leading from
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| (source: Phil's vintage and movie collectables) |
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| (source: Phil's vintage and movie collectables) |
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| (source: Phil's vintage and movie collectables) |
Additional photos of the derelict from the Alien blu-ray set
Alien: The Derelict Model after the movie
HR Giger's Biomechanical Landscape II (work 417) (1979)
HR Giger's Biomechanical Landscape II (work 417 referenced Pollock's "The Moon-Woman Cuts the Circle" merged with his Untitled (Bald Woman with Skeleton) and a comic book panel woman holding a long printout wrapped around Inspector Clouseau's head.
leading from
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| Biomechanical Landscape II (work 417) (1979) |
a. i) 17th of February 2016, looking at Giger's Biomechanical Landscape II (work 417), I realised that continued with his exploration of Pollock's paintings, taking the untitled painting known as "Bald Woman with Skeleton" and merged it with "The Moon-Woman Cuts the Circle" turned upside down.
The bird skull has been merged with the long bow shape stretching from the lower left to the upper right that represents the woman's body stretching down to a leg.
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| Untitled (Bald Woman with Skeleton) (1938-194 |
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a. iv) Pollock - The Moon-Woman Cuts the Circle (1942)
a. v) Pollock - The Moon-Woman Cuts the Circle (upside down)
a. vi) Pollock - The Moon-Woman Cuts the Circle next to Biomechanical Landscape II
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a. viii) white bulge and comparative form in Giger's painting
b) Comparisons with panel from The Inspector and the Pink Panther # 16,
b. i) Sunday 4th of March 2018, having learnt about the Pink Panther connection with Giger's art I find myself looking through the pages of the comic book The Pink Panther # 16, and come to page 5 to find a delightful image of a computer printout with a list of arrestees and decided that Giger would have looked through the comic book, found this panel delightful and then later would incorporate it into a work.
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| The Inspector and Pink Panther # 16, page 5 (August 1977) |
b. ii) The part of the print out to the left of the woman's head becomes horizontal ribbing while her face and head outline become a complicated curving structure that can barely be described, but this has been merged with the white bulge from Pollock's The Moon-Woman Cuts the Circle
c) See also: Aliens: Referenced in side view of the Alien Queen by Jim Cameron
Alien:The idea of the alien as a fawn
Leading from
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| Alien making a kill in the claw room |
a) Ridley had an idea about the alien being like a fawn or a young animal that someone would go up to and then its suddenly lashes out, which he talked to Veronica Cartwright about.
It was a beauty and the beast sort of thing.
None of them did try to communicate with it when it would jump out from the dark
b) However it was hard to say if any of that survived in the final movie.
Perhaps there was a lot more to be said about the actual idea than was being recalled by Veronica Cartwright in shorthand, but when she saw the actual movie, she could only see it as an evil thing that comes out to get the crew.
Although years later she saw it slightly differently being about a creature that had to use its survival instincts to survive
c) The idea of the creature being like a beautiful fawn which suddenly lashes out would would be carried on into the development of the Prometheus movie but soon dropped.
(See also: Prometheus:Babyhead)
- Veronica Cartwright: I remember when I first saw it, I was a little disappointed in that the part that Ridley had talked about of it being like a fawn or a young animal that you go up to and it lashes out, the beauty and the beast sort of part of it. That was not there as much anymore. That element of none of us did try to communicate with her, where it would just jump out at the dark. And I loved the element that we were creating that, and that was no longer in it. It was more like just shock value. So I was disappointed in that. (Report from interview for Alien Evolution)
- Interviewer: How did the ‘fawn’ element go?
Veronica Cartwright:I don’t know, I think when they were shooting it I mean, well, but you see, like years later I look at the movie and it does have that Hitchcockian feel. I mean it does have, you’re not quite sure whether you see it or don’t see it. Is it there, isn’t it there, when it comes forward at the end and stuff like that, it does have that Hitchcockian feel, so it could have just come out of what I thought we had shot and what Ridley had originally talked about. I didn’t see that element there as much when I first saw it. It seemed to be more like you know, just an evil thing and it’s just coming out and it’s gonna get you. Although years later when I have seen it, I mean those elements are there. I mean it’s survival instinct is what the thing is going on and it has to survive and it has to do whatever it can do to survive.
So, I’m able to accept it a lot better and I mean, obviously, people just loved it and it just takes years, I guess. (Report from interview for Alien Evolution)
February 2015
Leading from
Saturday 28th February 2015
1) Added Veronica Cartwright cast as Lambert
Friday 27th February 2015
1) Added Casting Tom Skerrit as Dallas
2) Added Sigourney's dream of continuation and this will be continued as I dig up snippets of information leading to Alien 5
Thursday 26th February 2015
1) Added the section Ron Cobb's art and will slowly build up the pages showing examples of his concept work for the movie
2) Added Nostromo surveyor / Lander which links up to the Nostromo Exterior Concepts which links up to Ron Cobb's art
3) Added information from the Allocine interview and the Simon Mayo interview with Sigourney Weaver from Kermode and Mayo's Film Review for Friday 27 February 2015 to Neil Blomkamp and Alien 5
4) Divided Casting Kane into two sections, Initial casting of Jon Finch as Kane and Casting John Hurt as Kane
5) Added Alien: Sigourney Weaver cast as Ripley
Wednesday 25th February 2015
1) Added Alien: Trying to override the detonation procedure
2) Creating a subsection Alien: Making the Movie for the links dealing generally with getting into the actual filming of the Alien movie
3) Updated Neill Blomkamp And Alien 5 with additional information from the Entertainment Weekly interview
Monday 23rd February 2015
Updated The robot head speaks with quotes from Alan Dean Foster's novelisation
Sunday 22nd February 2015
1) Started working on a page dealing with listing Ron Cobb's art for Alien.
2) Added image of possibly a derelict interior detail by Chris Foss to Chris Foss' Alien derelict interior
3) Broke "The Chestburster" down into various sections each with their own page
Saturday 21st February 2015
1) Updated the section about Giger and Jean Cocteau's Beauty and The Beast with a summary and an extra quotes.
2) Re-edited and added to Haven't a clue about Bishop 2
3) Added Giger haunted by Grimm's fairy tale as a child
4) Updated Giger on Bosch
5) Added image of Chris Foss' Nostromo's undercarriage to Barrel wheeled undercarriage
Friday 20th February 2015
Added a comment by Lance Henriksen from Starlog July 2004 to Haven't clue about Bishop 2
Tuesday 17th February 2015
Added Yaphet Kotto joins Alien
Monday 16th February 2015
1) Updated The Arrival of Jon Sorensen with his Number 6 story
2) Added Alien vs Yaphet Kotto, detailing the reports of Yaphet's attempt to come terms with the death of Parker at the hands of the Alien
3) Added a page for all articles featuring Yaphet Kotto to be linked to
Sunday 15th February 2015
1) Added image from Giger's Mordor painting series from 1975 to The Alien Derelict as the Ancient Egyptian God Ra's Barge of a Million Years? which indeed backs up the loose assocation being made.
2) Re-edited The Was-sceptre, the head of the alien?
Friday 13th February 2015
1) Added Neil Blomkamp and Alien 5
2) Added Dead Star which is William Malone's film script that later became transformed into the film Super Nova and with very little similarity
Thursday 12th february 2015
Re-edited the page Two robots chatting
Saturday 8th February 2015
1) Separated details about the conception of the Castle Harkonnen from Dune and The Gathering and expanded on it slightly.
2) Added to Dune and The Gathering a small detail about the fact that Giger met Jodorowsky on the evening of a Magma concert in Paris and perhaps the confusing question might be when this was if it is true that they met at the time of the "Le Diable" exhibition of the Galerie Bijan Aalam
Saturday 7th February 2015
1) Added Alejandro Jodorowksy comments from Rue Morgue 149 to Dune and the gathering
2) "Metal plates grafted onto his mothers hips" changed to "Giger inspired by mother's hospitalization and metal hip plates" and comment from Les Barany from Rue Morgue #149 added
3) Added comment from Bill Malone about how Event Horizon seemed very much like the idea of his Dead Star movie script, with comment from Rue Morgue #149 Thursday 5th February 2015
1) Rewrote Robot Head Speaks adding a proper summary for the information revealed in various drafts about what the robot head said since it may connect with the item about Ivor Powell's treatment for an Alien sequel/prequel
2) Added Derelict spaceship from the 1973 Star Trek the animated series episode , "Beyond The Farthest Star" which was novelised the followed year by Alan Dean Foster.
Wednesday 4th February 2015
1) Expanded on Rick Deckard, human or replicant? with details from Dangerous Days documentary, On the Edge of Blade Runner documentary, Electric Dreamer documentary and Future Shocks documentary
2) Added Ivor Powell wrote a treatment for an Alien prequel/sequel
Tuesday 3rd February
Expanded on "Changes to derelict" which seemed like too much of a blur
Sunday 1st February 2015
Added Rick Deckard, human or replicant?
(Expanding on the Blade Runner section, although it has nothing directly to do with Alien, the film's world comes into contact with the world of ideas that Ridley drew from for Alien in terms of the human Environments. However this is about Ridley's idea about Deckard being a replicant and how he spoke about it publicly at least within two years of the actual movie rather than assumed ten by most people. If I can find something earlier, then I will later include this as well.)
Alien: Switcharounds in Lambert's death scene
leading from
a) Lambert's incomplete death scene
When Parker is killed by the Alien, Lambert is supposed to sneak along the wall and get into the locker, the same one that the cat was in earlier in the film.
The Alien was supposed to have tracked her down with its sensory abilities and she dies of fright.
That's what she was told.
She kept asking when they were going to finish the scene but quickly they would go onto something else, in this instance they were going on to film the scene where Ripley confronts the alien and starts singing "You are my lucky star" and the next thing Veronica knew, and then they had her go in later and they hung her on a hook, so that they show her dangling legs. (Hung up on a meat hook? Was this some sort of a homage to Texas Chainsaw Massacre?)
b) Lambert's death intercut with scenes from Brett's death
All Veronica can assume is that Lambert got raped by the alien in the final film.
When the creature seemed to do is raise its tail up between her legs and indeed those were Harry Dean Stanton's legs from his death scene earlier in the movie.
He was wearing the tennis shoes and blue pants that Lambert was seen to wear at her moment of death. while in fact she should have been wearing white pants and cowboy boots.
When she saw what they did with her death, she was very surprised.
Later for the director's cut they altered the colour to make the trousers more like the colour of Lambert's.
But the floor was still not correct.
c) Possibilities of the alien's motives
When they made the movie, they didn't really know how she died, but there was the implication that there was a kind of sexuality to this androgynous male/female alien beast who could give birth itself and it could also impregnate, so it was as what Ridley could find about insects, based on a little bit of good old mother nature.
But it was as if there was some sort of dreadful ending, a terrible invasion of her body, as if it was a rape and therefore there would be an alien version of the Cartwright character, and more humanoid aliens in general on board this craft and this possibility is what Ripley now has got to destroy
d) Repercussions from the change in Lambert's death
After the movie, then there were the reporters asking "they said how did it feel to have the tail going under your legs" and Veronica replied "I don't know, why don't you ask Harry"
She was actually very pissed off but she thought in hind sight that it worked, but it might have helped if they had warned her.
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| Veronica Cartwright's legs from the time she's suspended from the hook as Lambert |
Source quotes
- Veronica Cartwright: From what I understand, remember when Yaphet Kotto gets killed? I was supposed to sneak along the wall and get into the locker - the same one the cat was in earlier. The Alien is supposed to track me down with his sensory things and I die of fright. Well, that's what they told me but the next thing I knew, I was hanging from a meat hook (Starlog, Yearbook vol 7, p32-33)
- Veronica Cartwright: All I can assume is: I got raped by the Alien. Also, those were Harry Dean Stanton's legs. If you look at the movie, he was wearing tennis shoes and blue pants. I was wearing white pants and cowboy boots. When I was the actual screen version I was very surprised.(Starlog Yearbook vol7, p33)
- Veronica Cartwright:(1:30:00) See those, that's Harry Dean's legs, cause I wear white pants and cowboy boots through the whole thing, that was taken from the scene where the alien comes down in that warehouse thing (1:32:00). Now they manipulated the film so they don't look blue, but that's not even the grating what's on the floor. So I remember the first time seeing this with an audience and then there were of course reporters, they go "well how does it feel?", and I say "I don't know, why don't you ask Harry?" I was so pissed off, I mean later it works, so it's fine but I think they could have warned me. But you see this death scene, it was never completed, originally what I was supposed to do is crawl away and I basically die of fright in the locker and it was supposedly the same locker that Jones had been in. That was, er, never shot, and erm, I kept asking when were we going to finish the scene, I mean the next thing I knew they were on to something else.(Alien commentary from Alien Quadrilogy DVD and Alien Anthology Blu-Ray)
- (1:30:08 /1:32:52 ) Ridley Scott: I mean we didn't know how she died but er, the implication that there was a kind of sexuality to this androgynous (1:33:00) male/female who could give birth itself, it could also impregnate, so it's like a , there are insects like that, we based that on a , you know a little bit of good old mother nature and erm, was that some dreadful ending, was that some terrible you know invasion of her body, a rape and therefore would there be a version of the Cartwright character. There'll certainly whatever happens, there'd be more humanoid aliens now on board this craft and that's what she's now got to destroy. (Alien commentary from Alien Quadrilogy DVD and Alien Anthology Blu-Ray)
- Interviewer: What did you think of the finished film?
Veronica Cartwright:I never got to finish my death scene and I was really blown away when I saw how I died. Because originally I was to go inside where the cache had been originally found in, so one of those silver things, and I’m supposed to basically die of fright. And we never ended up shooting that. So those are Harry Dean Stanton’s legs and if you look at the death when the tail comes up and under, those are Harry Dean Stanton’s legs and he’s wearing blue pants and he’s now wearing sneakers. And I wore white pants and cowboy boots in the whole movie. So when I saw that for the first time, I was pissed off because I never actually got to shoot my death and then they had me go in at some point and they hung me on a hook, you know, so you just see the dangling legs. So that was disappointing too. -
Interviewer: Why did that happen?
Veronica Cartwright: I don’t know. We shot for five days with the alien coming towards us and I kept saying when are we going to be shooting the stuff inside of the cubicle and they kept saying oh, we’ll get around to it, and the next thing I know, they started shooting Sigourney and the lucky star thing. And I said, well when are we going to be shooting the end of my death scene? And I was informed that we weren’t. That it had been shot. So, the first time I saw what the death scene was, and then of course, all the when they come and the press talk to you and eveything, they said how did it feel to have the tail going under your legs, and at that point I was so pissed off I said, I don’t know, they’re Harry Dean’s, it wasn’t my legs and if you look at the movie, it’s right there - blue pants and sneakers. And through the entire movie I’m wearing cowboy boots and white pants! That was a bit of a shock when I saw the movie.
Interviewer: Did you fall out with Ridley?
Veronica Cartwright:No. There was no falling out, as far as I knew I was supposed to shoot the end. Maybe they couldn’t decide on how, maybe it was a time element, maybe money had run out and they had to move on. I have no idea why it wasn’t shot. To this day I don’t know. I just showed up to work every day and I did my thing and I kept saying when are we going to shoot it because originally it had been, I was supposed to die of fright or something. They brought me in and hung me on the meat hook, there. I really I don’t know. Could have been a money thing. Could have been time element I don’t know.
Interviewer: Ok that aside - what did you think of the film?
Veronica Cartwright: Well, as I said before, I was disappointed in some of the elements.
(As reported from the interview for Alien Evolution)
March 2014
leading from
Monday March 31st 2014
Added
quotes from Cinefantastique podcast about Prometheus that shows the
reviewers not having a clue that the planet in the film was not the same
one as in Alien to Star Map Invitations and Mysteries of Planetoid Numbers
Sunday March 30th 2014
Added information from Terry Rawling interview from Starlog, February 1986 to Human to Spores section where he talks about the reasoning behind their decision to removal of the cocooning sequence
Saturday March 8th 2014
Friday March 7th 2014
a) Transcribed and translated interview with H R Giger from June 2012 for Blick
b) Created a section for H R Giger interviews to be linked to
Saturday March 1st 2014
Added additional quote by Dan O'Bannon from Reel Terror about his knowledge of the movie "Planet of the Vampires" to Space Jockey's origins in Swiss Family Robinson
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