Practical effects vs, CGI

Practical effects vs. Computer generated imagery


Originally 20th century fox asked Hill to direct Alien, to which he declined as the level of visual effects made him feel uncomfortable, and indeed the movie itself does require a massive amount of visual effects. With a budget of 8.4 million, Ridley relied solely on the use of practical effects to visually accommodate the movie, as computer generated imagery at this stage was still an emerging concept.
Ridley’s directors commentary on the movie uses the emergence of the face hugger as an example of how practical effects can achieve the same visual level of authenticity as CGI, requiring less funds and time. When Kane ventures out to investigate the distress signal coming from a derelict planet, he finds himself surrounded by eggs. The egg itself is crafted out of fibreglass, designed to be seen through when shone with a light. With hydraulics, mechanically the egg was able to open. Inside the egg Ridley used his own gloved hands to mimic that of the face hugger, which was designed to have long humanised fingers. The stomach of a cow was also used to give the content of the egg an organic feel.
For his exterior scenes of the spaceship, Ridley relied on the use of practical models and miniatures, which were crafted with amazing detail and used extensively throughout the film.
The Alien itself was played by design student; Bolaji Badej who with his slender lanky frame was chosen to fool the audience into thinking that no human was within the Alien costume, adding to the illusion that the creature had a life of its own. Bolaji Badej Was instructed to do tai chi classes to slow down his movement making for a more creepy approach.
Scott, accompanied by Swedish designer and concept artist Giger, are responsible for perhaps the most iconic monster of the last three decades, paving the foundation for countless spin offs, merchandise, video games and endless sequels, all without the aid of costly CGI.
To summarise, Ridley’s use of miniatures, meat products, puppetry and costumes were ingeniously crafted and executed to make Alien the pop culture classic it is today, 30 years on from it’s release. With a certain degree of smugness Ridley is often quoted commenting on the over use of CGI today. Arguably though as time moves on, one could nitpick the flaws of practical effects and the general animation of Ridley’s models, being moved on strings, couldn’t give an audience a real sense of weight, sapping the credibility of the giant space ship and massive refinery. Also Ridley voiced tension between he and his lighting crew who would often disagree on how to light the miniatures. Though lighting a computer generated 3d model is no less complicated, one could add that in the least the artist would have much more control.
Comparatively, one of the sequels “Alien resurrection” directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet relied heavily on bringing the Xenomorph to life through computer generated imagery. With a budget of 70 million one could easily guess that the film relied heavily on the use of CGI to visually bring this movie to life.
The opening scene shows an extreme close up of a tiny fictional fly, which is obviously used to link the Aliens hive like mentality and behaviour to that of an insect. Already with the heavy use of CGI one can see how a lot of majestic allure that the Aliens had, which had been hinted at in previous films, was now being shirked in exchange for visual imagery and animation.
The first Alien only hinted towards the creatures links with insects like ants, and then elaborated in the following sequel ‘Aliens; which introduced the Queen. The origins of the Alien were shrouded in mystery, and the Alien itself was never shown in full, as the suspense and tension of the creature was crucial to the horror sci-fi genre. However it seems that when a massive budget, accompanied by CGI comes into the equation, directors find it all to tempting to really show off the monster, and it’s movement, almost spoon feeding an audience through a visual medium. Though this could arguably be quite warranted given that Alien resurrection is the 4th movie in the series, one could say that fans would beg for such visually stunning clips of Aliens swimming, and running down dark corridors, and would in turn be bored by being teased with only snippets of the creature.
Similarly, the ramifications behind the malfunctioning Jaws shark, forced director Steven Spielberg to imply it’s presence, rather than show it in great detail, as the robot shark itself wasn’t convincing. This worked to the movies advantage as by teasing the audience a massive amount of suspense was created. Alien resurrection seems to exchange suspense for animation, and without the foundations of the Alien itself being coated in mystery, speculation and predisposed notion of terror by Scott, the film itself would fall flat into the abyss of meaningless monster films.
By comparing the two movies, one can see how the use of practical effects can drastically reduce budget and time, and that CGI though applicable to today’s audience does have the ability to give a character believable movement, but over showing the Alien requires a sacrifice in suspense and allure, taking from the audience their ability to imagine and speculate and project their own fears onto the seldom seen creature. The limitations of practical effects can force one to rely on other film making skills to help get the point across, while the seemingly ‘create anything’ attitude that comes hand in hand with CGI reveals a risk in which a director can patronise an audience, destroy suspense, and perhaps prevent the audience from using their imagination.









Bibliography:
"The Darkest Reaches: Nostromo and Alien Planet", The Beast Within: The Making of Alien.
“Ridley Scott (Director). (2003-12-02). Alien Quadrilogy. [DVD booklet]. Los Angeles, California: 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, Inc.”