| Alien Nation | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster |
|
| Directed by | Graham Baker |
| Produced by | Gale Anne Hurd Richard Kobritz Bill Borden (Executive Producer) |
| Written by | Rockne S. O'Bannon |
| Starring | James Caan Mandy Patinkin Terence Stamp Kevyn Major Howard |
| Music by | Curt Sobel |
| Cinematography | Adam Greenberg |
| Editing by | Kent Beyda |
| Distributed by | 20th Century Fox |
| Release date(s) | October 7, 1988 |
| Running time | 91 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $32,155,047[1] |
Alien Nation is a 1988 American science fiction film directed by Graham Baker and produced by Gale Anne Hurd, Richard Kobritz and Bill Borden. The storyline was based on a screenplay written by Rockne S. O'Bannon. It stars James Caan, Mandy Patinkin, Terence Stamp, and Kevyn Major Howard. The film depicts the integration of aliens settling in Los Angeles, much to the dismay of the local population. Released in 1988, the motion picture takes place in 1991. The film's plot is a buddy cop theme, with some detours into science fiction.
The filmmakers also introduced some sociological ideas, such as the effects of illegal immigration, discrimination and racism; as the aliens try to interact and fit in with human society. The aliens have enlarged spotty craniums, two hearts, can consume only raw food and are sensitive to seawater which acts like an acid on their skin. Over the course of the film, their slavery past is alluded as they are genetically modified for slave labor.
Alien Nation premiered in theaters nationwide in the United States on October 7, 1988, grossing $25,216,243 in domestic ticket receipts. The film earned an additional $6,938,804 in business through international release to make a combined $32,155,047 gross revenue. The film was met with mixed reviews before its initial screening in cinemas, and was considered a moderate financial success after its theatrical run. The popularity of the film's concept spawned a television series in 1989, and five television movie sequels during the 1990s, in an attempt to continue the character development surrounding the fictional alien culture.
Contents |
The year is 1991, three years since a giant ship bearing 300,000 aliens, the Newcomers, have landed in the Mojave Desert. Los Angeles becomes their new home. Some newcomers take or are assigned names such as Harley Davidson and Humphrey Bogart. However, the aliens are a discriminated race. They are referred to as 'Slag' , and the area in ghettos which they reside is known as 'Slagtown' . Matthew Sykes (James Caan) is a Los Angeles police detective who loses his partner Bill Tuggle (Roger Aaron Brown) in a shoot-out. The detectives were trying to stop two Newcomers from murdering another alien named Cecil Porter (Regis Parton), during what appeared to be a robbery at the mini-mart where he worked.
The next day, Sykes' superior Captain Warner (Francis X. McCarthy), announces that someone will have to work with a newly promoted Newcomer named Sam Francisco (Mandy Patinkin). He also states that if no one volunteers, someone will be chosen. Although bigoted towards the Newcomers, Sykes volunteers to work with Francisco during an investigation into a similar homicide of Newcomer Warren Hubely. Sykes believes the crimes are related and that it will give him an opportunity to investigate his partner's death, which he is officially ordered not to take part in. Meanwhile, Warner assigns the robbery murder case to detectives Fedorchuk (Peter Jason) and Alterez (Tony Perez).
As the pair work the Hubely-homicide case, Sykes discovers similarities between their investigation and the Porter robbery. Sykes and Francisco do not initially bond (Sykes preferring to call him "George"), and it doesn't help that in the language of the Newcomers, sai'ksss (Sykes) means "shit head." Sykes requisitions a .454 Casull revolver to handle the prospect of dealing with the hardened Newcomer physiology. While at the crime lab, Francisco detects an abnormality on one of the Newcomer criminals killed in the robbery, and asks a Newcomer assistant to check for something in particular, but does not reveal what it is to Sykes. Following an interview with Newcomer Trent Porter (Brian Thompson), the son of the Newcomer victim in the mini-mart robbery, Sykes and Francisco check out a nightclub called Encounters to investigate a link in the homicides. They want to talk to a Newcomer named Joshua Strader (Jeff Kober). However, they end up interviewing his girlfriend Cassandra (Leslie Bevis) instead, after he is murdered by a criminal ring led by Newcomer businessman William Harcourt (Terence Stamp) and his henchman Rudyard Kipling (Kevyn Major Howard). Cassandra attempts to seduce Sykes, who is at odds with the concept of a sexually-appealing Newcomer and retreats, much to Cassandra's amusement.
Sykes and Francisco retire to Syke's home, and the two find themselves getting intoxicated (Sykes on alcohol, Francisco on spoiled milk) and Sykes reveals how much he loves and misses his estranged daughter. Francisco confesses he finds humans strange but inspiring for their desires to aspire to high ideals even in the face of repeated failures to do so. Sykes suggests he not try to understand humans, noting their inability to understand each other.
The next morning, a henchman tries to plant a bomb in the detectives' car but he is interrupted by the hungover Francisco, who spent the night there. The bomber runs off and Francisco groggily takes the detached bomb into the house, handing it to the startled Sykes and explaining what he saw. The two of them return to the medical examiner's office, where Francisco gets the results of the test, not liking what he hears, but still trying to keeping the information to himself. Sykes, who is not happy with being kept in the dark, confronts Francisco in the elevator, demanding an explanation. Francisco reveals an unsettling secret--his species kept their slaves in line with a powerful drug they called Jabroka. It was given as a reward for those Newcomers who worked harder than others, and the drug made them work harder still; he confesses that for the slaves, it was their only avenue for pleasure, even as it killed them. The astounded Sykes asks why no one ever found out; Francisco explains that no one wanted to take the risk of not being accepted on Earth...or being exploited if humanity ever learned of the drug's existence. Sykes and Francisco resolve to look for the place where the drug is being developed, and discover a processing plant where many Newcomers worked (due to their ability to breathe methane) is the only place where it could be processed.
The two detectives head to the plant, and push their way into it despite the protests of the foreman on duty. Inside a supposedly methane-filled room, they discover the Jabroka drug lab. As Sykes watches the foreman, Francisco approaches the lab equipment with something like dawning horror, then destroys the equipment in an uncharacteristic display of unrestrained fury. He then confronts the foreman, lifting him off the ground and demanding to know where the completed product is located. Sykes wisely refrains from restraining Francisco, but does ask the foreman to come clean, saying he watched Francisco brutalize a fictional crook. They find out the drug has been taken to Encounters for a major drug deal. The Newcomers Hubley, Porter and Strader were involved in planning the operation, but were later murdered by Harcourt so he could keep the profits.
Ultimately, Sykes and Francisco track Harcourt to the Encounters club, where he is negotiating a release timetable for his potent narcotic. While Sykes is willing to call for backup, Francisco takes the car and goes after Harcourt himself, unwilling to make the existence of Jabroka known to the world. At the meeting, as Harcourt's buyers discover the potential of the drug, Francisco bursts in with the detached car bomb from earlier in one hand, and threatens to blow them up unless they hand over the drugs, demonstrating a willingness to destroy them all if the drug ever gets a chance to make his people slaves again. Kipling and Harcourt escape with the drugs after Cassandra reacts violently after she learns Harcourt had Shrader killed, and the two detectives pursue them in a car chase through downtown Los Angeles. They have a head-on collision, with Francisco being momentarily stunned and Kipling killed when the car explodes. Sykes chases Harcourt on foot, corners him on a desolate bridge. Harcourt then overdoses on a sample of the drug he was trying to distribute.
Sykes mistakenly believes Harcourt died from the overdose, but when he tells a cop about it, Francisco suddenly reacts to this news. As Harcourts' body is taken away in an ambulance, it mutates into a larger, muscular Newcomer with a violent streak. Francisco and Sykes go after the ambulance after Francisco reveals that an overdose does not kill a Newcomer, but changes the body chemistry, making them powerful and violent. They find the ambulance and two dead EMTs, and Sykes catches up with Harcourt again. After wounding him, he leads Harcourt onto the deck of a fishing trawler. The pair end up in a fight on the boat, and they both go into the water. Harcourt thrashes in the water as his body begins to disintegrate, but he drags Sykes down with him. Francisco commandeers a police helicopter, and rescues Sykes from the water by reaching down into it to pull him up even as the water eats away at his flesh. The two wounded cops look at each other as the pilot asks what the thing in the water was. Sykes responds by calling it just another ugly "slag," and Francisco then realizes Sykes will keep the secret.
With both murder cases solved, the authorities dismantle Harcourt's drug empire. The recovering detectives, now permanent partners, attend the wedding of Sykes' daughter, with whom he has mended relations and acts as her best man. Before he gives her away, he apologizes to Francisco for all the terrible things he knows he will say about him. Francisco accepts it good-naturedly, telling Sykes, "After all...you are only human." Sykes, in a voice-over, admits Francisco is a good partner, "except when he's got that sour-milk smell on his breath."
One of the usual 25 stories received each week by 20th Century Fox, the original screenplay for Alien Nation was submitted as a spec–script to producer Gale Ann Hurd in 1988.[2] The agency representing the storyline asked the production staff to view it as quickly as possible due to it being submitted to other film studios as well.[2] Both Hurd and her director of development Ellen Collett had the same initial response, seeing the script as a real page-turner.[2] According to Hurd, what really interested her about the film's story was the whole approach to the immigrant setting and the extrapolation of that to a science fiction setting.[2] The genre of science fiction in regards to representing aliens, tends to usually be in the form of one or two beings as shown on network series' like Star Trek. Typically, large numbers of stand-ins were not common in film since the Planet of the Apes picture twenty years earlier.[2] Working with co-producer Richard Kobritz, Hurd secured funding from Fox studios and began casting an experienced makeup team for the creation of the alien society.[2] Later, Hurd contacted cinematographer Adam Greenberg at his home in Israel to work on the production.[3] Caught by surprise, Greenberg recalled, "I was vacationing on the Dead Sea in a kibbutz (it was 125 degrees) and I got a call from Gale. That was the last thing to expect there, ..."[3] Though mostly an action picture, Alien Nation was somewhat of a throwback to other similar genre films such as Planet of the Apes and Silent Running.[2] The alien Newcomers are relegated to a second-class status.[2] Like other minorities, they live in their own neighborhoods, frequent their own clubs and develop their own underground.[2] Following the murder of a policeman, a human must partner up with an alien to solve the murder.[2] Their uneasy alliance creates a social mistrust, dealing with issues such as prejudice and racism.[2] By the end of the saga, the two completely different humanoids have combined their talents and overcome their social barriers to complete their task.[2]
Although several makeup effects companies were considered, 20th Century Fox chose Stan Winston Studios.[2] Stan Winston was not directly involved in the pre-production, but left the task to his top artists–Alec Gillis, Shane Mahan, John Rosengrant and Tom Woodruff.[2] Producer Gale Anne Hurd commented on creating the foundation for the makeup setting saying, "The primary problem was how to sell an alien race that was humanoid without making it look like people in rubber suits—and how to make it affordable. We knew there was going to be a lot of makeup application time and removal time—that was a given."[2] Artist Gillis recalled his involvement in the project saying, "We were involved in everything from designing and sculpting the aliens to supervising a crew of about thirty people. We sculpted the main characters, supervised the molding and production of their appliances and oversaw the sculpting of the secondary and background characters."[2] During the design phase, the producers supported the subtlety of the makeup and trying to make the aliens look as human as possible. Hurd explained, "We wanted the aliens to be more like a different ethnic race than like lizard people, ..." She added, "We didn't want our audiences thinking, 'Gee, look how different these aliens are.' Rather, after about five minutes we wanted the audience to accept them as different from us, but not so different that no one is buying the storyline. We wanted the aliens to be characters–not creatures."[2] A preliminary design sketch for the aliens as described by Mahan, was that "the males were going to have spines on top of their heads–kind of like a rooster's comb–and when they got angry, these spines would raise up. That would've required a mechanical headpiece, and Graham Baker thought it was a little too extreme so we went with smooth heads instead.[2] Coming close to a final design for the headpiece makeup, Woodruff explained how the masks had "heavier brows and a heavier skin texture that looked more leathery, and there were more pronounced lumps on the backs of their heads. After we went into production on these masks, Graham Baker decided that he wanted the aliens to look even more subtle, so we streamlined the design once we started doing the principal characters."[2] Mike Spatola was head of the painting crew for the mask design. Hairless by design, the coordinators felt the masks should have spotted marks where hair would be present on humans. Each alien headpiece had to be custom painted with a spotting pattern to match every backup secondary piece used for individual characters.[2] Each of the actors who played aliens also had their hands painted in a spot pattern, as an original plan of supplying them with appliances for hand pieces was discarded.[2]
| We wanted the aliens to be more like a different ethnic race than like lizard people, ... We didn't want our audiences thinking, 'Gee, look how different these aliens are.' Rather, after about five minutes we wanted the audience to accept them as different from us, but not so different that no one is buying the storyline. We wanted the aliens to be characters–not creatures. |
| — Gale Ann Hurd[2] |
After the generic alien concept was finalized, each of the effects coordinators worked with a specific actor. Mahan chose to work with Mandy Patinkin, as well as Francisco's son. Rosengrant worked with Leslie Bevis who played Cassandra. Woodruff worked on Terence Stamp who played the part of Harcourt.[2] In trying to emphasize the uniqueness of the characters, Mahan commented, "We wanted the audience to be able to recognize the actors immediately. They were all so good, it would have been a shame to cover them up completely."[2] Other effects coordinators like Gillis remarked, "The actor who played Trent Porter, for example–Brian Thompson–was a really rugged guy, so he came off looking like a really tough character. On the other hand, Kevyn Major Howard–who played Harcourt's murderous henchman–had very delicate, boyish kind of features, so we used that quality to create a creepy juxtaposition."[2] While effects coordinators were struggling to finish the final design and full-scale production of the alien prosthetics, Hurd chose makeup artist Zoltan Elek to supervise the overall application.[2] Elek had previously worked on the film Mask and the character Max Headroom.[2] Elek insisted that the alien coloration be much more closer to human skin tones rather than the originally chosen yellowish pigment. Elek recalled his disagreement with Winston as Stan felt, "... the aliens should be a totally different color than the humans, with a lot of yellows, blues and grays. To me, that scheme was too monstrous–in fact, we ended up using it on the Harcourt monster at the climax."[2] Another creative aspect of the makeup was the gradation between the principal and background masks. The crew of Alien Nation sought to avoid the same mistakes made in Planet of the Apes twenty years earlier. As explained by Gillis, "We had what we referred to as 'A-B-C-D' makeups, ... The 'A' makeups were those custom designed for the principal actors, while the 'B' makeups were mix-and-match where we would recombine pieces from other actors to create a new character. Our 'D' masks–the ones furthest from camera–were overhead slip latex masks incapable of changing expression. The 'C' masks, however, were made of foam latex and could be glued down to get some expression from the characters in the middleground."[2] Application of the Newcomer makeup known as "spuds" or "potatoheads" on set, required four hours;[4] a task which Patinkin described as being "a pain in the ass."[4] Masks were manufactured in a production line to meet the enormous demand for the film. Mahan mused, "We would pull the pieces out of the oven, fix them up, paint them and have them ready for pickup that afternoon to be taken to the set. The pieces were barely cold when Zoltan and his crew applied them."[2]
For the final dramatic scene involving Harcourt's demise, the rigged effects were handled in two stages. The first stage involved a dissolving head and body, while the second stage incorporated a flesh-less arm thrusting out of seawater.[2] Rosengrant noted, "While the dissolving makeup had to look extreme, it also had to appear realistic within the limits of the alien anatomy Winston's crew had designed. We wanted to avoid the amorphous 'blob-of-blood' look you see in so many of these slasher and monster pictures. We wanted to be able to see Harcourt's bone structure rather than just the glob hanging off of it." For the visual appearance he added, "Of course, we did use methocel slime to make it wet and nasty-looking, but the basic understructure was rooted in anatomy."[2] For Harcourt's facial disintegration, the coordinators came up with a foam rubber base makeup superimposed with a layer of gelatin appliances.[2] Elek explained, the crew "dug out chunks from the foam rubber pieces, filled the holes with Bromo Seltzer, then laid the gelatin appliances over the whole thing and colored them so you could not see the holes below. Once the stuntman, the camera and everyone else was in position, we took a large syringe filled with hot water and injected it into each of the Bromo Seltzer pockets as the camera started rolling. As the Bromo Seltzer started to fizzle, the hot water began eating its way through the gelatin skin and his face appeared to bubble and melt."[2] In the end, Mahan remarked, "We figured that going from something like the alien queen in Aliens to these straight prosthetic makeups would be simple, but it was really a lot of work."[2]
Numerous interior and exterior locations used to suit the needs of the story, were filmed in Los Angeles, California.[5] Within a 5-month shooting schedule, 3 weeks were spent shooting at studio locations.[3] Production designer Jack Collis, explained how the film integrates a minority group (the aliens) into the film saying, "The idea was to bring in this alien group, assimilate them into our society, and get them a locale that would be a part of Los Angeles, ... It would look almost as if a group of Koreans or Vietnamese that had moved into the area. This group would have established their own community. They have their own language, their own signs."[5] The film crew installed fictional alien language signs along Western Avenue and Santa Monica Boulevard.[5] Colored drawings were made of all stores on both sides of the street for two full blocks.[5] Painted and electrical signs were designed for each building.[5] Graffiti was also carefully planned out. The film crew did their own painting and even took a big blank concrete wall and inserted alien graffiti for a scene involving an early physical confrontation between the main characters.[5] Essentially, the alphabet of the alien citizens had to be designed as an integral part of their environment. He commented how the crew "came up with individual alphabets and then combined them into certain words like, say, 'enter' and 'open', so that we could repeat them, ..." while also mentioning how the they "brought in a language expert to give us something the actors could be comfortable with."[5] The Hawthorns, a well known family of sign painters, created most of the alien signs.[5] Collis even mused how at one one point, store owners liked, and wouldn't want to take down the alien graffiti used during filming on their properties.[5] Collis recalled how the alien language resembled "a flowing design more like hand writing than lettering, that looks almost like a heartbeat graph. Occasionally, we'd underline it as though it came from sort of electronic machine, like an IBM report. It turned out to be such a simple thing once we got it going, but we had to go through a process of 'what is this going to look like?' before we got what we wanted."[5]
Certain fictional locations in the film such as the Encounters Club, was filmed at Club Hollywood on Hollywood Boulevard.[5] Set decorator Jim Duffy, who was involved with the exotic dance scene at the club, used unique Austrian drapes to create a see-through design for actress Bevis who portrayed the character of Cassandra to perform around with.[5] Smaller set areas for Cassandra's dressing room, a couple of offices, and a big conference room where Harcourt's drug deal was taking place were built on stages at the film studio.[5] A Van Nuys bus stop set stood in as the taco burrito stand for the amusing scene between Francisco and Sykes relating to raw fast food.[5] Some of the stunt scenes involving an action sequence later in the film was shot at a harbor in San Pedro.[5] For certain scenes within that shot, the production crew built their own custom water tank 44 feet in length and 22 feet in width. Two submerged 75 horsepower motors churned to create artificial waves, while separate raised wind machines worked to create the effect of a helicopter hovering over water.[5] Other practical filming locations included Nichols Canyon Beach, the Los Angeles Police Academy and the York Street police station for interiors.[5] A bar called Monty's in downtown Los Angeles was used for a scene involving the rough alien played by Brian Thompson.[5] The interior of Sykes's house was filmed at a home near the studio, while a location in Beverly Glen stood in for a church in the final wedding scene.[5] Some of the more elaborate sets used extensively in the film, were the Millennium Biltmore Hotel and an Anheuser–Busch plant.[5] The alien villain Harcourt, is introduced at the hotel in the elite Crystal Room.[5] The lobby section of the hotel with its very high ceilings and extensive complement of gold motif, was used in an interview scene between the characters of Harcourt, Kipling and the detectives. Alternatively, the beverage plant was used as a disguise for a petroleum factory. Unused portions of the facility containing steel tanks were used as an interesting gloomy background.[5] A methane lab was recreated with translucent tubes running through them, as though drugs were in the process of being refined.[5] Certain visual smoke effects were also created to copy the look of an oil refinery.[5]
| A flowing design more like hand writing than lettering, that looks almost like a heartbeat graph. Occasionally, we'd underline it as though it came from sort of electronic machine, like an IBM report. It turned out to be such a simple thing once we got it going, but we had to go through a process of 'what is this going to look like?' before we got what we wanted. |
| — Jack Collis on Alien Nation's language.[5] |
As scripted by writer Rockne S. O'Bannon, Alien Nation was originally called, Future Tense. The film took some of its concept from the TV series In the Heat of the Night, with science fiction elements integrated in the plot.[2] During production, the film had a working title called, Outer Heat, which essentially was an amalgam of In the Heat of the Night and a 1960s science fiction TV series, The Outer Limits.[2] Jack Collis emphasized that the film was not a "space epic" but more of an action film.[5] He admitted, "We did build a spaceship, but it's a simple thing that you see on a TV monitor describing the landing of the aliens several years ago, before they became assimilated into our society. It gives us a background but not a lot of detail, ..."[5] Collis noted that the film was even "reminiscent of the work I did in Cocoon."[5] An earlier draft of the film was actually written by director James Cameron in 1987, but his name however, was not credited in the final cut of the film.[6] One conceit of the script was that immigrations officials ran out of names for the 300,000 aliens, and began to name them after familiar appellations of the past. Actor Mandy Patinkin's original name for his character was set to be George Jetson.[4] However, three days before the start of shooting, Hanna-Barbera wouldn't allow the name to be used.[4] Expressing his disappointment, Patinkin said, "I assumed that the name of the character I agreed to play was George Jetson. And I was pretty pissed off that there was a screw-up and that the name couldn't be used."[4] He went on to say, "I thought it made a tremendous difference to the piece that the guy's name was George Jetson because it gave a cartoon feeling, an innocence that was important to the movie's whole idea. It's a great loss to the piece that we couldn't recover, a great misfortune that couldn't be solved. It would have helped a lot."[4] In reference to the cartoon character, the producers would leave in the name "George" as a substitute.[4] Patinkin added, "Everything in the script is Jetson, everything on the makeup is labeled Jetson, we always refer to him as Jetson. Not even George, but Jetson. So in our minds, he's George Jetson. So as far as I'm concerned, anybody who sees the movie, they're watching George Jetson no matter what the hell they call him."[4] To understand his role of being a police officer, Patinkin spent two weeks hanging out with the New York City Police Department.[4] He took their training course, joined them on patrol, and spent time with them at the firing range.[4] Commenting on the character development of Francisco, he said "It's one of the better jobs that people from his race have acquired. He feels very proud of the fact that he's able to be a cop."[4]
Cinematographer Adam Greenberg, whose previous film credits included Three Men and a Baby, La Bamba and Near Dark, approached the film with a unique documentary-style technique.[3] Commenting on the initial photography lighting tests, Greenberg remarked, "The first ones were a disaster. They didn't look good at all. I didn't know how to photograph these aliens. It was the first time I had to deal with this kind of thing. But I have an eye and I learned from these tests."[3] At the Biltmore Hotel, a peculiar situation arose where the ceilings were simply too tall for standard lighting equipment. An ingenious idea was devised by the crew to have six to eight weather balloons sent up and have artificial light bounce off of them to create the proper lighting mood.[5] Greenberg remarked, "I wanted a very rich look from that place, gold and very warm. In the story it is very late after a big party. I wasn't going for any special effect, just nice light from lamps on the tables. The problem was, the hotel management wouldn't let us hang anything from the ceiling. In pre-production they had told us we could hang lights, but I didn't believe them. The ceilings there are very high and very beautiful."[3]
On character interactions, Greenberg noted how there was "a lot of dialogue between Jimmy and Mandy in the car. We used a lot of car mounts. I would light the alien so that he looked good, but if he passed into a shadow while going down the street you could see all the seams in his make-up. So I sometimes had to block all the streets with black paper."[3] The aliens were not too different from humans, and an incorrect lighting or camera angle could give away seams in the makeup.[3] In attempting to identify with the aliens regarding a unique look, Greenberg chose a deep blue color for filming. He said, "We ended up with very deep, strong blue – a sort of moonlight blue. We tried to do all the scenes in the movie that appear to be their places heavily favored by this deep blue color. The Encounters Club was one of those places."[3] Greenberg used Arriflex cameras and Zeiss lenses along with Fuji stock. Commenting on film grain he said, "I figured out from tests that it is better for me to use Fuji. Once film is blown up to 70mm the grain will stand out more and Fuji has smaller grain than Kodak. I can control the contrast with light, but I have to live with the grain."[3] Making use of multiple cameras, Greenberg noted, "Photographically, of course, one camera is best. But as a movie maker, and because I want the film to be a success, I realize that the photography is not the most important thing. The whole movie is most important. So in pre-production, I was the one pushing the director to always shoot with two or three cameras."[3]
| The aliens were not too different from humans, and an incorrect lighting or camera angle could give away seams in the makeup. |
| — Adam Greenberg[3] |
Lighting challenges were abound for Greenberg as most of the film took place at night.[3] One of the simplest techniques for lighting employed by Greenberg was using a car's headlights to dramatically produce a scene of terror. Greenberg explained, "We had a scene on Zuma Beach where the bad guys are dragging somebody into the ocean. I wanted to have a very hard, but very natural, and strong look. So, I used the car headlights. It was nice because everything behind the villains fell into darkness. It had a surrealistic look."[3] Greenberg also remarked how he had a close working relationship with DeLuxe lab in getting the correct color for the extensive night shooting in the film by bluntly saying, "In a movie like this I wanted the blacks to be very black, so I worked closely with DeLuxe lab ..."[3] He felt the daily challenges of night shooting visibly enhanced the appeal of Alien Nation by figuratively mentioning, "as a cameraman, you can create a lot more at night. Sometimes you have to feel your way. You also have true control at night. If a light is on it is because you turned it on."[3]
The score for the film was originally composed by Jerry Goldsmith, but later rejected in favor of music composed by Curt Sobel.[7] Goldsmith's score was however used for the film's theatrical trailer.[8] Musical artists Smokey Robinson, The Beach Boys, Michael Bolton, Mick Jagger and David Bowie among others, contributed songs to the music listing.[6] The audio soundtrack in Compact Disc format composed by Sobel was never officially released, but a limited edition of the original score initially composed by Goldsmith featuring 18 tracks, was released in 2005. The score was entirely synthesized and limited to 3,000 copies. The melody featured throughout the film recorded by Goldsmith, was originally composed for the movie Wall Street. After being rejected for both that film project and later Alien Nation, the score was used in the 1990 film The Russia House.[8] The sound effects in the film were supervised by Mark Mangini. The mixing of the sound elements were orchestrated by David MacMillan and Charles Wilborn.[6]
The following year after the film's release, the extraterrestrial plot concept was used as the basis for a television series of the same name. The show attempted to move away from the original film's premise, and delve more into the alien's distinct culture and characteristics. Premiering on September 18, 1989, the series aired 22 episodes and ran for a single season, ending on May 7, 1990.[9] Actor Gary Graham played the lead role of Matt Sikes, while Eric Pierpoint was chosen to play the character of the Tenctonese newcomer Sam Francisco. Supporting acting roles were played by Michele Scarabelli, Lauren Woodland and Sean Six.[10] Contributing directors to various episodes included Harry Longstreet, Stan Lathan, Lyndon Chubbuck and Kenneth Johnson. Writing credits were assigned to Steve Mitchell, Kenneth Van Sickle and Kenneth Johnson among others.[11] In the near future, the Sci-Fi Channel is planning to air a new Alien Nation television show in keeping with the popularity of the series.[12][13] The new series is rumored to take place in the decade of the 2020s, about 20 years after the aliens' first arrival on Earth. With their population ballooning to 3.5 million, the aliens are said to live in their own communities similar to the North African ghettos in France, as described by producer Tim Minear.[14]
Following the demise of the television series in 1990, plans were devised to continue the popularity of the concept surrounding the race of the Newcomers through a string of television films. Premiering on October 25, 1994, the first of five sequels entitled Alien Nation: Dark Horizon, was released with a plot surrounding a distinct Newcomer arriving on Earth attempting to lure the aliens back into a life of slavery. The film was written on a screenplay conceived by Andrew Schneider and Diane Frolov.[15] Alien Nation: Body and Soul would follow on October 10, 1995 with a story revolving around a slaveship medical experiment involving a child who appears to be part human and part Newcomer. A side plot also involves the character of Sikes and a female Tenctonese exploring a relationship. Harry and Renee Longstreet were credited writers for the storyline.[16] The franchise would see two more sequels in 1996. Alien Nation: Millennium was released on January 2, 1996, and dealt with a mysterious cult that uses mind-altering alien artifacts to lure Newcomer followers into a doomsday scenario. The film's plot is a tie-in to one of the television episodes titled: Generation to Generation that premiered on January 29, 1990.[17] Alien Nation: The Enemy Within was aired on November 12, 1996 and revolved around a story from which the detectives try to save their city from an alien threat originating from a waste disposal facility. Racism was a key theme encountered by the character of Francisco.[17] The fifth and final sequel would appear on July 29, 1997. Alien Nation: The Udara Legacy, finds the detectives trying to stop a resistance group among the Newcomers trying to indoctrinate those among them into causing mayhem. A smaller plot is introduced with the younger Newcomer Buck, played by actor Sean Six, enlisting to become a police officer.[17] All the sequels in the series were directed by veteran producer Kenneth Johnson.[18]
Pocket Books, a division of Simon & Schuster, began publishing a novel series in connection with the film starting in 1993. The writing team of Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens, known for their work in Star Trek, committed to a novel entitled Day of Descent.[19] Some of the novels were pretexts for the movie sequels, such as the novel Cross of Blood authored by K.W. Jeter, which became a tie-in to the Dark Horizon film,[20] or the novel Body and Soul authored by Peter David, which became one of the sequels of the same name.[21] Subject matter such as racism and discrimination with extraterrestrial themes were regularly encountered within the books. Authors K. W. Jeter and Barry B. Longyear were regular contributors to the series with novels like, The Change[22] and Slag Like Me.[23]
Between 1990 to 1992, Malibu Comics began printing several comics from an adaptation of the general Alien Nation storyline. Among first released titles were, The Spartans created with the help of author Bill Spangler and illustrator James Tucker,[24] and A Breed Apart authored by Steve Jones.[25] Other titles included Public Enemy authored by Sandy Carruthers and illustrated by Lowell Cunningham,[26] and a unique version entitled Ape Nation, a crossover series adapted with the Planet of the Apes franchise. The Ape Nation series included four different adventures called Plans, Pasts, Pawns and Pains along with a collector's edition.[27] Other contributors to the series included illustrators Terry Pallott and Leonard Kirk to titles like, The Skin Trade.[28]
The film received mixed reviews from critics. Rotten Tomatoes reported that 56% of 25 sampled critics gave the film a positive review, with an average score of 5.4 out of 10.[29]
/VE1117789176.html?categoryid=31&cs=1&p=0 Alien Nation Film Review]. Variety Magazine. Retrieved March 10, 2010.</ref>
| "The movie is simply a failure of imagination. Nobody looked at the screenplay and observed that it didn't try hard enough, that it had no surprises, that it didn't attempt to delight its audiences with twists and turns on the phoned-in plotline." |
| —Roger Ebert, writing in The Chicago Sun Times[30] |
Another positive review centering around the science fiction elements of the film was delivered by Janet Maslin of The New York Times. She praised the theme saying, "Alien Nation has the best science-fiction idea this side of The Terminator." However, Maslin was quick to admit the film "settles down, with remarkable ease, into the routine of a two-cop buddy film, extraterrestrials and all. Matthew and Sam (whom Matthew refuses to address that way, renaming him George) go through all the familiar stages of forging a friendship between partners: cool antipathy, exchanges of insults, growing mutual respect on the job and, finally, an all-night drinking binge to solidify their buddyhood."[31] On a negative front, author Jay Carr of The Boston Globe commented on James Caan's performance viewing him "Looking like a Paul Newman gone wrong, ..." He went on further stating that "the film's air of enlightenment is only makeup deep. And while 'Alien Nation' is no smarter than, say, a 'Lethal Weapon,' it hasn't got the juice or the level of sensory jolt a 'Lethal Weapon' supplies."[32] Other critics such as Gene Siskel acknowledged the similarities between other police thriller movies, but still found the film to be a "Genuinely entertaining version of that old reliable; a cop buddy picture with two very different detectives". He explained, "Now this is an example of how a you can put a nice twist on a familiar story, and it will work if its been fully written. Caan and Patinkin have special characters to play." Compelled by the acting, he felt "The buddy combination here, worked for me." He ultimately gave the film a Thumbs Up review.[33] Not nearly as impressed with the film was author NF of TimeOut Magazine calling it, "Worthy, predictable, and dull." A summation of the negativity was described as being, "Played hard and fast, the film might just have worked, but the decision to soft-pedal the violence merely emphasises the obviousness of the liberal point-scoring (parallels with Vietnamese or Nicaraguan refugees are so facile as to be crass)."[34] Critic Leonard Maltin bluntly referred to the film as "A great concept that doesn't quite pay off." But in a hint of commendation, he remarked how the film contains "many clever touches and terrific performances by Caan and Patinkin."[35]
The film won the Saturn Award for Best Science Fiction Film of 1988,[36] and received two Saturn nominations for Best Supporting Actor for Mandy Patinkin as well as Best Make-Up for John M. Elliott Jr. and Stan Winston. The film also received two other nominations, among them for Best Dramatic Presentation from the Hugo Awards[37] and Best Film for Graham Baker from the Fantasporto International Fantasy Film Awards.[38]
The film premiered in cinemas on October 7, 1988. At its widest distribution in the U.S., the film was screened at 1,436 theaters grossing $8,421,429, averaging $5,889 in revenue per theater in its opening weekend. During that first weekend in release, the film opened in first place beating out the films, The Accused and Punchline.[39] The film's revenue dropped by 49% in its second week of release, earning $4,252,252.[40] In the month of November during its final weekend showing in theaters, the film came out in 10th place grossing $1,306,849.[41] The film went on to top out domestically at $25,216,243 in total ticket sales through a 5-week theatrical run. Internationally, the film took in an additional $6,938,804 in box office business for a combined total of $32,155,047.[42] For 1988 as a whole, the film would cumulatively rank at a box office performance position of 41.[43]
The film was initially released in VHS video format on September 10, 1996.[44] The Region 1 Code widescreen edition of the film was released on DVD in the United States on March 27, 2001 and includes a narrative and interview filled Featurette, a Behind the Scenes clip featuring director Graham Baker, a TV Spots special, the Theatrical Trailer and Fox Flix theatrical trailers for The Abyss, Aliens, Enemy Mine, Independence Day and Zardoz.[45] Currently, there is no exact set date on a future Blu-ray Disc release for the film.
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