Alien 2: On Earth (1980) (Blu-ray Review)
Directed By: Ciro Ippolito
Starring: Belinda Mayne, Mark Bodin, Michele Soavi
Rated: UR/Region 0/1:85/1080p/Number of Discs 1
Available from Midnight Legacy
Uncut, English language, 1.85 widescreen release of the 1980 Italian Horror/Sci-Fi film directed by Ciro Ippolito (Sam Cromwell). Starring Belinda Mayne, Mark Bodin, Roberto Barrese, Michele Soavi and Judy Perrin. A group of cave explorers are confronted in an underground cavern by a mysterious living rock. Little do they know that it bears home to deadly, flesh-eating creatures, intent on wiping out the entire human population. Can they survive and ultimately prevent Earth’s total annihilation? Never released in the United States, only a handful of countries saw a cropped and edited VHS release nearly thirty years ago, that is until now. For our inaugural release, Midnight Legacy is proud to present the first-ever widescreen release of Alien 2 On Earth. The definitive version, transferred from the original 35mm negative, which runs longer than any other version seen throughout the world. The presentation that finally represents the intended vision of Alien 2 On Earth.
For a movie that was never released in the good ol’ U.S. of A and was only available 30 years ago in limited chopped up and edited VHS form, the movie at least looks great here. It’s been remastered from the masters and it at least looks like it’s way better than it actually is. The crew that put this together did a wonderful job and it’s really awesome as far the quality of the films presentation goes, even if the film it’s self lacks a little in a few areas. And, mainly that area being the pacing of the film. You know how I feel about pacing. The film is more science fiction than horror, so the slow pace seems to be even slower. We are around a good 40 minutes into the film before any REAL business starts to pickup. Now, I know in 1980 things were very different, but I’d have at least liked things a lot better had people started dropping much sooner and at a more rapid fashion than what we ultimately get here in this movie.
I did still find the overall tone and the setting of Alien 2 here to be pretty interesting and I also felt that it at least set a nice vibe and overall tone. I also will admit that I didn’t hate it. I probably could have enjoyed it even more so than I did however if it had of stopped lagging and got with the program a lot sooner than it does. While not the all out “GOREMANIA!” you might expect from a lot of the descriptions of the movie, when there actually is blood it’s not bad. It’s that weird really really red looking blood that you see in a lot of Italian horror films and some folks seem to dislike that but I find it pretty cool for the most part. I also won’t take too much away from this one for using the same “Italian type ending” that I’ve seen more than a few horror films made in Italy use. I mean come on now, if the great Lucio Fulci can use the same type of ending this movie uses in one of his films, then it has to be cool right?
– Special Effects Outtakes
– Dutch VHS Trailer
