Alien: Face Hugger in The Infirmary

(Still collating)

leading from

Making the Movie

a) Ridley's original idea

Originally, the auto-dock in Ridley's ideas would have been far more elaborate. He thought in hindsight that he was thinking too logically and that if they had brought an alien organism like the Face Hugger aboard, everyone would stay in their suits right form the beginning, and then they'd go straight into a hospital decontamination area to decontaminate there suits, isolated there until they were able to safely get out of them.

Then they'd place him in the autodoc where they would be behind glass, completely insulated from him and the creature. He was going to have all the work they do on the alien creature done with remote controls from removing the helmet, through trying to pry it loose, to their futile attempts to cut it off

In the final film, they forgo decontamination completely, with Ash seeing it necessary to get Kane into the infirmary, then they examine Kane without any real protection other than from the oxygen they're breathing as they open the helmet.

b) Cutting the helmet

A machine removes the helmet like an orange peel, to reveal the creature inside as it resettles itself more securely on Kane's face.

 

In the final film, they remove the helmet manually, Ash cuts through with a laser scalpel while Dallas holds the helmet and together they break it open to reveal the creature inside.

Shot from Alien from the Alien Anthology Blu-Ray set

Shot from Alien from the Alien Anthology Blu-Ray set

1. Cinefex: The face-hugger was the second alien form to go before the cameras. The creature's attack on Kane would be left until late in the shooting schedule, but its unveiling in the Nostromo's autodoc was captured in the early weeks of principal photography of principal photography. Only after Kane had been placed on the examination table and the remains of his helmet cut away, did the full horror of his encounter become apparent - clamped squarely over his face was the gruesome alien organism, held firmly in place by eight spindly fingers and secured by a long tail which constricted tightly around Kane's neck at the slightest attempt to disengage it. "You could leave that thing sitting on his face all day and nothing much would happen, " said Ridley Scott, " but the tail gave it a punch - made it alive. And articulating it was dead easy. We just got covered the tail with Vaseline to make it slippery, fastened a piano wire to the tip of it, and then pulled from below so it slid across his neck and tightened as the same time"(Cinefex #1)

c) X Ray scan

Early Ridleygram of Facehugger scan

See also: Alien: Joe Petagno's facehugger concept art

Facehugger X-Ray scan illustration by Joe Petagno

Shot from Alien from the Alien Anthology Blu-Ray set

Shot from Alien from the Alien Anthology Blu-Ray set

d) Autodoc

Ridley was concerned about the bacteriological danger of this Face Hugger creature, and thought that everyone would have to be talking through sheets of glass all the time.

He wanted Kane to be examined by an expert which was the autodoc, and it would tell them that there was no bacteriological danger.

It would have been too complicated to do and he decided that he just had to get out of the need for this thing, so they didn't bother, thinking instead that if one didn't raise the question, then nobody would think about it.

While the final autodoc is working on Kane, the Nostromo with its crew takes off.

Ridley thought that the set which was based on Ron Cobb illustration was one of the most realistic and beautiful pieces of technology that he had seen, and he was comparing it to what he has seen in Kubrick's 2001 A Space Odyssey that provided a benchmark.

Kubrick, as far as Ridley knew, had worked closely with finding out what NASA speculative designs were or would be.

As marvelous as it was though, passing beyond the year 2001, that technology still hadn't come into being, and Ridley who was setting his film about a hundred years into the future wanted to avoid this sort of thing but inevitably, he was still very much influenced by this film.

Nostromo infirmary concept art by Ron Cobb

Nostromo infirmary concept art by Ron Cobb (image source Fantastic Film #11)

Nostromo infirmary concept art by Ron Cobb (image source Alien Vault)

e) The scene was filmed from August 16th to 17th in 1978

The final autodoc as seen here was much more cabinet on the left side of the wall in the background was based on a design by Ron Cobb, that the examination bed swiveled around into it.

They could leave the facehugger on John Hurt's face all day and nothing much would happen

What gave the facehugger life was the tail, and articulating it was very easy. They covered it with Vaseline to make it slippery, fastened a piano wire to the tip and then pulled it from below so that it slid across the neck and tightened at the same time
 

Filming on 17th August 1978

Shot from Alien from the Alien Anthology Blu-Ray set

Shot from Alien from the Alien Anthology Blu-Ray set

 Ron Cobb in the Nostromo's Auto Dock (also known as 'Ash's Lab') Source: http://roncobb.net/05-Alien.html

Nostromo's Auto Dock Scanner (Under construction)Source: http://roncobb.net/05-Alien.html

1. Ridley Scott: This was a far more elaborate auto-dock than we ended up shooting. At that time I was thinking too logically, and Christ Almighty, if they brought an organism like that back on board, to begin with, everybody would stay in their suits. And they’d go straight into a hospital decontamination area. They would be isolated until they decontaminated the suits and were able to safely get out of them.
   
   Then they’d place Kane in the autodoc and they would be behind glass, completely insulated from him and the “face hugger." I was going to have all the work on the alien done with remote control tools, from trying to pry it loose to their futile attempts to cut it off.
   
   Fantastic Films: Why did this ultimately change?
   
   Ridley Scott: In a way it just became too logical for the film, though I, personally, would have stuck with it. But there’s no denying that the way we do it now is just easier. The action moves are faster. This version would have meant dwelling on it too long for the type of film we were supposed to be making. It would have meant more hardware, rather than people. Ultimately, that’s the reason why I ditched it.
   
   There was a question I had in my mind about the sequence’s credibility level. I wanted some examination of Kane by the expert which is the auto- dock. It says. “Well there is no bacteriological danger in that sense of the word.” Otherwise everyone’s going to be talking to each other through sheets of glass all the time. That would be a hell of a hangup. Eventually you’ve just got to get out of that situation. So I wanted that in there but then we finally didn’t bother, because if you don’t raise the question' nobody’ll think about it. So while the machine is working on Kane, they take off.  (Fantastic Films 011, October 1979)
2. Ridley Scott: This particular set here, where Ron Cobb had a... done a lot of visuals of the interior of the Nostromo, and now I'd say this is one of the most realistic and beautiful pieces of technology I've seen in a, well, you know, I think...um... the best ever technology ever presented probably was in 2001, Stanley Kubrick, and so it was very difficult because Stanley had done that, and it was and still is one of my favourite films if you had to say you know "what's your twenty favourite films?", that would have to be in there, and therefore it was tricky not to get influenced by what he done. Of course, what he had done, I think, A: had worked closely with finding out what NASA speculative designs were or would be, so when you think about 2001 and look at what's happening today, it still hadn't begin, right, and er... So we had to avoid that all cost. But inevitably, it's fair to say I was very much influenced by 2001 (long pause)
   
   (Dallas: I'm willing to take that chance, now cut it off
   Ash:You're willing to take that responsibility
   Dallas:Yes, yes, I'll take that responsibility, now get him out of here
   Scene with incision made in facehugger's finger leading to acid bleeding)
   
   Boy that's effective, I forgot how effective that was. Now that's just polystyrene (38:00) on fairly  potent acid, and it surely goes through there fast. (Raw Alien 20th Anniversary DVD Ridley Scott Commentary)
3. Ridley Scott: The infirmary is beneath the kitchen. (Alien commentary from Alien Quadrilogy DVD and Alien Anthology Blu-Ray combined)
4. Roger Dicken: Then, as with the Chest Burster, it was laid over an articulated armature. The tail just had a wire running through it, so you could thrash it about, or pull it tighter around John Hurt’s throat. There were air-bladders to make it breathe, and pistons which could move all the legs. The armature had one removable leg at the front, for the sequence when they cut that leg open, which took a number of takes to get the acid just right. (http://cellulord.blogspot.com/2009/10/a30-alien-30-pt-5.html)
5. Cinefex: "The facehugger was the second alien form to go before the cameras. The creature's attack on Kane would be left until late in the shooting schedule, but its unveiling in the Nostromo's autodoc was captured in the early weeks of principal photography. Only after Kane had been placed on the examination table and the remains of his helmet cut away, did the full horror of his encounter become apparent - clamped squarely over his face was the gruesome alien organism, held firmly in place by eight spindly fingers and secured by a long tail which contricted around Kane's neck at the slightest hint of an attempt to disengage it. "You could leave that thing sitting on his face all day and nothing much would happen, " said Ridley Scott. " but that tail gave it punch - made it alive. And articulating it was dead easy., We just covered the tail with Vaseline to make it slippery, fastened a piano wire to the tip of it, and then pulled from below so it slide across the neck and tightened at the same time." Cinefex #1

f) The acid for blood shot

Ron Cobb came up with the idea about giving the alien beat extremely corrosive blood that would eat through the hull 

See: Alien: Acid for blood

For the facehugger, Roger Dicken made one of the fingers with a special joint where you could unclip it and take it off. For the acid scene, he made about six replacement fingers with tubes inside so that the characters in the film could cut into them with the laser, and acid would run out.


Several weeks before the shooting of the scene, Roger Dicken had an idea for the acid blood scene, he put together as a demo model a small mock-metal girder made from a special mixture that he concucted, that when a chemical was poured on it, would melt away bit it still looked like mental all the way through.

He took it to the studio and showed it to Ivor Powell and some other people who were working on the movie,

He took along a small leg with the hollow tube in it and squeez bottle full of coloured water.

When he cut the leg with a razor blade, the water dropped onto his pseudo-girder and it immediately started to foam up and disintegrate.

To his way of thinking, it looked very much like melting metal but for some reason they decided not to use it.

Brian Johnson's team would have sections of the deck made out of styrofoam and was painted silver.

They produced a mixture of chemicals that was quite corrosive enough to make you not want to get it on your skin.

It was mainly chloroform and acetone, with some cyclohexylamine and acetic acetic acid, with one or two other things thrown in.

This ate right through the styrofoam, but it left enough colour behind so it really looked to Brian like metal

But, what they came up with in the final film looked to Roger Dicken like cellulose thinners on polystyrene.

1. Roger Dicken: And thereby hangs another tale: As part of my work on that sequence, I put together, as a demo model, a mock-metal girder which, when you poured a chemical on it, would melt away, but still look like it was metal all the way through. I think I showed it to Ivor Powell, but, at the end of the day, I didn’t take it any further because they’d decided to use the old stand-by of polystyrene and cellulose thinners, which just looks like white polystyrene once you burn past the surface. (http://cellulord.blogspot.com/2009/10/a30-alien-30-pt-5.html)  
2. Cinefex: A key element in the face-hugger sequence was the realization for the crew that they were dealing with a creature infinitely more dangerous than even the ferocity of its initial onslaught had suggested. When efforts to pry the tenacious beast from Kane's face prove unfruitful, Ash and Dallas mount a more direct attack by attempting to amputate one of its fingers.  At the first incision, however, a yellowish fluid oozes from the wound, incredibly corrosive, it eats through the floor within seconds, penetrating two decks of the ship and threatening the hull before its virulence dissipates. (Cinefex #1)
3. Dan O'Bannon : "What really bothered me about the whole idea of this thing running around the ship," was why they didn't just kill it. Why didn't they spear the goddamn thing, or shoot it with some gun that wouldn't go right through it and penetrate the hull. Or why they wouldn't get a bunch of long pointed shafts and drive it out into the airlock. I mentioned that to Ron Cobb, and he said, 'why not give it extremely corrosive blood that would eat through the hull?" And I said "well, that doesn't make much sense, but it would certainly make it very, very difficult for them to deal with it on board the ship' - so I put it in"(Cinefex #1)
4. Roger Dicken:  I'd designed the face-hugger, so that one of the fingers had a special joint where you could unclip it and take it off.  For the acid scene, I made about six replacement fingers with tubes inside so we could cut into them with the laser and the acid would run out.  (Cinefex #1)
5. Brian Johnson: First, we had sections of the deck made out of styrofoam and painted silver. Then we produced a mixture of chemicals that actually was pretty corrosive - you wouldn't want to get it on your skin, you know. It was mainly chloroform and acetone, with some cyclohexylamine and acetic acid and one or two other things thrown in. And that stuff just ate right through the styrofoam, but it left enough colour behind so it really looked like metal. (Cinefex #1)
6. Roger Dicken:  To me the effect looked just like cellulose thinners on polystyrene. And I don't know why they did that in that way, because several weeks before they were going to do that shot, I concocted a special mixture which I formed into the shape of a metal girder - just a few inches long, with rivets in it - and I took it to the studio and showed it to Ivor Powell and some other guys who were working on the movie. I also took along a small leg with the hollow tube in it, and a squeeze bottle full of coloured water. When I cut the leg with a razor blade, the water dropped onto my pseudo-girder and it immediately started to foam up and disintegrate. To my way of thinking it looked very much like metal on the melt, but for some reason, they decided not to use it (Cinefex #1)