Alien: Romulus director Fede Álvarez expected to take notes after franchise creator Ridley Scott saw the movie. However, Scott’s immediate reaction took him by surprise – he loved it. While Scott did advise Álvarez during the movie’s production, along with Aliens director James Cameron, seeing the final movie, with all of Álvarez’s directorial nuances could have gone either way with Scott. However, it seems he was more than happy to heap praise on the latest addition to the saga.
While Alien: Romulus seemed to be making all the right noises before its arrival in cinemas, there are few who foresaw its out-of-this-world box office run over its opening weekend. Breaking through the $100 million, the new movie has been a clear winner thanks to Álvarez mainly sticking to the format and bringing to it his flair for violence and gore.
The director sent Scott his cut of Romulus as soon as it was complete, and then approached him directly afterward to get his immediate feelings about the movie. Sharing details of that chat with Collider, Álvarez said:
“When I had the cut of the film, I sent the movie to him. He was in the theater, and I wanted to see him right away. I really wanted to get his fresh reaction out of the film and what he felt. I went to see him, sat down, waited on the table, I had a notepad and a pen next to me just waiting just to hear whatever he had to say to write it down.
I remember what his first reaction was: he walked in, and he said, “What can I say? It’s fucking great.” And then he said, “You have a big movie here.” He really believed that the movie would do great. He told me, “I think it just can do as well as Prometheus did.” I hope he’s right. And he said it at the time when I thought this was gonna be smaller and more for the horror community. All horror audience shows up and no more. I didn’t see it as an event movie like I think is becoming right now.”
Alien: Romulus is Fede Álvarez’s Movie
Despite Álvarez speaking with both Scott and Cameron throughout the creation of Alien: Romulus, the final movie remained Álvarez’s vision throughout. Scott previously noted that as producer on the movie, he gave advice about the Alien franchise itself, but not on how the film should be directed. He said:
“The danger of all franchises is they do die unless somebody suddenly decides to pick up the mat and run down the field with a ball. Fede is a surge of energy, and I had to step back and let him do it … Fede had a blueprint firm in his mind, and his script was pretty clear. It was also long, but the screenplay is always long. And so we got into that a little bit.”
It is safe to say that whatever magic came together around Alien: Romulus, it has reinvigorated the franchise in the same way Prey did for the Predator IP. Considering the concerns many people had when Disney acquired both properties in their merger with Fox, these classic sci-fi franchises have never looked better.
Alien: Romulus
is now playing in cinemas.
