preview I've ever been in. I mean, people were screaming and running out of the theater."[79]
—Editor Terry Rawlings describing the film's screening in Dallas.
An initial screening ofAlien for 20th Century-Fox representatives inSt. Louis was marred by poor sound. A subsequent screening in a newer theater inDallas went significantly better, eliciting genuine fright from the audience.[79] Two theatricaltrailers were shown to the public. The first consisted of rapidly changing still images set to some of Jerry Goldsmith's electronic music fromLogan's Run, with the tagline in both the trailer and on the teaser poster "A word of warning...". The second used test footage of a hen's egg set to part of Goldsmith'sAlien score.[63] The film was previewed in various American cities in the spring of 1979[63] and was promoted with thetagline "In space no one can hear you scream",[79][95] which was written byBarbara Gips, husband ofPhilip Gips, who designed the poster.[96]
Alien wasrated "R" in the United States, "X" in the United Kingdom, and "M" in Australia.[50] In the UK, theBritish Board of Film Censors almost passed the film as an "AA" (for ages 14 and over), although concerns existed over the prevalent sexual imagery. 20th Century-Fox eventually relented in pushing for an AA certificate after deciding that an X rating would make it easier to sell as a horror film.[97]
Alien had its world premiere as a midnight screening on May 24, 1979, at theSeattle International Film Festival[98] and opened in alimited release in American theaters on May 25.[95][99] Moviegoers lined up for blocks to see the film atGrauman's Egyptian Theatre inHollywood, where a number of models, sets, and props were displayed outside to promote it during its first run.[63][79] It received awide release in the United States on June 22.[100] Vandalsset fire to the model of the space jockey, believing it to be the work of thedevil.[63] The film started its international release in Japan on July 20 and then Brazil on August 20.[101] In the United Kingdom,Alien premiered at a gala performance at the 33rdEdinburgh International Film Festival on September 1, 1979,[102][103] before starting an exclusive run at theOdeon Leicester Square in London on Thursday, September 6, 1979,[104] for one week before expanding slowly until opening wide in Britain in 180 theaters on October 1, 1979.[101] The film opened in France and Spain in September before expanding to other markets in October 1979.[101]
The film was a commercial success, opening in 90 theaters across the United States (plus 1 in Canada), setting 51 house records and grossing $3,527,881 over the four-dayMemorial Day weekend with a per-screen average of $38,767,[5] whichDaily Variety suggested may have been the biggest per-screen opening in history.[105] It was thenumber one film in the United States where it remained for three weeks.[106] In its first 4 weeks it grossed $16.5 million from only 148 prints before expanding to 635 screens.[5] In the UK, the film opened at theOdeon Leicester Square in London and grossed£71,988 in its opening week, the biggest opening week of all-time for any cinema in the UK, to become the number one film in the UK.[107][108] It remained at number one for eight weeks.[109]By the beginning of October 1979, the film had grossed $27 million internationally including $16.9 million in Japan, $4.8 million in France and $3.7 million in the UK.[101] It went on to gross $78.9 million in the United States and£7,886,000 in the United Kingdom during its first run.[63] Including reissues, it has grossed $81.8 million in the United States and Canada, while international box-office figures have varied from $24 million to $122.7 million. Its total worldwide gross has been listed within the range of $104.9 million[5] to $188 million.[6] In 1992, Fox noted the worldwide gross was $143 million.[110]
20th Century Fox claimed thatAlien lost $2 million in the 11 months following its release. The claim was decried by industry accountants as an example ofHollywood creative accounting, used to disguise the revenue and limit any payments to Brandywine. By August 1980, Fox readjusted the figure to $4 million profit, although this was similarly refuted. Eager to begin work on a sequel, Brandywine sued Fox over their profit distribution tactics, but Fox claimed thatAlien was not a financial success and did not warrant a sequel. The lawsuit was settled in 1983 when Fox agreed to fund a sequel.[111]
Critical reaction toAlien was initially mixed. Some critics who were not usually favorable towards science fiction, such asBarry Norman of theBBC'sFilm series, were positive about the film's merits.[63] Others, however, were not; reviews byVariety,Sight and Sound,Vincent Canby, andLeonard Maltin[b] were mixed or negative.[113] A review byTime Out said the film was an "empty bag of tricks whose production values and expensive trickery cannot disguise imaginative poverty".[114] In their original review onSneak Previews, criticsGene Siskel andRoger Ebert gave the film "two 'yes' votes." Ebert called it "one of the scariest old-fashioned space operas I can remember." Siskel agreed that it was scary but said it was basically a "haunted house film" set "in a spaceship" and was "not the greatest science fiction film ever made."[115] Siskel gave the film three stars out of four in his original print review, calling it "an accomplished piece of scary entertainment" and praising Sigourney Weaver as "an actress who should become a major star," but listed among the film's disappointments that "[f]or me, the final shape of the alien was the least scary of its forms."[116]
Alien has been released in manyhome video formats and packages over the years. The first of these was a 17-minuteSuper-8 version for home projectionists.[122] It was also released on bothVHS andBetamax forrental, which grossed it an additional $40,300,000 in the United States alone.[63] Several VHS releases were subsequently issued both separately and asboxed sets.LaserDisc andVideodisc versions followed, including deleted scenes and director commentary as bonus features.[122][123] A VHS box set containingAlien and its sequelsAliens andAlien 3 was released in facehugger-shaped boxes, and included some of the deleted scenes from the Laserdisc editions.[123] In addition, all three films were released onTHX certified widescreen VHS releases in 1997.[124] WhenAlien Resurrection premiered in theaters that year, another set of the first three films was released including aMaking of Alien Resurrection tape. A few months later, the set was re-released with the full version ofAlien Resurrection taking the place of the making-of video.[123]Alien was released onDVD in 1999, both separately and, asThe Alien Legacy, packaged withAliens,Alien 3 andAlien Resurrection.[125] This set, which was also released in a VHS version, included a commentary track by Ridley Scott.[122][123] The first three films of the series have also been packaged as theAlien Triple Pack.
"The traditional definition of the term 'Director's Cut' suggests the restoration of a director's original picture, free of any creative limitations. It suggests that the filmmaker has finally overcome the interference of heavy-handed studio executives, and that the film has been restored to its original, untampered form. Such is not the case withAlien: The Director's Cut. It's a completely different beast."[126]
In 2003, 20th Century Fox was preparing theAlien Quadrilogy DVD box set, which would includeAlien and its three sequels. In addition, the set would also include alternative versions of all four films in the form of "special editions" and "director's cuts". Fox approached Scott to digitally restore and remasterAlien, and to restore original scenes which had been cut during the editing process for inclusion in an expanded version of the film.[126] Upon viewing the expanded version, Scott felt that it was too long and chose to recut it into a more streamlined alternative version:
Upon viewing the proposed expanded version of the film, I felt that the cut was simply too long and the pacing completely thrown off. After all, I cut those scenes out for a reason back in 1979. However, in the interest of giving the fans a new experience withAlien, I figured there had to be an appropriate middle ground. I chose to go in and recut that proposed long version into a more streamlined and polished alternate version of the film. For marketing purposes, this version is being called "The Director's Cut."[126]
The "Director's Cut" restored around four minutes of deleted footage, while cutting about five minutes of other material, leaving it about a minute shorter than the theatrical cut.[63] Many of the changes were minor, such as new sound effects, trimming of some shots to speed up the film's pace and the removal of the "What Are My Chances?" scene. The restored footage included the scene in which Ripley discovers the cocooned Dallas and Brett during her escape of theNostromo. Fox released the Director's Cut in theaters on October 31, 2003.[63] TheAlien Quadrilogy boxed set was released December 2, 2003, with both versions of the film included along with a new commentary track featuring many of the film's actors, writers, and production staff, as well as other special features and a documentary entitledThe Beast Within: The Making of Alien. Each film was also released separately as a DVD with both versions of the film included. Scott noted that he was very pleased with the original theatrical cut ofAlien, saying that "For all intents and purposes, I felt that the original cut ofAlien was perfect. I still feel that way", and that the original 1979 theatrical version "remains my version of choice".[126] He has since stated that he considers both versions "director's cuts", as he feels that the 1979 version was the best he could possibly have made it at the time.[126]
TheAlien Quadrilogy set earnedAlien a number of new awards and nominations. It won DVDX Exclusive Awards for Best Audio Commentary and Best Overall DVD, Classic Movie, and was also nominated for Best Behind-the-Scenes Program and Best Menu Design.[127] It also won aSaturn Award for Best DVD, and was nominated for Best DVD Collection and GoldenSatellite Awards for Best DVD Extras and Best Overall DVD.[128] In 2010 both the theatrical version and Director's Cut ofAlien were released onBlu-ray Disc, as a stand-alone release and as part of theAlien Anthology set.[129]
In 2014, to mark the film's 35th anniversary, a special re-release boxed set namedAlien: 35th Anniversary Edition, containing the film onBlu-ray, adigital copy, a reprint ofAlien: The Illustrated Story, and a series of collectible art cards containing artwork by H.R. Giger related to the film, was released.[130] Asoundtrack album was released, featuring selections of Goldsmith's score. Additionally, asingle of the Main Theme was released in 1980,[71] and a disco single using audio excerpts from the film was released in 1979 on the UK labelBronze Records by a recording artist under the nameNostromo.[131]Alien was re-released onUltra HD Blu-ray and 4K digital download on April 23, 2019, in honor of the film's 40th anniversary.[132] The 4k Blu-ray Disc presents the film in 2160p resolution withHDR10high-dynamic-range video. Several previously released bonus features on the 4k Blu-ray include audio commentary from director Ridley Scott, cast and crew, the final isolated theatrical score and composer's original isolated score by Jerry Goldsmith, and deleted and extended scenes.[133]
Critics have analyzedAlien's sexual overtones. The film is often cited as a major work ofabjection, as outlined byJulia Kristeva in her 1980 workPowers of Horror. According to Kristeva, the abject refers to that which signifies the breakdown of conventional borders and rules. It confronts the subject with the fallibility of the human body and societal norms, and thus exposes how the supposedly sacred distinctions between what is Self and what is Other are arbitrary.[134] She suggests that this confrontation—often manifesting in excrement, bodily invasion, and corpses—is an inherently traumatic interruption of subjectivity, and thus all evidence of abjection is hidden in conventional society. Much ofAlien's effectiveness as a work of horror has been attributed to its use of abject themes and imagery, a narrative strategy that has made Kristeva's abject a major framework for feminist and psychoanalytic critics such as Barbara Creed. Following Creed's assertion that the alien creature is a representation of the "monstrous-feminine asarchaic mother",[135] Ximena Gallardo C. and C. Jason Smith compared the facehugger's attack on Kane to a male rape and the chestburster scene to a form of violent birth, noting that the alien'sphallic head and method of killing the crew members add to the sexual imagery.[136][137] Dan O'Bannon, who wrote the film's screenplay, has argued that the scene is a metaphor for the male fear of penetration, and that the "oral invasion" of Kane by the facehugger functions as "payback" for the many horror films in which sexually vulnerable women are attacked by male monsters.[138] David McIntee claims that "Alien is a rape movie as much asStraw Dogs (1971) orI Spit on Your Grave (1978), orThe Accused (1988). On one level, it's about an intriguing alien threat. On one level it's aboutparasitism and disease. And on the level that was most important to the writers and director, it's about sex, and reproduction by non-consensual means. And it's about this happening to a man."[139] He notes how the film plays on men's fear and misunderstanding of pregnancy and childbirth, while also giving women a glimpse into these fears.[140]
Alternatively, H.R. Giger's xenomorph design has been interpreted through the lens of "machinic modernism," an aesthetic movement reacting to industrialization and social upheaval, linked to proto-fascist ideology (New Cinemas 2023).[141] The xenomorph embodies traits such as armoured aggression, zoomorphism, and hierarchical social organization, reflecting anti-humanist ideals that valorize violence and dominance. Eden contextualizes the creature alongside works byWyndham Lewis andJacob Epstein, whose art similarly celebrated hardened, phallic forms as responses to modernity's destabilizing forces. The alien's role in the narrative—eliminating a flawed, liberal crew to pave the way for Ripley's emergent leadership—mirrors proto-fascist fantasies of elite replacement, where a "heroic" figure (Ripley) justifies authoritarian reorganization by contrast to both weak democracies (the crew) and totalitarian horrors (the xenomorphs).[141] This framing draws on insights of Professor Anne Quema who observed that 'Giger in particular, and the Gothic in general, belong to the twentieth century trend of anti-humanist representation of identity. This iconoclastic project has its roots in early European avant-gardism so that Epstein'sRock-Drill [...] and Giger's biomechanoids are part of the same genealogy.'[142] These readings, challenge the view of the xenomorph as a purely feminist return of the repressed,[135] or as a boundary-defying deconstructive symbol,[143] instead framing it as a "vanishing mediator" that consolidates fascistic subjectivity through its phallic coherence and mythic violence.
Film analyst Lina Badley has written that the alien's design, with strongFreudian sexual undertones, multiple phallic symbols, and overall feminine figure, provides anandrogynous image conforming toarchetypal mappings and imageries in horror films that often redraw gender lines.[144] O'Bannon described the sexual imagery as overt and intentional: "I am going to put in every image I can think of to make the men in the audience cross their legs. Homosexual oral rape, birth. The thing lays its eggs down your throat, the whole number."[145]
Some have argued the film's narrative details and visual design were inspired by those of the 1965 Italian filmPlanet of the Vampires(top), such as a scene in which the crew discovers a ruin containing giant alien skeletons.[146]
Alien's roots in earlier works of fiction have been analyzed and acknowledged extensively by critics. The film has been said to have much in common with B movies such asThe Thing from Another World (1951),[55][147]Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954),[148]It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958),[36][83]Night of the Blood Beast (1958),[149] andQueen of Blood (1966),[150]as well as its fellow 1970s horror filmsJaws (1975) andHalloween (1978).[55] Literary connections have also been suggested: Philip French of theGuardian has perceived thematic parallels with Agatha Christie'sAnd Then There Were None (1939).[147] Many critics have also suggested that the film derives in part fromA. E. van Vogt'sThe Voyage of the Space Beagle (1950), particularly its stories "The Black Destroyer", in which a cat-like alien infiltrates the ship and hunts the crew, and "Discord in Scarlet", in which an alien implants parasitic eggs inside crew members which then hatch and eat their way out.[151][152] O'Bannon denies that this was a source of his inspiration forAlien's story.[30] Van Vogt in fact initiated a lawsuit against 20th Century Fox over the similarities, but Fox settled out of court.[153]
Several critics have suggested that the film was inspired by Italian filmmakerMario Bava'scultclassicPlanet of the Vampires (1965), in both narrative details and visual design.[154] Rick Sanchez ofIGN has noted the "striking resemblance"[155] between the two movies, especially in a celebrated sequence in which the crew discovers a ruin containing the skeletal remains of long-dead giant beings, and in the design and shots of the ship itself.[156]Cinefantastique also noted the remarkable similarities between these scenes and other minor parallels.[156] Robert Monell, on the DVD Maniacs website, observed that much of the conceptual design and some specific imagery inAlien "undoubtedly owes a great debt" to Bava's film.[157] Despite these similarities, O'Bannon and Scott both claimed in a 1979 interview that they had not seenPlanet of the Vampires;[158] decades later, O'Bannon would admit: "I stole the giant skeleton from thePlanet of the Vampires."[159]
WriterDavid McIntee, as well as reviewers forPopMatters andDen of Geek, have noted similarities to theDoctor Who serialThe Ark in Space (1975), in which an insectoid queen alien layslarvae inside humans which later eat their way out, a life cycle inspired by that of theichneumon wasp.[30][160][161] McIntee also noted similarities between the first half of the film, particularly in early versions of the script, toH. P. Lovecraft'sAt the Mountains of Madness, "not in storyline, but in dread-building mystery",[162] and calls the finished film "the best Lovecraftian movie ever made, without being a Lovecraft adaptation", due to its similarities in tone and atmosphere to Lovecraft's works.[56] In 2009, O'Bannon said the film was "strongly influenced, tone-wise, by Lovecraft, and one of the things it proved is that you can't adapt Lovecraft effectively without an extremely strong visual style ... What you need is a cinematic equivalent of Lovecraft's prose."[163] H. R. Giger has said he liked O'Bannon's initialAlien storyline "because I found it was in the vein of Lovecraft, one of my greatest sources of inspiration."[164]
Findings from an international audience research project conducted by staff fromAberystwyth University,Northumbria University andUniversity of East Anglia were published in 2016 byPalgrave Macmillan asAlien Audiences: Remembering and Evaluating a Classic Movie. 1,125 people were surveyed about their memories and opinions of the film in order to test some of the theories offered by academics and critics about why the film became so popular and why it has endured for so long as a masterpiece. The study discusses memories ofAlien in the cinema and on home video from the point of view of everyday audiences, describing how many fans share the film with their children and the shocking impact of the "chestburster" scene, among other things.[165]
In a 1980 episode ofSneak Previews discussing science fiction films of the 1950s and 1970s, the reviewers were critical ofAlien.Roger Ebert reiteratedGene Siskel's earlier opinion, stating that the film was "basically just an intergalactic haunted house thriller set inside a spaceship". He described it as one of several science fiction pictures that were "real disappointments" compared toStar Wars,Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and2001: A Space Odyssey. However, in both episodes Ebert singled out the early scene of theNostromo's crew exploring the alien planet for praise, calling the scene "inspired", said that it showed "real imagination" and claimed that it transcended the rest of the film.[167] Over two decades later, Ebert had revised his opinion, including the film on hisGreat Movies list, where he gave it four stars and said it was "a great original".[168] In 1980,Alien was mentioned inCinefantastique's chronological recap of the top films of the 1970s but was not included in the article's "Decade's Top Ten" list.Frederick S. Clarke, theCinefantastique editor, wrote thatAlien was "an exercise in style, refreshingly adult in approach, wickedly grim and perverse, that manages to compensate for a lack of depth in both story and characters".[169] In 1982,John Simon of theNational Review praised the cast, particularly Weaver, and the visual values. He wrote: "For fanciers of horror, among whose numbers I do not count myself,Alien is recommendable, provided they are free from hypocrisy and finicky stomachs".[170]
Despite initial mixed reviews,Alien has received critical acclaim over the years, particularly for its realism and unique environment,[83] and is cited one of the best films of 1979.[171][172] It is seen as one of the most influential science-fiction films.[173][174] It holds a 93% rating onRotten Tomatoes, based on 208 reviews and an average rating of 9.1/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "A modern classic,Alien blends science fiction, horror and bleak poetry into a seamless whole."[175]Metacritic reports a weighted average score of 89 out of 100 based on 34 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[176]Halliwell's Film Guide awarded it a full four stars, describing it as "a classic of suspense and art direction".[114] Alan Jones ofRadio Times awarded it five out of five, describing it as a "revolutionary 'haunted house in space' thrill-ride [...] stunning you with shock after shock", praising the "top-notch acting [...] and imaginative bio-mechanical production design", as well as "Ridley Scott's eye for detail and brilliant way of alternating false scares with genuine jolts, which help to create a seamless blend of gothic horror and harrowing science fiction".[177]
Critical interest in the film was re-ignited with the theatrical release of the "Director's Cut" in 2003. Roger Ebert ranked it among "the most influential of modern action pictures" and praised its pacing, atmosphere, and settings:
One of the great strengths ofAlien is its pacing. It takes its time. It waits. It allows silences (the majestic opening shots are underscored by Jerry Goldsmith with scarcely audible, far-off metallic chatterings). It suggests the enormity of the crew's discovery by building up to it with small steps: The interception of a signal (is it a warning or anSOS?). The descent to the extraterrestrial surface. The bitching by Brett and Parker, who are concerned only about collecting their shares. The masterstroke of the surface murk through which the crew members move, their helmet lights hardly penetrating the soup. The shadowy outline of the alien ship. The sight of the alien pilot, frozen in his command chair. The enormity of the discovery inside the ship ("It's full of ... leathery eggs ...").[55]
David A. McIntee praisesAlien as "possibly the definitive combination of horror thriller with science fiction trappings."[56] He notes that it is a horror film first and a science fiction film second, since science fiction normally explores issues of how humanity will develop under other circumstances.Alien, on the other hand, focuses on the plight of people being attacked by a monster: "It's set on a spaceship in the future, but it's about people trying not to get eaten by a drooling monstrous animal. Worse, it's about them trying not to get raped by said drooling monstrous animal."[56] Along withHalloween andFriday the 13th (1980), he describes it as a prototype for theslasher film genre: "The reason it's such a good movie, and wowed both the critics, who normally frown on the genre, and the casual cinema-goer, is that it is a distillation of everything that scares us in the movies."[56] He also describes how the film appeals to a variety of audiences: "Fans ofHitchcockian thrillers like it because it's moody and dark. Gorehounds like it for the chest-burster. Science fiction fans love thehard science fiction trappings and hardware. Men love the battle-for-survival element, and women love not being cast as the helpless victim."[178]
David Edelstein wrote, "Alien remains the key text in the 'body horror' subgenre that flowered (or, depending on your viewpoint, festered) in the seventies, and Giger's designs covered all possible avenues of anxiety. Men traveled through vulva-like openings, got forcibly impregnated, and died giving birth to rampaging gooey vaginas dentate — how's that for future shock? This was truly whatDavid Cronenberg would call 'the new flesh,' a dissolution of the boundaries between man and machine, machine and alien, and man and alien, with a psychosexual invasiveness that has never, thank God, been equaled."[179]
In 2008, theAmerican Film Institute rankedAlien the seventh-best science fiction film as part ofAFI's 10 Top 10, aCBS television special ranking the greatest movies in ten classic American film genres. The ranks were based on apoll of over 1,500 film artists, critics, and historians, withAlien ranking just aboveTerminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) and just below Scott's other science fiction filmBlade Runner (1982).[180] The same year,Empire namedAlien the 33rd-greatest film, based on a poll of 10,200 readers, critics, and members of the film industry.[181] In 2021, Phil Pirrello ofSyfy named it the second-scariest science fiction film. He described it as a "groundbreaking science fiction classic" and "a movie so influential that it's hard to think of a time beforeAlien".[182]
"The 1979Alien is a much more cerebral movie than its sequels, with the characters (and the audience) genuinely engaged in curiosity about this weirdest of lifeforms...Unfortunately, the films it influenced studied its thrills but not its thinking."[55]
Alien had both an immediate and long-term effect on the science fiction and horror genres. Shortly after its debut,Dan O'Bannon was sued by another writer named Jack Hammer for allegedly plagiarising a script entitledBlack Space. However, O'Bannon was able to prove that he had written hisAlien script first.[183] In the wake ofAlien's success, a number of other filmmakers imitated or adapted some of its elements, sometimes by using "Alien" in titles. One of the first wasThe Alien Dead (1979), which had its title changed at the last minute to cash in onAlien's popularity.[184]Contamination (1980) was initially going to be titledAlien 2 until 20th Century Fox's lawyers contacted writer/directorLuigi Cozzi and made him change it. The film built onAlien by having many similar creatures, which originated from large, slimy eggs, bursting from characters' chests.[184] An unauthorized sequel toAlien, titledAlien 2: On Earth, was released in 1980 and included alien creatures which incubate in humans. Other science fiction films of the time that borrowed elements fromAlien includeGalaxy of Terror (1981),Inseminoid (1981),Forbidden World (1982),Xtro (1982), andDead Space (1991).[184]
The "chestburster" effect was parodied inMel Brooks's comedySpaceballs. Near the end, in a diner, John Hurt does a cameo appearance as a customer who seems to be suffering indigestion. He turns out to have an "alien" in his gut, and moans, "Oh, no...not again!" The "alien" then does a song-and-dance, singing a line of "Hello, Ma Baby", from the classic Warner Bros. cartoonOne Froggy Evening.[185]
Nintendo's long-runningMetroid video game series, created in 1986, was significantly influenced byAlien, both in stylistic and thematic elements. As an homage toAlien, villains inthe firstMetroid installment were named Ridley and Mother Brain, after the movie's director and the ship computer, respectively.[186]
Notably, atPaisley Abbey, during a restoration project that took place in the 1990s, a stonemason fromEdinburgh hired to replace twelve crumbling stonegargoyles erected one bearing a strong resemblance to the space creature from the film.[187][188] A picture of the gargoyle went viral in 2013, though a photograph of the statue first surfaced on the internet in 1997.[189] In 2002, it was confirmed the abbey would be subject to a 10-year-long restoration project.
InSFR Yugoslavia the film and its sequels were distributed under the titleOsmi putnik (transl.Eighth Traveller).[190] The highly popular Yugoslav and laterCroatianhard rock bandOsmi Putnik chose their name after the film.[191]
In 2019, authorJ. W. Rinzler publishedThe Making of Alien, a behind-the-scenes book about the making of the film with cast and crew interviews and previously unseen photographs.The Verge praised the book as "the definitive story of the classic horror film".[195]
Eli Roth citesAlien as his primary influence, saying "I sawAlien when I was 8 years old. To me, it was like a combination ofJaws andStar Wars and that's the movie that made me want to be a director. It traumatized me. I actually threw up I was so nervous after I saw it but that's like the highest compliment you can give a horror film."[196]Ty Franck, one of the authors behind the sci-fi seriesThe Expanse, creditsAlien as one of his major inspirations.[197]
Alan Dean Foster wrote a novelization of the film in both adult and "junior" versions, which was adapted from the film's shooting script.[65]Heavy Metal magazine publishedAlien: The Illustrated Story, agraphic novel adaptation of the film scripted byArchie Goodwin and drawn byWalt Simonson, as well as a 1980Aliencalendar.[65] Two behind-the-scenes books were released in 1979 to accompany the film.The Book of Alien contained many production photographs and details on the making of the film, whileGiger's Alien contained much of H. R. Giger's concept artwork for the movie.[65] Amodel kit of the alien, 12 inches high, was released by theModel Products Corporation in the United States, and byAirfix in the United Kingdom.[122]Kenner also produced a larger-scale Alien action figure, as well as a board game in which players raced to be first to reach the shuttle pod while Aliens roamed theNostromo's corridors and air shafts.[122] OfficialHalloween costumes of the alien were released in October 1979.[122]
In 2019, students atNorth Bergen High School in New Jersey adapted the film into a play. The production had no budget, with props and sets developed from recycled toys and other items. Social media recognition brought Scott's attention to the play. He wrote a letter of congratulations to the students ("My hat comes off to all of you for your creativity, imagination, and determination") and recommended they consider an adaptation of his filmGladiator for their next stage production.[198] He donated to the school to put on an encore performance at which Weaver was in attendance. She got on stage before the performance to congratulate the cast and crew for their creativity and commitment.[199]
In 1982, Fox Video Games released anAlien video game for theAtari 2600. With gameplay reminiscent ofPac-Man, in it the player traverses a maze collecting items and destroying alien eggs, while avoiding the creature.[200]Argus Press Software made another game calledAlien in 1984 for theCommodore 64,ZX Spectrum, andAmstrad CPC computers, a straighter adaptation of the film where after Kane's death the player controls the crew of theNostromo roaming the ship in search for the alien.[201][202]
The 2014 video gameAlien: Isolation, which serves as a partial sequel toAlien in featuring Ripley's daughter Amanda trying to find out the whereabouts of her mother 15 years after the destruction of theNostromo, had two downloadable content packs titledCrew Expendable andLast Survivor depicting alternate versions of key events from the film, with the original cast members Sigourney Weaver, Tom Skerrit, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, and Yaphet Kotto reprising their respective roles.[203]
Crew Expendable centers around the events of the movie after Brett's disappearance in the air ducts, prompting the crew to attempt to force the alien into the airlock. Unlike the film, where Dallas would be the first to attempt this while armed with a flamethrower, the game provides the player with the option to play as Ripley, Dallas, or Parker, which would result in the chosen character to enter the ducts first.
Last Survivor focuses on the climax of the film, where Ripley is left to be the last crew member and proceeds to self-destruct theNostromo.
In 2023, anAlien Chapter DLC was released for the multiplayer asymmetrical horror gameDead by Daylight. It included theXenomorph andEllen Ripley as a playable Killer and Survivor, respectively. The Nostromo was added as a Map in the form of theNostromo Wreckage, where players can interact with the environment and spot Easter-eggs such asJonesy the Cat, and aFacehugger. The Xenomorph's Power allows it to enterCrawler Mode, where it runs on all fours, gains access to a Tail Attack, and becomes stealthier. Its secondary ability involves Tunnels that it can enter and travel quickly around the Map, gaining Crawler Mode quicker while inside them. Survivors are able to collect Flame Turrets from these tunnels, which, once placed down, can indicate if the Xenomorph is near, and will spew a stream of fire if it gets close enough, potentially forcing it out of Crawler Mode. The Xenomorph can destroy these turrets, which will force Survivors to collect new ones. Notable Cosmetics that players can buy and equip include theXenomorph Queen fromAliens, theGrid Xenomorph fromAlien vs. Predator, a Human-Xenomorph Hybrid based on theNewborn fromAlien Resurrection, and Rain Carradine fromAlien: Romulus as a Skin for Ripley. Sigourney Weaver's likeness was not used for Ellen Ripley, and neither did she voice the character.
Sigourney Weaver became the star of theAlien films, reprising her role as Ripley in three sequels between 1986 and 1997. She did not appear in either of theAlien vs. Predator crossovers of the 2000s, but has expressed interest in doing a fifthAlien film.
The success ofAlien led20th Century Fox to finance three directsequels over the next eighteen years, each by different writers and directors.Sigourney Weaver remained the only recurring actor through all four films: the story of her characterRipley's encounters with thealiens became the thematic and narrative core of the series.[55]James Cameron'sAliens (1986) focused more on action and involved Ripley returning to the planetoid accompanied bymarines to confront hordes of aliens.[88]David Fincher'sAlien 3 (1992) hadnihilistic tones[56] and found her on a prison planet battling another Alien, ultimately sacrificing herself to prevent her employers from acquiring the creatures.[204]Jean-Pierre Jeunet'sAlien Resurrection (1997) saw Ripley resurrected throughcloning to battle more aliens even further in the future.[205]
Sigourney Weaver has expressed interest in reuniting with Ridley Scott to revive her character for anotherAlien film. In the 2003 commentary track for theAlien DVD included in theAlien Quadrilogy set, she and Scott both speculated on the possibility, with Weaver stating: "There is an appetite for a fifth one, which is something I never expected...it's really hard to come up with a fifth story that's new and fresh...but I have wanted to go back into space...I think outer space adventure is a good thing for us right now, 'cause Earth is so grim...so we've been talking about it, but very generally."[22] Scott remarked that, if the series were to continue, the most logical course would be to explore the origins of the space jockey and the aliens.[209] Weaver supported this idea, saying "I think it would be great to go back, because I'm asked that question so many times: 'Where did the alien come from?' People really want to know in a very visceral way."[22]David Giler said that he,Walter Hill, andGordon Carroll, the producers of the first four films in the series, would not be willing to produce another unless it was about the aliens' homeworld and Weaver was on board (despite the fact that they were among the producers ofAlien vs. Predator films). Weaver indicated that she would only return to the franchise if either Scott orJames Cameron were to direct.[210] Cameron had been working on a story for a fifthAlien film which would explore the origins of the creatures, but ceased work on it when he learned that Fox was pursuingAlien vs. Predator, which he felt would "kill the validity of the franchise".[211][212]
In July 2009, 20th Century Fox announced thatJon Spaihts had been hired to write a prequel toAlien, with Scott attached to direct.[213] The script was subsequently re-worked by Scott andDamon Lindelof. TitledPrometheus, it went into production in May 2011, and was released the following year. Scott said in a statement: "WhileAlien was indeed the jumping-off point for this project, out of the creative process evolved a new, grand mythology and universe in which this original story takes place. The keen fan will recognize strands ofAlien's DNA, so to speak, but the ideas tackled in this film are unique, large and provocative."[214]
Variety reported on February 18, 2015, that a newAlien film would be developed byNeill Blomkamp.[215] On February 25, it was confirmed thatSigourney Weaver would have a role in the film,[216] the intent being to produce a direct sequel toAliens, ignoring the events of later films, featuring the characters of Hicks and Newt.[217] Blomkamp's sequel was ultimately shelved by Fox in favor ofAlien: Covenant, a continuation of Scott's prequel,Prometheus.[218][219] An eventual fifthAlien film,Alien: Romulus, set between the events ofAlien andAliens, was released in 2024, directed byFede Álvarez. A television series titledAlien: Earth, developed byNoah Hawley, released on streaming onHulu in 2025. Severalcomputer gamesbased on the film were released, but not until several years after its theatrical run.[122]
^Official documentation for the film states that the budget was $11 million, but other sources give different numbers.Sigourney Weaver has stated that it was $14 million, whileRidley Scott,Ivor Powell, andTom Skerritt have each recalled it being closer to $8.4 million.[4]
^Maltin reassessed the film upon the release of the Director's Cut and gaveAlien a positive review.[112]
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^abcdefghijklmnopqrstuv"The Eighth Passenger: Creature Design",The Beast Within: The Making of Alien
^Clark, Frederick S.; Jones, Alan (1979)."Bolaji Bodejo: The Alien".Cinefantastique. Oak Park, Illinois, USA: Frederick S. Clark.Archived from the original on August 13, 2014. RetrievedSeptember 21, 2014.
^Scott, Ridley (2004).The Force Is With Them: The Legacy of Star Wars (Star Wars Trilogy DVD box set, audio commentary track). Los Angeles:Lucasfilm Ltd. and20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, Inc.Within the context of that fantasy [George Lucas] said people still have to wash behind their ears at night. That was another wonderful touch. It influenced me when I didAlien. I thought I better push it a bit further and make them truck drivers.
^abcdefghij"Fear of the Unknown: Shepperton Studios, 1978",The Beast Within: The Making of Alien.
^abcMackinder, Adrian (January 1, 2002)."Alien (1979) Movie Review".Future Movies.Archived from the original on December 22, 2013. RetrievedJuly 2, 2008.
^Cobb, Ron (1981).Colorvision. Wild and Woolley. pp. 60–61.ISBN978-0909331436.
^Mollo, John;Cobb, Ron.The Authorized Portfolio of Crew Insignias from the United States Commercial Spaceship Nostromo, Designs and Realizations.One of the things I enjoyed most about "ALIEN" was its subtle satirical content. [...] "Weylan-Yutani" for instance is almost a joke, but not quite. I wanted to imply that poor old England is back on its feet and has united with the Japanese, who have taken over the building of spaceships the same way they have now with cars and supertankers. In coming up with a strange company name, I thought of British Leyland andToyota, but we couldn't use "Leyland-Toyota" in the film. Changing one letter gave me "Weylan", and "Yutani" was a Japanese neighbor of mine. [...] "Weylan-Yutani" now only appears on the beer can, underwear, and some stationary, so the joke sort of got lost.
^abcd"Fox's 'Alien' Wows Alien Filmgoers".Variety. October 10, 1979. p. 28.
^Malcolm, Derek (September 6, 1979). "Something nasty lurking amid the good old Alien corn: Derek Malcolm reviews the new films in London and Edinburgh".The Guardian.
^Kristeva, Julia. [Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection]
^abCreed, Barbara. "Alien and The Monstrous-Feminine."Alien Zone: Cultural Theory and Contemporary Science Fiction Cinema. Ed.Annette Kuhn. London: Verso, 1990. 128-141.
^Badley, Lina (1995).Film, Horror, and the Body Fantastic: Contributions to the Study of Popular Culture. Westport, CT:Greenwood Press. p. 120.ISBN978-0-313-27523-4.
^Sanchez, Rick (February 27, 2002)."Planet of the Vampires".dvd review. San Francisco: IGN Entertainment, Inc. p. 1.Archived from the original on March 8, 2005. RetrievedApril 10, 2012.
^abFrentzen, Jeffrey.Cinefantastique Magazine, Volume 8, Number 4, 1979, pgs. 24 – 25. "Alien: It! The Terror from Beyond the Planet of the Vampires"
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^J.W.Rinzler.The Making of Alien, Titanbooks, 2019, page 22.
^The date in which the events ofAlien are set is not revealed in the film itself, but the first draft of the script gave the year as 2087. McIntee, 23.
^Ridley Scott (Director) (2003).Alien (DVD (audio commentary track)).20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, Inc.It's a tough one, particularly with the success of four. I think if you close the lid it should be the end of the first chapter, and I think very simply what no one's done is simply gone back to re-visit 'what was it?' No one's ever said 'who's the space jockey?' He wasn't an Alien. What was that battleship? Is it a battleship? Is it an aircraft carrier? Is it a bio-mechanoid weapon carrier?...Why did it land? Did it crash-land, or did it settle there because it had engine trouble?...And how long ago? 'Cause those eggs would sit there.
Anderson, Craig W. "Alien".Science Fiction Films of the Seventies. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1985. Print. 217–224.
Bell-Meterau, Rebecca. "Woman: The Other Alien inAlien".Women Worldwalkers: New Dimensions of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Ed. Weedman, Jane B. Lubbock, Tex: Texas Tech Press, 1985. Print. 9-24.
Elkins, Charles, ed. "Symposium onAlien". (Jackie Byars, Jeff Gould, Peter Fitting, Judith Lowder Newton, Tony Safford, Clayton Lee).Science-Fiction Studies 22.3 (Nov. 1980): 278–304.
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