Director: Ridley Scott

Producers: Glenn Carroll, David Giler, Walter Hill

Screenplay: Dan O’Bannon

Music: Jerry Goldsmith

Cast:

Ripley : Sigourney Weaver (Ghostbusters, Gorillas in the Mist)

Dallas : Tom Skerritt (Picket Fences, M*A*S*H, Top Gun)

Kane : John Hurt (The Elephant Man, Rob Roy, “1984”)

Ash : Ian Holm (The Madness of King George, Naked Lunch)

Lambert : Veronica Cartwright (The Right Stuff, Witches of Eastwick)

Brett : Harry Dean Stanton (Wild at Heart, Paris Texas)

Parker : Yaphet Kotto (Live and Let Die, Midnight Run)

Alien:The Nostromo is a commercial towing vehicle carrying 20 million tons of mineral ore, a crew of seven people, and is on a course heading back to Earth…

…that is until they are awoken from suspended animation several months before their arrival to answer a space distress call.

When they land on the once-inhabited planet and go exploring, the unluckyJohn Hurt is attacked by something strange which attaches itself to his face, causes him more than an ounce of trouble, and escapes to another part of the ship.

One by one the crew are picked off by the alien as they attempt to track it down and destroy it, leading to an incredibly tense finale.

The alien creature was designed by H.R. Giger, who also worked on the designs for the spaceship and the creature’s lair, and was handpicked by directorRidley Scott himself.

“Alien” is one of the perfect examples of how to make a suspense-filled film, without resorting to unnecessary violence and bad language.

I was fortunate enough to catch a double-bill of “Alien” and “Aliens” at my local cinema two years ago, and they are an absolute knockout on the big screen. The suspense is in no way diminished on the smaller screen, the widescreen ratio giving you the full composition of the picture so it makes for a fantastic home cinema experience.

Colors are sharp and vibrant, and it’s worth pointing out that the widescreen video which came as part of the VHS ‘face hugger’ boxset a few years ago had the film in a slightly less-wide ratio.Thankfully, Encore have used the same master as the original single-tape widescreen release which retains the exact 2.35:1 ratio.

The surround sound is used to excellent effect as the sound of the ship’s computers and controls hum from all around; computers bleep from their respective screen positions and when the ship is set to self-destruct, your speakers had better watch out… and the sound of the alien attacking its victims makes your flesh crawl right off!

The side-break is well placed coming after the scene where Ripley, Parker andLambert think they’ve found the alien, but it turns out to be Brett’s cat,Jones, which is followed on side 2 by the scene where Brett goes “Looking forJones”.

Chapters are sensibly placed at each key scene change, with chapter titles helping to find your chosen favorite moment with ease such as”Something he ate?”, “Ash’s True Colors” and “Looking for Jones”.