Okay kiddos, you heard the man and you know the drill. There have been plenty of documentaries about Aliens before, as anyone who has owned the beloved 1986 sci-fi sequel from James Cameron on its various formats. But there has never been any documentary quite as extensively comprehensive and defy as Aliens Expanded, and very much true to its raison deter emphasizes on the title Aliens Expanded due to the runtime of five hours not quite as long as an unusually long hyperloop, but not far off. It comes from writer-director Ian Nathan, who has literally written the book on the film. (In the interests of full transparency: Nathan is a former editor of Empire, and the film features contributions from ‘Empire’s’ Digital Editor In Chief, James Dyer. Neither had any influence or sway on this review.)
As with 2019’s Memory: The Origins Of Alien on Ridley Scott’s original film, also a Nathan involvement, this aims to be a last word on the subject of a last word on a classic.
Given the circumstances, we can say it’s ‘for the fans’ which in the case of Aliens, is practically every single person. It is also however, ‘by the fans’ as it was brought to life by thousands of crowd-funders (the credits alone are almost thirty minutes long and include video messages from its funders), and you can tell that it is lovingly crafted the kind of project where there is more than enough added impetus.
Weyland-Yutani’s database is recreated here with some cartoonish images overlaid on it, and this mega project is broken into different chronological account divided into sections such as ‘Salvage’ and ‘Bad dreams’, and even includes short and more relaxed scenes. The manner in which it has been edited is modest as it is solely composed of old videos and interviews, but not all: the movie leaves out most of the graphics in order to avoid taking attention away from the sound. Only what sound? Nearly every important person in the film has been extensively interviewed, including (composer) director James Cameron, producer Gale Anne Hurd, actors Sigourney Weaver, Lance Henriksen, Michael Biehn, Jenette Goldstein, Carrie Henn, Paul Reiser, William Hope, Collette Hiller, Daniel Kash, Cynthia Scott, Mark Rolston, Ricco Ross and many others.
Other crew members such as VFX supervisors, dubbing mixers and creature-effects specialists were also included in the interviews of the film in addition to authors, journalists, podcasters, a psychologist, an astrophysicist as well as military experts. These resulted in a variety of enrichening and insightful stories, some of which are quite familiar with the fans of Aliens such as the tea lady anecdote, and the others which are completely novel.
Cameron strongly criticizes the initial producers David and Walter, stating that they didn’t really grasp the concept of sci-fi. While talking about to the British crew, he is rather diplomatic, To be uncharitable, I would say that they were on a whole other wavelength from us. Throughout the movie he maintains to be outspoken, discussing finding a fit between Scott’s and his sensibilities, even showing his raw storyboards or comic sketches. And I agree with that because the movie exemplifies hardcore genre-director creativity.
Weaver is equally frank and outspoken, once again expressing her greatest displeasure over the sensitive scenes of Ripley standing near the grave of her daughter on Earth of the Earth, cut out from the original theatrical version. (Then they would make the director’s version) But it’s just so nice to also hear in detail from the wider Colonidal Marine cast too the ultimate badass squad who individually nay have received less screen time due to a more orthodox approach. The cast members no longer around, meanwhile, are conspicuous by their absence: Bill Paxton earns a moving tribute from his castmates, who clearly adored him, while Al Matthews a real Vietnam veteran who was in control of the actors ‘boot camp’ with an ex-SAS commando was clearly given as much reverence off camera.
The film also makes room for all kinds of interesting facts and titbits: how Bill Paxton’s Other bug hunt phrase captured the interest of the legion so much that it spawned the writing of whole novels and comics and how the Vietnam naming reminiscent of TMNT were scratched onto helmets and uniforms I each grease for example onto him by Ricco Ross kept saying Leeds simply because had run out of space on helmet writing Heather the mother of his kids.
There are innumerable narratives of this sort, in a movie that will surely be devoured by Aliens enthusiasts by the time it’s game over, man, but which will probably last a number of sittings. “What I notice is a psychogenic film the myth being something like ‘I come closer to the goddess’,” Cameron observes in the movie. Aliens Expanded is surely the ideal proof for that.
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