Prometheus is a movie that 5 years ago I would never have imagined going and seeing. I remember thinking down of other people for seeing movies that were clearly "wrong" because of violence or what have you. However, since I left the JW organization I have realized that movies are competition to the organization. The true reason why they go to such great lengths to demonize movies like Prometheus is because movies often hold deep messages about God and the universe. Science fiction for example often asks big questions about the future of the universe as well as the genesis of humanity.
In my opinion the best acting in Prometheus was done by Michael Fassbender who played an android named David. What's so interesting about him is he represents the whole of all science in the fictional Prometheus world of our future. He is able to show emotions such as curiosity and he even takes a liking to the character Lawrence played by Peter O'Toole in Lawrence of Arabia. So much so that he likes to mimic his look at dialect.
In the beginning of the movie there is a brilliant scene where a humanoid figure is standing on a waterfall and drinks of this cup that makes it break up and fall into the water and then eventually completely deteriorate. Throughout the movie there is a theme of creation coming from destruction and this scene sets that tone. We are not given information about what the setting of this prologue is, however.
The movie is about a trillion dollar operation to travel to this distant world in a vessel called Prometheus. The characters awaken from their stasis as fodder for a sci-fi horror film, but a deeply enlightening and exhilarating sci-fi horror film. Everybody gets briefed by a holographic old dead man as to why they are there and they all put on suits and get ready to be fodder in a sci-fi horror film. When they arrive on the terrain they see some sort of compound and a key line is uttered in the movie. "God doesn't build in straight lines" is said by one of the people in the bridge area with a see through glass viewing panel. They see the compound which are these big spiral pyramid things that are built in a straight line. They find that it's got a series of caverns and they send people down into them.
They eventually make their way to the complex in their space suits and when they get a reading from their instruments of breathable air a character named Charlie fairly naively takes off his helmet and takes a few deep breaths. This was foolish because there could also be microorganisms that he could have been infected by even though it ended up safe. He seemed to have a misguided faith in the place to begin with. David, the android, is the secret weapon as he is able to read the alien language enough to push buttons and open doors. While inside the caverns they accidently trigger some sort or holographic recording device and they get to see what appears to be a "last recording." It shows a bunch of large aliens running through the corridors frantically. One seems to get hit by something and falls down lifeless.
They find an ancient headless body of one of the aliens right where the recording last positions itself. David is able to open the door and the head of the alien is in the other room. The alien was decapitated by the falling door indicating there was an emergency closing of it and it didn't make it in time. They get the head and have to get back to the ship because of a massive storm being detected. The android shows himself to be acting in secrecy as he hides a liquid compound in some cylinders within the structure he finds for himself.
The return to the ship is perilous as they are trying to get back before a storm hits. Two crew members are left behind and the main character, Elizabeth Shaw, is almost killed. Just before they get back to the ship they lose the head of the alien and Elizabeth has to risk her life in the storm to retrieve it. Without the aid of the android she would have been lost with the head rendering the trip worthless. We are shown the incredible sacrifice that Elizabeth is willing to make in order to find the truth about this particular alien head. Elizabeth believes the head to be her creator and she is willing to die for that idea as she showcases before everybody.
They bring the head back to their lab and find out that it's DNA matches human DNA therefore proving her theory correct. However, there is the question of who created the creators? David is intrigued by the shear will of the humans and the sacrifice that they are willing to make for truth. He still has the liquid compound that no one else knows about and he gets Charlie to take it in a drink. The android is programmed to not harm his masters, but he asks what Charlie would be willing to do for the truth and he replies, "anything." This is giving David consent to do anything, including kill Charlie, if it's in the spirit of getting to the bottom of this creation mystery.
We eventually find out that the old man in the original briefing was not dead, but was just in stasis like the rest of them. It turns out he is seeking eternal life and is the real reason for the Prometheus mission after all. To make matters worse the man is on death's door step and time is of the essence.
The two crew members who were left behind are given a ghastly fate. Crewman Milburn is, like Charlie earlier, acting in a vary naive way. He sees a snake looking thing and acts like it's a flower or something and it ends up killing him very brutally. Crewman Fifield dies because he tries to cut the snake thing off of Milburn but it's blood is unfortunately acid and it burns his head and kills him. I get the feeling that the writers are trying to show that people who are naive about nature die horrible senseless deaths.
The God theme in this movie is very intricate. Elizabeth has a cross necklace and is called a "true believer" by the old man Weyland, played by Guy Pearce, who assembled the crew in the first place. In fact that was the reasoning why he brought her specifically along was because she was a true believer. He wanted the motivation that faith gives you in order to secure his own eternal life. This is a very deep allegory for what happens in real life in regards to faith. Faith's innocence makes it strong in the individual, but it also gives a naivety that can be taken advantage of. Wayland, is just a shyster with a selfish purpose.
They all return to the alien complex in suits again and Charlie becomes sick because of David spiking his drink with the alien compound. Elizabeth is feeling guilt because her mate appears to be having some sort of reaction to the environment. The way it looks she knows it to be terminal and he is in extreme pain and she keeps telling him that's she's sorry. When they try to return to the ship another lead character, Meredith, comes out with a flame thrower. Everybody thinks that Charlie is sick from some sort of microorganism or something. Meredith has to burn Charlie alive in front of Elizabeth and everyone understands because no one wants to have what happened to Charlie happen to them. It's a pretty hardcore scene.
Meanwhile David, using the death of Charlie as a distraction, is finding the truth about the whole complex. He goes to a special cockpit like room and finds a second recording which shows the Creator aliens, which were called Engineers in Elizabeth's theory, operating the controls. The whole cockpit works like a planetarium and the scene is rather spectacular and I hear it's amazing in 3D which I did not see. He also finds that there are Engineers in the room who are in some kind of stasis. He finds that all of them are dead except one who he hears it's heart beating.
The ethics of all this is fascinating. David, as an android, represents the whole of science as created by humanity. He finds out the humans were created by the Engineers and therefore the Engineers are the true creators of himself. He has the same problem as us in not knowing. He is driven by curiosity and not emotion which is exactly what science is driven by. Since this mission was to find the truth giving the specimen to Charlie was merely finding out the truth at the cost of his life. This, again, is the theme of the process of creation through destruction.
We find out that not only did David murder Charlie he also impregnated Elizabeth because her and Charlie had had sex before they went off on the second mission. The organism that was in Charlie actually integrated with Elizabeth's reproductive process and we are given another version of this creation at the process of destruction theme. The typical Alien birth process is always with the death of the host, but Elizabeth saves herself in dramatic fashion. She uses a piece of medical technology on board that has the capability of doing a cesarean operation to cut the alien out. Elizabeth is completely unaware that all of these dramatic events were the cause of David spiking Charlie's drink. After saving herself David applauds of what he calls her "survival skills." He, like everybody else on the ship, is skeptical of her faith in God as she always wears a cross necklace. Yet her faith seems to give her better survival skills than the rest.
David brings his master, Weyland, who is seeking eternal life back to the cockpit room and Elizabeth chooses to come with them. They awaken the Engineer who upon hearing David speaking it's language goes into a rampage. He starts with pulling off David’s head with two hands. Androids in the alien universe have a white fluid that is kind of like blood and that goes everywhere. The old man seeking eternal life is swiftly killed and so is everybody else except for Elizabeth who narrowly escapes.
The Engineer then fires up the alien cockpit controls and activates a launch sequence. Elizabeth rushes to safety and warns the bridge crew of the Prometheus that they have to stop the alien ship because it was going to destroy earth. In dramatic fashion the Prometheus, and it's remaining crew, runs into the alien ship crashing it to the surface in spectacular fashion. Elizabeth escapes into a medical ward of Prometheus that is detached from the ship. Inside she finds the baby alien that she gave birth to trapped inside the room where she did her self cesarean. The alien is like the face huggers in the first movies, but about 500 times larger.
Elizabeth is warned by David's head, who still is in ear shot of a communications device, that the Engineer is coming to kill her and he barges into the ward through the door, but Elizabeth unleashes the giant facehugger, which she gave birth too, which engages the Engineer. Then Elizabeth retreats from the detached medical ward and back onto the alien terrain. David thinks she is dead, but is astonished when he hears her voice. Her will breaks at that moment, but it is David who cheers it back to health.
Elizabeth goes to the cockpit room where she finds the head of David the android still in working order. She and the head of David, which is all we need of science anyway, are now the last survivors of the Prometheus and are shown to fly off together in another alien ship. They set off to find out the truth about who created them, but for diametrically opposed reasons. One is for reason and curiosity and the other faith. The first thing that Elizabeth asks for when she finds the head of David is her cross which he had kept. He becomes a believer in belief because he had seen the accomplishments of belief: Elizabeth was not only alive, but the last remaining.
The giant face hugger kills the Engineer and plants an egg into it's body which gives birth to what appears to be the first species of alien (from the Alien series) which is a big step for alien lore fans. Again, we have the theme of a creation coming from destruction. The death of an Engineer of humanity used for the host of the creation of the aliens from Aliens. God doesn't build in straight lines. I for one, eagerly await the next installment.
-Sab