Aliens

Cast View all

	Sigourney Weaver	Ripley
	Carrie Henn	Newt
	Michael Biehn	Corporal Hicks
	Paul Reiser	Burke
	Lance Henriksen	Bishop
	Bill Paxton	Private Hudson
	William Hope	Lieutenant Gorman
	Jenette Goldstein	Private Vasquez
	Al Matthews	Sergeant Apone
	Mark Rolston	Private Drake
	Ricco Ross	Private Frost
	Colette Hiller	Corporal Ferro
	Daniel Kash	Private Spunkmeyer
	Cynthia Dale Scott	Corporal Dietrich
	Tip Tipping	Private Crowe
	Trevor Steedman	Private Wierzbowski
	Paul Maxwell	Van Leuwen
	Valerie Colgan	ECA Rep
	Alan Polonsky	Insurance Man
	Alibe Parsons	Med Tech
	Blain Fairman	Doctor
	Barbara Coles	Cocooned Woman
	Carl Toop	Alien Warrior
	John Lees	Power Loader Operator
	Bill Armstrong	Lydecker

Crew View all

Director	James Cameron
Writer	James Cameron, David Giler, Walter Hill, Dan O'Bannon, Ronald Shusett
Producer	Gordon Carroll, David Giler, Walter Hill, Gale Anne Hurd
Musician	James Horner
Photography	Adrian Biddle

Trailer

Edition details

Personal

Notes

Out Of Print

WSR Narrative Review

Story Synopsis:
With this James Cameron-directed Aliens epic, we are taken back to the creepy world of Ellen Ripley (Weaver), the only survivor from mankind’s first encounter with the Alien. This time she must face both the monstrous Alien as well as inept military men.

DVD Picture:
The THX digitally mastered DVD, viewed in the component anamorphic format exhibits superior visual quality. Color fidelity is natural, with accurate fleshtones, rich and vibrant colors, and deep pure blacks. Contrast and shadow delineation are superb, with excellent visual information between darkness and picture black. There are no distracting artifacts or compression pixelization for a visual experience that exhibits excellent clarity in all aspects of image quality. The anamorphic and letterbox aspect ratio measures 1.85:1.

Soundtrack:
The remastered Dolby® Digital 5.1 discrete soundtrack delivers a full scale aggressively holosonic soundfield experience when all the channels are fully engaged. At times, however, the sound is limited to three-channel stereo with no surround signal, and dialogue is sometimes wanting in spatial integration and naturalness. Otherwise, this is a thrilling sonic experience with extended and powerful bass enhanced with aggressive and system challenging .1 LFE. The orchestral music scoring is hauntingly beautiful and features a wonderfully spatial soundstage presence that images wide and deep. This soundtrack will not disappoint in its delivery of a sonic nightmarish experience.

DVD/Previously Reviewed LD Comparative Review:

With considerably less noise and artifacts than the previously reviewed LaserDiscs (Alien and Aliens in Issues 1 and 18, Alien 3 in Issue 2, and Alien Resurrection in Issue 29), the anamorphically enhanced, THX® digitally mastered DVDs are finally what fans of the Alien series have been waiting for. With increased vertical and horizontal resolution, contrast and shadow delineation are refined with superior visual information in the darkest scenes for optimal suspense. Color fidelity is excellent with rich and vibrant hues and deep, pure blacks. All aspects of visual quality are excellent, and there are no distracting artifacts of any kind. Most notably is the lack of irritating moiré patterns apparent on the Alien Resurrection LaserDisc. Both Alien and Alien 3 have anamorphic and letterbox aspect ratios of 2.32:1; Aliens measures 1.85:1; and Alien Resurrection is framed precisely at 2.35:1.

The Alien series’ sound design played an important role in the effectiveness of all four films. Any science fiction film requires an array of original sound effects to create an other worldly environment, and this series is particulary rich with both complexity and startling realism. The scores by Jerry Goldsmith, James Horner, Elliot Goldenthal and John Frizzell capture the senses from the vast emptiness of space and grisly human terror. These four DVD soundtracks are newly remastered in Dolby® Digital, but the Alien soundtrack is dramatically less dynamic, and below reference level, with no split surrounds and very weak .1 LFE enhancement, making it a 4.1 mix. Our reference Dorrough meter bridge shows aggressive split surround signals on the discrete LaserDisc reviewed in Issue 18 version, but monaural surround on the DVD version. Both are THX digitally mastered for optimum performance, but the THX standard of quality is not heard on this DVD. The other three films are superior in sonic character, delivering system-challenging bass enhanced with .1 LFE. The Aliens soundtrack delivers a full scale aggressive holosonic soundfield experience when all the channels are fully engaged. The Alien 3 soundtrack out-performs the matrix PCM LaserDisc in spatial dimensionality and dynamic impact. The use of aggressive split surrounds creates an exciting soundfield experience with phantom center back imaging. Like the LaserDisc version, Alien Resurrection intensifies all 5.1 discrete channels at very high SPL levels. Surround envelopment is directionalized with effective use of split surrounds.

This Disc Contains The Following WSR-Rated Superb Qualities:
Superb Sound Effects Recording Quality
Superb Special Visual Effects Quality
Superb Color Fidelity
Reference Quality
Collector Edition

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