With ‘Alien – The Uncanny Creature from a Strange World’, Ridley Scott (‘Napoleon’) would write film history in the late 1970s. The chamber play, creepy masterpiece starring Sigourney Weaver had a lasting influence not only on the science fiction but also on the horror genre and is now one of the most discussed and cited reference works in the field of atmospheric suspense. cinema.
A few years later, ‘Aliens: The Return’ was no longer directed by Ridley Scott, but by ‘Avatar’ creator James Cameron. As the ‘Gladiator’ director said in an interview with Now explained, this decision not only angered him at the time, but also hurt him. The reason for this is quite understandable:
That’s why Ridley Scott was angry
“When I found out someone else was going to make the film, I actually tried to do it myself. [einen zweiten Teil] to develop. When James Cameron called me, he told me it was a difficult task because my creation was so unique. It would be hard for him to make it that scary again. So he said he wanted to approach it in a more action-packed, military way. I thought to myself, ‘Welcome to Hollywood’.”
Ultimately, it wasn’t a bad decision that ‘Alien 2’ consciously distanced itself from its predecessor in terms of tone and staging. So James Cameron has managed to avoid constant comparisons with the style-defining original – and with the sequel he has delivered a multi-layered masterpiece of his own. In the conversation, Ridley Scott further explains:
“James and I talk often. We’re not exactly friends, but we talk and he’s a great guy. I was angry. I would never have told James that, but I think I was hurt. I knew I had delivered something very special, something unique. I was hurt, deeply hurt, I think I was pretty beat up at that point because I was trying to recover from Blade Runner.”
Even though ‘Blade Runner’ is now widely praised as the work of the century and should also have a lasting influence on cinema, the dystopian science fiction thriller starring Harrison Ford was a complete flop in the early 1980s. Moreover, the press could not do anything with the film. After ‘Alien’, Ridley Scott suffered a bitter setback with ‘Blade Runner’ – and his sadness and anger at not being allowed to shoot ‘Alien 2’ (a certain success thanks to the first part) is more than understandable.