Address: Fede Alvarez
Interpreters: Cailee Spaeny, Isabela Merced, David Jonsson
Year: 2024
Premiere: August 15, 2024
★★★
Alien: Romulus arrives as a cinematic entry that threads a familiar needle without claiming a full reimagining of the franchise’s origin. It occupies a space between Ridley Scott’s original Alien and James Cameron’s sequels, using a pivotal character from the early chapters as a hinge to place events at a murky, in-between moment. The result isn’t a nostalgic reprise; it’s a contemporary retelling that keeps the core threat intact while recasting the cast in younger roles who confront the same unforgiving environment. The film leans into the idea that the nightmare remains constant even when the faces.
Set in a distressed mining colony, the story follows a young scavenger named Rain, portrayed by Cailee Spaeny. Rain embodies the determined resilience that defined Ripley, yet she operates in a world that feels grittier and more isolated than the Nostromo’s corridors of yesteryear. The setting is purposely harsher and more claustrophobic, with Alvarez’s design choices extracting a richer sense of dread from the mechanical grime and dim lighting. The inclusion of a flawed, black-skinned android adds a new layer to the moral questions the saga has always posed about synthetic life and autonomy.
As producers, Ridley Scott and Walter Hill anchor the film in the spirit of the Alien saga, while Alvarez propels it forward with a fresh artistic voice. The director embraces a vintage aesthetic—old-school computer interfaces, flickering screens, and tangible set pieces—that nods to Scott’s groundbreaking 1979 cinema while foregrounding a modern pacing and sensorial intensity. Alvarez has a track record of reinvigorating classic horror properties, and Romulus reflects that skill: it revisits iconic visual moments from the franchise while orchestrating new situations that feel both familiar and startlingly original. A notable addition is the way acid fluid behaves in an anti-gravity setting, offering fresh scientific and visual tension that broadens the franchise’s practical imagination.
The film’s tonal balance lands in a space where suspense, dread, and visceral action coexist. The reprises of signature shots are done with a knowing wink, yet the narrative pushes beyond simple homage by threading character arcs through an evolving colony crisis. The result is a story that respects its roots but invites viewers to witness the fear from a slightly different vantage point—one that foregrounds youthful resolve and moral ambiguity in the face of a relentless predator. The atmosphere remains unyielding, with Alvarez crafting scenes that linger in the memory long after the screen goes dark.
Critically, the film earns its place by tethering its admiration for the original to a thoughtful recontextualization. It challenges the audience to consider how the same survival instincts survive through new hands and new technologies, even as old questions—what is sentient, who is expendable, and how far will a crew go to preserve life—persist with sharpened urgency. In this way, Romulus becomes more than a mere nod to canonical moments; it stands as a contemporary inquiry into fear, agency, and the ethics of creation within a tightly wound space habitat.