Name: 分析。エイリアン (An Analysis: Alien)
Uploaded: 2021-01-14T08:14:51.000Z
Duration: 18 min 34 s
Description: VoiceTubeの動画で発音を聞きながら英語表現を覚えよう！学べる英語：

[Rafa] Hi, I'm Rafa, and before I say anything else, I feel the need to confess that I originally

intended to make this essay about Alien 3, and I tried, guys, I really did. But I ultimately

realized it simply isn't possible to talk properly about Alien 3 without first taking

the time to talk properly about the two films that came before it, and I couldn't do all

of that in an essay that would stay under my (admittedly arbitrary) time limit of 20

minutes. So, instead of one essay, you're gonna get three -- and maybe, if I can

summon the courage, I'll do Resurrection and Prometheus, too. Maybe.

So, Alien: the film that started it all. On the surface, it's a bit perplexing why this

movie became such an enduring phenomenon, both in terms of pop culture and academia.

No film history program worth its salt would leave Alien off its curriculum, but why? Movies

about aliens or mutated monsters that slowly kill off a group of isolated humans one by

one were just as commonplace then as they are now. If anything, they oversaturated the

science fiction genre at the height of its cinematic popularity in the 1950s.

So what made this film different from the hundreds of other creature features that came

before it? Well, there are relatively superficial factors, such as the seriousness with which

the production was approached... [Dallas] What do you got? [Kane] See what you make of this.

[Rafa] ...the attention to believability and atmosphere...

[Rafa] ...the performances of the cast... [Ash] I can't lie to you about your chances, but...

[Rafa] ...and the sheer mesmerizing beauty of the film, but the real key to Alien's

groundbreaking magnificence lies in the Alien itself, and what it represents.

[Kane] It seems to have life. Organic life.

H.R. Giger's design for the monster was unlike anything anyone had ever seen, founded

on principles of sexual horror intended to assault the viewer at a visceral, subconscious

level, while also constructing a politically radical critique of our society. Of course,

the xenomorph was not the first monster to function on a symbolic level. There was The

Thing, for instance, which channeled American fears of a communist infiltration, and of

course Godzilla, which I examined in an earlier essay, but none had ever tackled sexual violence

While there had been other monsters that featured sexuality as part of their horror, or at least

as part of their appeal, the xenomorph's sexual

threat is far more literal. It's an organism that is utterly dependent on violent acts

of oral rape in order to reproduce. The facehugger, which can seemingly lie dormant indefinitely

until a host arrives, forcibly inserts itself down the throat of its victims to impregnate them.

The smothering, the finger-like limbs that grip the face, the tail tightening around

the throat…this image bears an uncanny resemblance to something out of a hardcore facial abuse

porno, which…you know what, I'll just let you Google that on your own.

Getting face-raped by an alien creature is horrific enough on its own, but it's made

much worse by the indiscriminate nature of the assault. The Alien doesn't distinguish

between the genders of its victims, a point subtly emphasized by the disturbing lack of

eyes at every stage of its life cycle. In other words, it has the capacity to turn anyone

regardless of gender into an unwilling mother for its demonic offspring. [Ash] Kane's son.

[Rafa] What happens to Kane -- a violent rape resulting in an unwanted pregnancy and death from childbirth --

is a trifecta of historically feminine fears that are perversely inflicted on a man.

We bear witness to the total desecration of the male

body and the gender binary it represents.

Watch how the adult Alien attacks Brett...

[Rafa] These attacks are phallic. The erect,

toothed tongue strikes Brett and Parker in a place that has been established as a sexualized

area: the face, where Alien impregnation occurs. And I really shouldn't have to explain what

If we take a closer look at the facehugger, we can see that its phallic appendage also

doubles as an umbilical cord, infantilizing Kane at the same time it feminizes his body.

[Dallas] What's it got down his throat? [Ash] I would suggest it's feeding him oxygen.

[Dallas] Paralyzes him, puts him in a coma...

...then keeps him alive. Now what the hell is that?

[Rafa] This corruption of maternity is echoed in the figurative mothers of the derelict spacecraft

and the Nostromo. The derelict is an eerily feminine object, the shape of its hull suggesting

a pair of legs spread open, and the entrances between them are unmistakably vaginal. The

bio-mechanical appearance of this ship suggests the possibility that it might have once been

alive, at least partially, but if so, it is most certainly dead now, defiled by the eggs

it carried in its womb-like cargo hold. Similarly, the Nostromo, whose central computer is referred

to as “mother,” is inevitably destroyed because of the infestation of the xenomorph.

These mothers have been so degraded by their masters -- by the Company's special

order and whoever thought it was a good idea to carry these many eggs around -- that

they in effect become dangerous themselves. Incapable of nurturing, their bodies become

Viewed this way, Ripley's compulsion to save the cat is understandable: a maternal,

protective act in defiance of the Alien's all-consuming patriarchal power.

In essence, the Alien personifies the worst excesses of male lust, and here we begin to

see a grander social critique take shape.

[Lambert] You pound down the stuff like there's no tomorrow.

[Parker] Listen I'd rather be eating something else, but... right now I'm thinking of food.

[Rafa] If hyper-masculine sexuality is the main threat

of this film, so much so that it destroys men as well as women, the film can be read

as a feminist allegory for the oppressiveness of patriarchal society. The Alien represents

male sexual dominance being exerted on the people, who are then pushed into performing

traditional gender roles that ultimately destroy them. The gung-ho machoness of Kane...

[Kane] We've come this far, we must go on. We have to go on.

[Rafa] Parker... [Parker] I'm for killing that goddamned thing right now. [Ripley] Okay.

[Rafa] ...and Dallas... [Lambert] Who gets to go in the vent? [Ripley] I do.

[Dallas] No. [Rafa] ...ends poorly for them, just as Lambert's hysterical passivity leads to her demise.

[Lambert] What? And end up like the others?

[Rafa] Even Ash, an asexual robot, feels the overwhelming need to make a male performance.

His admiration and envy of the Alien's physical perfection inspires him to attack Ripley by shoving a

porn magazine into her mouth, mimicking the Alien's sexual violence, and he does it

on something that almost looks like an altar of pornographic images. This, of course, also

The one exception in all this, obviously, is Ripley. Unlike Lambert, she bears little

resemblance to the archetypal female and is largely defined by characteristics that were

traditionally masculine. As the only character who clearly defies culturally imposed gender

roles, perhaps it shouldn't have been all that surprising that she alone survives.

[Ripley] Why don't you just fuck off? [Parker] What?

[Rafa] But the Alien's threat is a bit more nuanced than simply being a walking penis monster.

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分析。エイリアン (An Analysis: Alien)

vulnerable

ultimately

significant

properly