Escape to the Movies: Prometheus

[Headbiter]

I'm pretty sure the machine said "This procedure is only available for male patients" when Shaw asked it for a cesarean (c-section). I guess the joke was supposed to be that in the future, males carry babies Junior style, while for some reason the operation has grown completely obsolete for women. It's just a dumb idea that served as a small joke/obstacle to create tension.

WoW, it's like you didn't even watch the scene at all. The machine can't perform a c-section, because it's only programmed for male patients. Not because males are the ones who carry children, which is completely retarded.


Think about why it would only be programmed for males if it was in vickers lifeboat. The answer is pretty obvious, it's not for her, it's for Weyland. Even she wasn't important enough for one, it's a pretty subtle way to further show the relationship between them.

No, it's not like I didn't watch the scene at all. It's like I don't have the exact wording of the sentence written down in front of me and that's how I took it when I first heard it.

Furthermore, I didn't say males are "the ones" that carry children, I said that if that's the case, C-sections for women are obsolete in the film's future. They still have their vaginas.

Speaking of retarded, how right you are. It's anything but retarded to introduce a universal healing machine which the main protagonist actually knows of, of which there are 12, meaning, this isn't a unique piece of equipment, and not so much as foreshadow that they're all either programmed for men or women? Or how about this idea on its face? Why should it possibly be for "men only"? Okay, let's assume Weyland specifically rigged the thing not to serve women. What then? Why the fuck does it still perfectly execute an operation, without checking for a dingdong or nothing?

See, one of these options is a stupid throwaway line, basically a bad joke, and the other is simply dumb writing, like a whoooole lot of other things in this movie. Take your pick.

You gotta admire though how he defends total BS with even more total BS and keeps a straight face while doing so. It's why fans are so amusing.

So let's buy the BS that there's ANY situation, where a medical engineering company says "Hey, we should invest in and build a machine that can perform surgery,in its essence a high-precision profession, but refuses to perform it on one gender."

We also accept then, that mentioned company doesn't immediately go bankrupt and indeed not only builds such a machine but designes it in such a way, that despite its restriction it can't tell man or woman apart and intentionally performs its duty like a hillbilly lumberjack, should the "wrong" gender - which he cannot identify - use its service.

Let us further accept the BS, that they take only ONE such machine on this huge ship to this expedition into deep space with a number of people. Which, may I remind you, cost billions of dollars and was started solely because a woman "chose to believe" that mankind was constructed by aliens. That means they spent BILLIONS of Dollars for a wild goose chase but refused to invest in another surgery-machine.

We then accept that they pick a male-only model, and only a male-only model, when the commanding whatsoever is a woman, who made a very clear point that she doesn't want to leave anything to chance as far as her safety is concerned. By extension we thereby accept that they imagined a scenario where Weyland is in need of major surgery but they cannot conceive a possibility where a woman could require the same or similar surgery.

And on top of that giant pile of BS we are now asked to accept, that they put this thing in VICKER's appartment, because she has a "certain kind of relationship" with Weyland.

Okay, I'll play. Construct me now a scenario, if you will, that will bring up the need to perform major surgery ONLY on Weyland and is MOST LIKELY to happen in Vickers', the "woman in charge", room AND IN NO OTHER ROOM on the ship, including Weyland's room, given how he clearly tried to keep his presence on the ship concealed AND the frigging sickbay.

I'm looking forward to that explanation with glee and anticipation.

 

[Callate]

I saw this yesterday, and I essentially agree with Bob's review. It's a watchable film, competently put together and well-acted, but it also has some significant problems, and might well have been stronger if they had omitted the "Alien Prequel" aspect altogether.

My biggest problems follow in spoiler.

Spoiler

1. Having made a point that the two members who were left behind are exactly the opposite of interested in coming into contact with alien life- are, in fact, going out of their way to avoid doing so- why, then, do we still pull this "let's get way too close to something whose closest immediate Earthly comparison would be a cobra" business?

2. For @#$%'s sake, stop taking off your helmets, you idiots. We later establish that our heroine's father died of Ebola- she, if no one else, damn well ought to know better.

3. Did you know that the goop/aliens can turn a corpse into a zombie capable of walking back to the ship in an inhospitable atmosphere, absorbing gunfire and flames like it wasn't a thing, and killing off all the superfluous crew in the space of minutes? Hello, applied phlebotinum.

4. Was there something cut out of the script that was supposed to make us want Charlize Theron's character to die off in an ignominious fashion? She's kind of cold, yeah, but especially given the gratuitous reveal that she isn't even really in charge of the expedition, it's not a death I'm rooting for.

5. My, but that Engineer makes it from the bridge of the crashed ship to forcing open the airlock of the "lifeboat" in short order, doesn't he?

There's some other stuff I'm a little more willing to hand-wave. Basically, when it's being science fiction, it's stronger- some elements like David keeping occupied through two years of the crew's suspended animation are particularly well handled. When it's being a thriller, people act in stupid thriller ways and stupid thriller cliches make their ugly faces apparent.

 

[adamtm]

The whole movie is just a collection of movie-clichés.
If Prometheus wanted to be something more than a creature-feature it would needed to try harder.

Right now its up there wit The Core as "dumb fun".

If you're judging it as a creature-feature, it falls massively short in that department. Like I said before, here's the list of "monsters":

Bald oversized humans who don't get enough sun.
A facehugger without the facehugging.
A squid.
& a step down from the original flick's monster.

All the really impressive visuals typically involved huge barren environments or microscopic close ups, not monsters.

I'm trying to give the movie the benefit of the doubt, the "best" aspect was the creature-feature aspect of them movie, but that doesn't mean it was good in that aspect.

What it definitely wasn't is a hard sci-fi movie, or a philosophical piece about man meeting his maker.
In essence theres only two ways of looking at Prometheus.

Its either a horrible attempt at sci-fi, or a mediocre creature-feature.

The best case scenario is still a failure.

---

I encourage everyone to go see an in-depth analysis of the first Alien movie by SFDebris:

http://blip.tv/sf-debris-opinionated-reviews/alien-review-part-1-6191679

Notice how in Alien, the characters are professionals, flawed, yes, but professionals at what they do.
They are professionals that are thrust into a horrible situation outside of their expertise and knowledge.
They are miners, they weren't trained for first contact, alien infections or other crap that happens.

Whereas in Prometheus the team is selected -specifically- for a job (alien contact and research) but act like teenagers on a roadtrip.
Thats where the dissonance comes from.

The -only- way this makes sense in Prometheus is if Wayland specifically selected the dumbest bunch of people for the job in the hope they would all get killed. OR if Wayland just got a "FUCK NO!" from every sensible human being on the planet that he asked to go on the mission and was forced to take those retards instead because he REALLY REALLY wanted to go.

In which case Prometheus is an unfunny dark comedy.

 

[Headbiter]

It's not that hard a concept to grasp.

It is, very much so. In your desperate attempt to make this lazy screenwriting make sense however, you ignore the most basic of questions.

But it did perform surgery on her. It wasn't programmed to only accept males.

First: That was anything, but no surgery. And on that matter, I haven't even touched yet how a woman who just got a shitload of painkillers in her system and had herself cut open like a turkey simply walks that experience off.

Second: Whatever it did there, it shouldn't have done it according to its OWN statement. Why would it even bring up the whole "only for men"-thing, if it performs the intervention anyway? Why, if it was "configured" for Weyland wouldn't it say so or at least show it on a display, instead of spouting that "only for men"-BS?

There is no "wrong" gender, it simply wasn't programmed with the surgery she requested, simply because it was configured for Weyland's personal use.

Like I said, basic, logical questions: WHY - THE - HELL would anyone create a fully automated machine for surgical interventions that ISN'T capable of doing them all? Especially when it comes to things like a cesarian: They're in deep space, a few men and women alone. What if, for whatever reason, they were out there for a longer time, one of the women got pregnant and there were complications with the birth? Suck it, you only downloaded the "old dying man"-application? It's mindbogglingly stupid.
And what does that even mean "configured for Weyland"? It's frigging surgery, so as long as the old guy doesn't hide his heart in his skull, there's not much to "configure".
Apart from that and just for protocol, you're still pulling that "It's for Weyland"-stuff right out of the darker places of your body.

It was implied in the beginning of the movie that this surgery machine cost a lot more than the entire expedition to the planet.

Which is just another one of those things you only accept if you don't think about it at all. How in the blazes does a surgical unit cost "a lot more" than a space ship, fuel for this space ship, a paid team of scientists and what the f*** else is on that ship to ensure the survival of the crew?

First, it's not a "male only" model, as it was able to perform surgery on a female

Second, it simply stated that it was configured for use by a male occupant, in this case Weyland. Who wouldn't need female only surgeries.

Third, Weyland didn't want anyone else using the machine.

See all the above + you're making stuff up again.

I get the feeling that the "lifeboat" wasn't intended for Vickers, but was for Weyland. Actually I'm pretty sure his sleep pod thing was on the lifeboat as well.

Then why would she lead them there? You want to tell me, he wanted to stay undetected on the ship and the first thing his...whatever Theron was does, is to lead the entire Southpark-cast right into his secret life boat and explicitly explain about that wondrous surgical unit he "doesn't want anyone else to use"?
Wow. Congratulations. In your version of the movie, the characters are even dumber than they originally were.

And done, it's not that hard when you actually think about it.

Sorry, all you've done is throw up even more confused ideas that make no sense and turn the characters in even bigger dunces. You just guess and ignore what was presented right there in the movie and still you can't make it sound reasonable.

Oh and what I absolutely love...

You and Hammer seem to have a hard time understanding such a relatively small part of the film that it's a wonder you can even understand any of it.

That phrase. "*whine* You just don't undershtand it." Of course we understand it. Who the hell wouldn't understand it? Sorry, but that movie isn't half as deep and philosophical as it likes to pretend to be. It's just that the more you think, actually THINK about what happens there the less sense it makes and the more contrived reasons and ideas you have to come up with to create any sense. Example: Your entire "Vickers' stuff actually belongs to Weyland"-theory. Giant made-up theory to stuff a idiotic plothole.
To paraphrase Spoony: The only reason there is a movie is that all the characters behave like frigging mouthbreathers.

And yeah, you're right that it's a small part of the film and yet it's so half-assed it makes the entire scene completely ridiculous. And it's by far not the only one at that. If we were to discuss every idiocy in every post, we'd have half an encyclopedia in no time.

Want to know the real reason for this whole surgery-mess? They wanted a shock-moment. One of those "Be disturbed"-moments for the audience. That's all. A surgery-machine that has to perform a cesarian on a concious woman, although it's supposedly only for men, so the surgery gets sloppy and "disturbing". Whole story.

 

[whiffleball]

Want to know the real reason for this whole surgery-mess? They wanted a shock-moment. One of those "Be disturbed"-moments for the audience. That's all. A surgery-machine that has to perform a cesarian on a concious woman, although it's supposedly only for men, so the surgery gets sloppy and "disturbing". Whole story.

Not much of a disturbing surgery, if you count it as that. Hell, the whole surgery consisted of swabbing her stomach with iodine, lasering a hole, pulling out mess, and then stitching her up. Why wasn't there any blood when the opened a whole in her stomach? Why didn't machine do something with the "foreign object" after it removed it, but instead left it dangling above her? Also, it kind of looked like horizontal Caesarean anyways.

As for the helmets thing, that seemed to only be used as an example of the guy's reckless behavior. But if that was the case, why did we need to show him to be reckless? He didn't do anything else in the movie that I can remember. Also, the movie is set in the future. They could have just had a throwaway line from someone else saying that the atmosphere scanner detected no biological particles in the air? That way everyone else wouldn't look like an idiot.

 

[adamtm]

Want to know the real reason for this whole surgery-mess? They wanted a shock-moment. One of those "Be disturbed"-moments for the audience. That's all. A surgery-machine that has to perform a cesarian on a concious woman, although it's supposedly only for men, so the surgery gets sloppy and "disturbing". Whole story.

Actually the first thing I thought about when I saw it was a hamfisted abortion statement.
But that might just be me.

 

[Furioso]

Saw the movie, it was horrendous, the characters were the dumbest pieces of shit I have ever seen in a movie, from the guys who were terrified of the aliens suddenly wanting to touch the obvious death worm, to the surgery machine that for some reason only worked on men despite being owned by a woman for her own personal use, just awful

 

[Deacon Cole]

I have a tangential question, who is Team Hollywood? Does this mean that we'll be getting reviews from people besides Moviebob in the future?

 

[jbm1986]

I enjoyed the movie for the most part. Great visuals, pretty good soundtrack, great cast. I think where the film drops the ball is in the dialog and some of the scenes.

[snip]... and that one line that one throwaway line that was so overly dramatic and had no impact on the story or characters.

Spoiler

...FATHER

I am hoping the movie had to go through massive cuts for the theatrical release, hopefully we will get a directors cut that will have and explain more.[...]

Also this^ part felt horribly out of place. Maybe she enjoyed all that over-the-top acting from snow white?

Another part that bothered me was after

Spoiler

Shaw attacked a few crew members who try to quarantine her. Soon after that, she goes with some people to the other ship, one of which I think she attacked, and they act like nothing happened

maybe I missed something?

 

[whiffleball]

Another part that bothered me was after

Spoiler

Shaw attacked a few crew members who try to quarantine her. Soon after that, she goes with some people to the other ship, one of which I think she attacked, and they act like nothing happened

maybe I missed something?

All you missed was the lack of continuity between certain scenes.


Another thing that has come to mind. Nothing about the planet/moon they were on hinted at this being the primary planet of the albino aliens. So why did they keep mentioning it to primitive/early civilization man for tens of thousand years? Was it always a military base/production facility for weapons of mass destruction? Was the expectation that human's would develop enough to travel there? Why would they want this if the plan was to ship the monsters to earth?

 

[Headbiter]

Not much of a disturbing surgery, if you count it as that. Hell, the whole surgery consisted of swabbing her stomach with iodine, lasering a hole, pulling out mess, and then stitching her up. Why wasn't there any blood when the opened a whole in her stomach? Why didn't machine do something with the "foreign object" after it removed it, but instead left it dangling above her? Also, it kind of looked like horizontal Caesarean anyways.

Well, appearantly it was disturbing enough to give that specific scene a certain reputation and induce seizures in 15-yr-old Australian boys who want to prove they're tough.
But generally speaking you're right, that's why I said "disturbing". Ever saw "The Cell"? The scene with the horse that gets seperated into several segments by glass-plates? That kind of "disturbing".
To the rest, well, more plotholes and more aspects that make this machine look more and more like an invention of Dr. Wiley while he was stoned.

As for the helmets thing, that seemed to only be used as an example of the guy's reckless behavior. But if that was the case, why did we need to show him to be reckless?

That's another argument I can't wrap my head around. Sorry, but there's reckless and then there's mindnumbingly stupid. He was among the people specifically chosen for this trip on a new world, which may include finding the origins of the human race and the first thing he does is to take off his helmet in an unfamiliar atmosphere? Hell, the fact that he put that helmet on in the first place means, that he was aware of a potential risk. And then, all of a sudden, someone used the Dunce-switch and doi-doi-doi, helmet off because I can.
That's really beyond reckless.

Actually the first thing I thought about when I saw it was a hamfisted abortion statement.
But that might just be me.

That would be Twilight: Breaking Dawn. Come to think of that, is that a new Hollywood-Trend? Botched up/messy C-sections?

 

[Doclector]

I agree with pretty much everything said.

Special mention goes to the soundtrack though, which could handle tense horror, action, and more hopeful tones as well, which goes a long way to making you understand the characters perseverance in finding answers.

 

[adamtm]

Actually the first thing I thought about when I saw it was a hamfisted abortion statement.
But that might just be me.

That would be Twilight: Breaking Dawn. Come to think of that, is that a new Hollywood-Trend? Botched up/messy C-sections?

Just how the scene was set up:

Woman has something in her body she wants to get rid off. (unwanted pregnancy, literally)
Machine denies her request. (its agains the "law" of the machine)
Does it anyways against the "recomendation". (abortion clinic)
Must pay the "price" (pain).

The only way this could have been more clear is if she said "i want an abortion" instead of "c-section".

I dont know, i might be overthinking this.

 

[Luca72]

Just how the scene was set up:

Woman has something in her body she wants to get rid off. (unwanted pregnancy, literally)
Machine denies her request. (its agains the "law" of the machine)
Does it anyways against the "recomendation". (abortion clinic)
Must pay the "price" (pain).

The only way this could have been more clear is if she said "i want an abortion" instead of "c-section".

I dont know, i might be overthinking this.

I didn't think about the abortion symbolism like that. If anything, it seemed pro-choice. The framework for that scene was "there's something really bad inside me, and I'm going to do whatever it takes to get it out." So she goes to the med-pod, gets an impromptu surgery on self-administered painkillers like a BOSS, and saves her life.

I mean, she never had any second thoughts about getting the surgery, and didn't feel bad about it afterward (she would have been completely loony if she did)

There's a reason I talked about the aliens seeding humans specifically, and then took a relatively small timescale. For one, we're supposed to believe the aliens have the exact same DNA as humans (let's just say the DNA is very similar because the idea of identical DNA is fairly dumb), which is why these aliens simply seeding all life on earth (and other planets) is not even an option. The chance of something extremely like them (down to the vast majority of the DNA at least) evolving all over again from a single celled organism over hundreds of millions of years is ludicrously small. And they'd have to wait out those hundreds of millions of years, somehow without themselves being affected by evolution, and keep spending incredible amounts of resources checking up on this planet once in a while.

You say the end result would somehow be a genetically identical sentient race, but how the hell is that even remotely the main possibility? How do you control a mechanism of such massive proportions, which, ironically, is happening at such minuscule steps at a time? And which does not have any sort of goal? Evolution is not a bloody ladder. Unless, of course, magic. But magic is not what makes sci-fi good.

This whole thing tries way too hard to cram Christian theology into aliens. The "god" creating man in his own image, the birth by a woman who shouldn't give birth (replace "virgin" with "barren") which happens on Christmas, the "the aliens got wiped out 2000 years ago" thing (Guess what happened then), and so on.

I'm not trying to defend the science of this movie at all. I don't know that I've ever seen a sci-fi movie with really sound science. I think Ridley Scott has at best a "15 minute wikipedia scan" knowledge of how DNA works, and decided to just run with an idea. I can generally accept that - Blade Runner is full of poor scientific assumptions but still tells a poignant, touching story. My biggest disappointment about Prometheus as opposed to Alien is that it's a downgrade from "hard sci-fi" to just "sci-fi". The main difference being that sci-fi tends to have a lot of what you said - magic, basically (aka the "future whatever device").

But simply because we have no idea how life would evolve on another planet, we can assume there was a fairly earthlike planet the Jockeys came from (since they settled on a moon pretty close to earth conditions, it's likely they'd pick one that's habitable to them - therefore, their own planet is probably pretty similar to earth), and they have some sort of ability to use DNA at the most basic level, or their own DNA, as a model or guide for a similar evolutionary process, modified slightly for earth conditions (different elements, gravity, etc.)

You say the chances of evolving in a similar pattern are extremely small, but we don't actually know that for sure. Natural selection holds that mutations guide evolution, and in that case, it would be virtually impossible to have the same beings evolve twice. But natural selection doesn't always hold up today as a reliable method for evolution, so although we know that evolution certainly HAPPENS, we still don't understand all its mechanics. There's a concept called "ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny" (not as highbrow a concept as it sounds) that applies to certain embryonic animals. What it means is that as the animal develops, it basically goes through the characteristics of its previous evolutionary forms - ie: it starts as a multicelled organism, develops organs, gills, becomes fishlike, then becomes amphibian-like, etc. Maybe what the Jockey does at the beginning of the movie is an extremely advanced and drawn out version of that.

Anyway, I'm just trying to say that some of the scientific concepts proposed aren't THAT ridiculous, they're just out there. As for the intentions of the Space Jockeys, I got nothin. Why would they seed life on earth for billions of years, come back and share a star map that goes to a MILITARY INSTALLATION, and then immediately decide upon waking to go kill everyone on earth? And I honestly didn't even notice the Christian overtones in the movie, I sincerely hope that's all coincidence. In an interview for Prometheus Scott said he considers religion to be one of the most dangerous and destructive forces out there, so I'm hoping the images were all a fluke. If he tries to tie this into some grand Christian mythos in the next film that'll probably kill my interest in the franchise.

 

[adamtm]

Just how the scene was set up:

Woman has something in her body she wants to get rid off. (unwanted pregnancy, literally)
Machine denies her request. (its agains the "law" of the machine)
Does it anyways against the "recomendation". (abortion clinic)
Must pay the "price" (pain).

The only way this could have been more clear is if she said "i want an abortion" instead of "c-section".

I dont know, i might be overthinking this.

I didn't think about the abortion symbolism like that. If anything, it seemed pro-choice. The framework for that scene was "there's something really bad inside me, and I'm going to do whatever it takes to get it out." So she goes to the med-pod, gets an impromptu surgery on self-administered painkillers like a BOSS, and saves her life.

I mean, she never had any second thoughts about getting the surgery, and didn't feel bad about it afterward (she would have been completely loony if she did)

I never said the statement was anti-abortion.
The interpretation can be either way.