Alien Quadrilogy Disc 2 untouched DVD9

DISC TWO

”The Beast Within: The Making of Alien”



Pre-Production

-“Star Beast: Developing the Story” –featurette (18 min)

-First draft screenplay text by Dan O'Bannon (with additional introduction notes by O'Bannon)

-“The Visualists: Direction and Design” -featurette (17 min)

-Ridleygrams gallery (Ridley Scott's original storyboards)

-Storyboard gallery (organized by scene)

-Conceptual artwork gallery (organized by artist, inc. Cobb, Foss, Moebius and Giger)

-“Truckers in Space: Casting” -featurette (15 min)

-Sigourney Weaver's screen test footage (4 mins)

-Cast portrait gallery

Production

-“Fear of the Unknown: Shepperton Studios, 1978” -featurette (24 mins)

-Production photo gallery (organized by subject)

-Continuity polaroids gallery

-“The Darkest Reaches: Nostromo and the Alien Planet” -featurette (17 min)

-Set photo gallery

-“The Eighth Passenger: Creature Design” -featurette (31 min)

-Chestburster multi-angle sequence (5 min - 3 angles with 2 audio tracks: Production audio or audio commentary by director Ridley Scott)

-H.R. Giger's Workshop photo gallery

Post-Production

-“Future Tense: Editing and Music” -featurette (16 min)

-7 deleted scenes (not added back in for the “Director's Cut”)

-“Outward Bound: Visual Effects” -featurette (19 min)

-Visual effects photo gallery

-“A Nightmare Fulfilled: Reaction to the Film” -featurette (19 min)

-Poster explorations gallery

-Special shoot photo gallery

-Premiere photo gallery



The documentary on the second platter runs 182 minutes and is far more comprehensive than the documentary that appeared in Legacy. It definitively traces the film's development and rewrites, identifying who was responsible for what and looking at the controversy that existed for a while over the screenplay credit. It also explores the conflicts composer Jerry Goldsmith had with Scott (Scott lifted some music from Goldsmith's score to Freud instead of using what Goldsmith had written for a couple scenes). They both laugh at it now as being caused, in part, by Scott's lack of experience as a director in communicating what he wanted to others, a problem the cast also confronted, though that aspect actually contributed to the tension in their performances. The program explores every aspect of the movie's creation and includes fresh interviews with practically every major artist who was involved. There is one discrepancy, however. In the commentary, Scott claims that they got the cat to hiss by confronting it, off camera, with a German shepherd. In the documentary, they say the cat was confronted by another cat.



Also included on the second platter is O'Bannon's somewhat infamous first draft screenplay, written in 1976, along with an admirable and fairly long essay by O'Bannon about its creation. Presented in their entirety, as well, are a complete collection of Scott's initial storyboards and notes, which represented his thorough analysis of what the film's creation would involve and enabled Scott to persuade Fox to double the movie's budget. That is followed by a reasonably extensive collection of detailed standard storyboards that were prepared for the actual shoot, and extensive production photos, effects photos, publicity photos, continuity photos and more (including some fascinating early poster designs), all effectively captioned.



Weaver's 5-minute audition is included, with an optional commentary by Scott ("There was a lot of discussion about what to do with her hair. I said, 'Leave it alone. Don't muck about. Don't start cutting her hair.' She was born to be Ripley.". There is a marvelous 5-minute segment of multi-camera angles from the 'chestburster' scene with more optional (and informative) commentary by Scott. Finally, there are 16 minutes of additional deleted scenes that Scott chose not to include in his alternate cut, but that feature some terrific material, including more jaunty interaction between Weaver's character and Yaphet Kotto's character, and more exploration of the alien crash site.