Filmmaker Fede Álvarez is all set to give life back to the Alien franchise with his upcoming Alien: Romulus and all the updates so far are proving he won’t disappoint. Not only has he earned tremendous praise from mastermind Ridley Scott, the one who kick-started this saga in the first place, but his own words are making it evident this movie would be nothing short of a masterpiece.
This stands especially true after his recent comments on how he developed the project. As Álvarez admitted himself, he didn’t fall for one of Hollywood’s cheapest tricks in filmmaking that ruined what could have otherwise been potential masterworks like The Flash and Green Lantern, among others: Turning to excessive CGI and green screens for the developing part.
Fede Álvarez Swears He’s Against Using Hollywood’s Cheapest Filmmaking Trick
For quite some time now, Hollywood has suffered from a severe lack of originality in multiple aspects of filmmaking, especially if looking at fictional works in superheroes and similar genres. Instead, they have chosen the CGI and green screen approach, letting technology take control and bring their imagination to life without actually bringing it to life.
While a lot of projects have succeeded through this technique, the overuse of it has also caused some really critical failures. This list includes, obviously, films from the super-verses, like The Flash (2022) and Green Lantern (2011), but it also includes non-superhero films like Skyscraper (2018) and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008).
But when it comes to the upcoming Alien: Romulus, director Fede Álvarez seems to have had a strict rule to go as natural as was feasible.
As it turns out, even the mastermind behind the Don’t Breathe film series feels that it’s nothing more than just “a means to an end” that robs the feeling of true and genuine filmmaking from the creators.
During a recent interview with The Movie Podcast, talking about the making of films through CGI and green screens, he said:
Eventually, the build of the movie can look amazing, but on the day, it just looks- it’s all a means to an end, right? There’s no joy of really being on a set and seeing things and seeing creatures. It seems to have disappeared for a while in certain movies as well, and I’m not interested in that.
That being put out loud and clear, Álvarez clearly isn’t all that influenced by the constantly advancing technology in the moviemaking industry, and evidently made as minimal use of it in Romulus as possible as well. Instead, he claimed that he chose the more natural approach, channeling his inner kid and doing it the original way that it’s supposed to be done.
Fede Álvarez Prefers Going Through the Adventures of Moviemaking
Continuing in the interview, Álvarez went on to talk about how he prefers shooting in chronological order, even if it means constantly switching between sets, back and forth, just to nail the scenes in the correct order. According to his truthful admission, going any other way “robs you of the experience of going through the adventure.”
That said, he most certainly chooses to go through the adventure rather than skipping it all in CGI and green screens. As he continued to say:
Sometimes it makes more sense and whatever, but for me, it’s really more about going through that adventure, seeing something that is real, seeing the characters going through that, film it for you guys, and then show it like, ‘This is what happened. This is the adventure that we went through.’
Needless to say, Fede Álvarez is more inclined to the part of filmmakers who choose to make the moviemaking experience fun by building and working with real things. And that, obviously, one of the best news fans of the Alien saga could ever be bestowed with, as it means we’re all in for some really peaking action adventures through this forthcoming movie.
Alien: Romulus hits the screens on August 16, 2024.
