In
our previous Face-Off, we pitted
THE NICE GUYS‘
Russell Crowe and
Ryan Gosling against each other. While I gave Gosling the slight edge, your opinions ranged from agreeing, to calling it a tie, to say Crowe blows Gosling out of the water. Crowe is definitely more of a powerhouse than Gosling, but as a couple of you pointed out, he tends to be hit or miss, especially over the last decade, while Gosling has been pretty consistently on for his (relatively short) career.
This week, we’re looking at two of the finest films to come out of the 1970’s… which also both happen to be about humans taking on a terrifying monster. By all logic, JAWS and ALIEN should have been forgettable B-movie, monster-in-the-house fare, but in the capable hands of Steven Spielberg and Ridley Scott, both films would go on to be considered classics and inspire a generation.
When a massive shark begins terrorizing Amity Island, the town’s mayor opts to keep the beach open to turn a profit. In order to protect his family and the people of his town, Police Chief Martin Brody teams up with oceanographer Hooper and shark hunter Quint to take down the beast.
When the spaceship
Nostromo receives a mysterious distress signal from a nearby planet, the crew are awakened from stasis to investigate. After one of the officers is attacked and brought on board, the crew learn they have invited a horrifying creature onto the ship.
Giving ALIEN the slight edge here due to the fact that the crew are stuck in space with the alien, while in JAWS the terror is confined to the water.
“This was no boat accident.”
“It’s a carcaradon carcharias. It’s a Great White.”
“I think that I am familiar with the fact that you are going to ignore this particular problem until it swims up and bites you on the ass!
“This was no boat accident.”
“Y’all know me. Know how I earn a livin’. I’ll catch this bird for you, but it ain’t gonna be easy. Bad fish. Not like going down the pond chasin’ bluegills and tommycods. This shark, swallow you whole. Little shakin’, little tenderizin’, an’ down you go. And we gotta do it quick, that’ll bring back your tourists, put all your businesses on a payin’ basis. But it’s not gonna be pleasant. I value my neck a lot more than three thousand bucks, chief. I’ll find him for three, but I’ll catch him, and kill him, for ten. But you’ve gotta make up your minds. If you want to stay alive, then ante up. If you want to play it cheap, be on welfare the whole winter. I don’t want no volunteers, I don’t want no mates, there’s just too many captains on this island. $10,000 for me by myself. For that you get the head, the tail, the whole damn thing.”
“You’re gonna need a bigger boat.”
“Fast fish.”
“Sometimes that shark, he looks right into you. Right into your eyes. You know the thing about a shark, he’s got… lifeless eyes, black eyes, like a doll’s eye. When he comes at ya, doesn’t seem to be livin’. Until he bites ya and those black eyes roll over white. And then, ah… then you hear that terrible high pitch screamin’ and the ocean turns red and spite of all the poundin’ and the hollerin’ they all come in and rip you to pieces.”
“Smile, you son of a bitch.”
“You still don’t understand what you’re dealing with, do you? Perfect organism. Its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility.”
“Back to the ole freezerinos.”
“Yes. I read you. The answer is negative.”
“Micro changes in air density, my ass.”
“So, um, we think we should discuss the bonus situation…”
“That’s the only way. We’ll move in pairs. We’ll go step by step and cut off every bulkhead and every vent until we have it cornered. And then we’ll blow it the f*ck out into space! Is that acceptable to you?”
“Mother! I’ve turned the cooling unit back on. Mother!”
“The ship will automatically destruct in “T” minus five minutes.”
“You bitch!”
“Final report of the commercial starship Nostromo, third officer reporting. The other members of the crew, Kane, Lambert, Parker, Brett, Ash and Captain Dallas, are dead. Cargo and ship destroyed. I should reach the frontier in about six weeks. With a little luck, the network will pick me up. This is Ripley, last survivor of the Nostromo, signing off. Come on, cat.”
After directing a couple successful films,
Steven Spielberg came barrelling onto the scene with
JAWS. With cinematography still impressive to this day, genuine intimacy and realism from the cast, and a tension unmatched by most films of the genre, there is no question a new titan of the industry was making his mark.
I’d really love to call this one a tie.
Ridley Scott takes what could have been a forgettable movie of the week and turns it into a masterpiece, building tension and letting us spend real time with the characters before all hell breaks loose. While
ALIEN is pretty damn perfect, though,
JAWS just features more of those “remember
that?” moments, largely to the way Spielberg chose to handle them.
Quint, Hooper, and Brody head out on the Orca to hunt down the shark. The crew successfully harpoon barrels into the shark, but the beast just uses them to yank the ship around and render it useless. Hooper enters a shark cage in hopes of injecting it, but the shark destroys the cage, attacks the boat, and kills Quint. As the boat sinks, Brody manages to get a scuba tank in the sharks mouth and shoot it with a rifle, blowing the fishy to bits. As the smoke clears, Brody and Hooper paddle into the sunset.
After setting the Nostromo to self-destruct, Ripley, Lambert, and Parker make for the ship’s shuttle. Ripley alone makes it to the shuttle, at which point she goes back for the freaking cat, makes it back to the shuttle, and disengages, watching the Nostromo explode behind her. The end. Oh, wait, the alien is on the shuttle! Ripley uses the ship’s controls and a grappling hook to expel the alien, at which point it tries to reenter the ship through the engine. Ripley activates the engine, blows the thing to hell, signs off, and goes the f*ck to sleep.
JAWS has inspired three mediocre-to-poor sequels, a ride at Universal Studios, the documentary THE SHARK IS STILL WORKING, and arguably, every water-based horror film out there, from
DEEP BLUE SEA to SHARKNADO 6: THE SHARKNADOING. It should also be noted that
ALIEN was pitched to studio execs as “
JAWS in space.”
ALIEN was followed by a sequel that some deem better than the original as well as two more films which are less universally acclaimed but still have a very solid fan base.
Ridley Scott recently brought an
ALIEN prequel to life with
PROMETHEUS, and
Ridley Scott and company are currently gearing up to bring us
ALIEN: CONVENANT in 2017.
ALIEN has also inspired plenty of underwhelming fare, including that whole
ALIEN VS. PREDATOR thing, but I think it’s safe to say this film has had a wider and heavier impact on the cinematic landscape than
JAWS has.
John Williams provides one of the first unforgettable, iconic scores of his career. With two simple notes, Williams would play a huge hand in making
JAWS a permanent fixture of the cinematic landscape.
Jerry Goldsmith’s score is beautiful, unsettling, intimate, and grand all at once. The only thing lacking here is any kind of memorable theme. Granted, it can be argued the less notable the better, but in the case of
JAWS, at least, the score helped make the movie.
Holy crap, this is a tough one. I think when all is said and done,
ALIEN has endured partially thanks to
James Cameron‘s brilliant sequel as well as the subsequent films (which tend to at least be pretty interesting if not always good), while
JAWS has remained an acclaimed classic
in spite of the lackluster sequels and facsimiles it spawned. I can still watch
ALIEN any day of the week, but I know some people find it too slow by today’s standards, while I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone say the same about
JAWS. It also doesn’t hurt that
JAWS seems to have been one of the inspirations for
ALIEN, at least based on Scott’s pitch to the studio. Feel free to disagree down below; I certainly won’t argue.
Agree? Disagree? Which do you prefer?
POST YOUR CHOICE BELOW!
If you have a suggestion for a future Face-Off, let us know below or send me an email at [email protected].
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