PROMETHEUS Reaction (((NO SPOILERS till June 8)))

[Sergio Perez]

Congratulations Jim and the Red team. Honestly Icannot believe I own the same camera that shot this. It was expensive, yes, but not unaffordable with a little financing. Of course that film is a multi million dollar production, but one can achieve, with creativity and a little thinking outside of the box, similar visual quality when using an Epic ( or Scarlet). That inspires me to do more and more, every day. Thank you!

[Petri Teittinen]

A huge disappointment. 3 out of 5 stars -- and that's me being generous. It looks great, certainly, with very effective and naturalistic 3D to boot... but the script is a total shambles. It relies almost exclusively on nonsensical motivations and characters behaving like complete effin' idiots when they absolutely should know better. Despite the arresting visuals, my willing suspension of disbelief got shattered several times by the obvious faults in logic and gaping holes of the script. All in all, a massively wasted opportunity.

[Martin Beek]

Exciting movie, praise all around. Here are my two cents.
Weird skin color grading on Charlize Theron in several shots.
Picture is nicely denoised - grays and shadows nice and clean, only noise seen..: on Charlize Theron's face and dress!
I think the guy who did the grading and final beauty pass was as impressed by Charlize as i am. ;-)


Martin.

[Tim Lüdin]

You have to realize that we began RED (about 6 years ago) to design and build a proper film replacement camera. A few years later... one of my heroes (Ridley Scott) shoots Prometheus on our cameras. It is his 1st movie not shot on film. After shooting... his comment is "film grain is so "1960's". :-)

This is dream come true for me... everything we could have imagined. And this is the same camera that is in the hands of many.

I can't help but sit back and enjoy the moment. There aren't many moments in life that measure up to this one...

Jim

This is very big for me too. Ridley is my all time director hero, period. It's 2012 and I'm owning the same camera that was used to shoot prometheus, crazy.
So that's a big thanks to you Jim and team to make that a reality. I never would have dreamed so far when me and my friend placed the despite for RED 505.
It seems that 5 years later, everything falls into place for RED and us now. CS6 is rocking like crazy and the Epics are used by our heroes. What more do you want.

Semper Fidelis

Tim

[Tim Hole]

I like MOON, but this blows MOON out of the water by a mile.

I guess THE FOUNATAIN is also sci-fi, though I don't really think of it that way.

I'd say The Fountain is probably one of the purest sci-fi's out there. Moon is a very good sci-fi film. Star Wars however, is not Sci-Fi. It is many things but Science Fiction it is not. Prometheus is pure sci-fi on a big scale. I loved every second of it—Flawed as it was. I wrote my take on it, after I saw it on another thread:

Saw it this morning and I am still buzzing. Don't expect it to be claustrophobic like alien or gungho like Aliens...it is its own beast and man is it a ride. It looks incredible in every way. The 3D is subtle for the most part but the HUD stuff is awesome, as the sandstorm (which is also in the trailer). Its definitely not slow on the uptake. The opening sequence is insane. It looks incredible, the sets look incredbile. The FX are top notch. The cast are completely solid. Yes Fassbender is fantastic, ad is Theron and the rest of them...I especially like Sean Harris character (Harris is a great actor anyway -- remember the addict/dealer in Harry Brown).

The film is not perfect, however right now I still haven't returned to earth and cannot truly identifiy them (nor do i want to). Is it everything I wanted it to be,after waiting so DAMN long to see...A positive yes. Does it belong in the Alien Canon? Yes it certainly does. Just try not to do the comparison thing when you see it. Try to enjoy it for the story that is being told. Not how it fits into Alien.

The questions it asks are pretty big, however do we get any real answers...can't really talk about this until more people have seen the film.

Its difficult to go into detail about cinematography or effects, without really giving away plot points but put it this way it couldn't have looked better...Everyone who worked on it should be truly proud. RED should be truly proud (yet again).

SO yeah I kind of enjoyed it!!!

Must see in IMAX 3D. 4K is 4K and I do love it, however you don't get the IMAX sound nor do you get a masking free screen. The great thing about IMAX (Experience or True IMAX) is that the front of the auditorium is 100% IMAGE. For 3D that really means something.

Mark Kermode gave a decent rounded view of it (Spoiler free), though I think I enjoyed it more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jyxZBuWSXM

[C.H.Haskell]

A huge disappointment. 3 out of 5 stars -- and that's me being generous. It looks great, certainly, with very effective and naturalistic 3D to boot... but the script is a total shambles. It relies almost exclusively on nonsensical motivations and characters behaving like complete effin' idiots when they absolutely should know better. Despite the arresting visuals, my willing suspension of disbelief got shattered several times by the obvious faults in logic and gaping holes of the script. All in all, a massively wasted opportunity.

Agreed. Visually stunning...masterfully executed, breathtaking clean 3D visuals...congrats RED. MAJOR feat, up there with one of the best looking 3D films, if not THE best I have ever seen. I love Ridley Scott, I am amped that we are shooting on the same camera but On the other hand, how on earth did this script get a green light in this condition? You will be seduced visually but then you get lost in the many holes in the story. The concept had a great deal of potential but it was polluted with a ton of exposition and on the nose dialogue. I will watch again with no sound perhaps. Show, Dont tell me everything i am about to see or am going to see. 3of5 stars is generous...this had the potential to be one of the greatest sci fi's ever...but no where close.

[Alex Lindblom]

Let us start with the positive, it looks good. Best looking red film since “The secret in their eyes” in my opinion.

I'm huge Alien and Ridley Scott fan, to do Alien and Blade Runner back to back has to be one of the greatest achievement in cinema history.

Now Prometheus, if a could steal a British expression and be a bit -- cheeky, I would say it's impossible to spoil this movie, since nothing happens in it. Then we have the characters, who makes a lot of strange decisions considering their occupations. Also how should I put it, well their reactions in certain situations seems a bit off, you see, they only make sense if they already know about the whole Alien lore, which they can't, since this is a prequel, I can see people arguing this last point, but I don't want to go into spoilers.

So for me Prometheus only manage 4th position in the franchises, behind -- Alien, Aliens and even behind David Fincher's much compromised Alien 3. I have to say in defense of Alien resurrection that it's quiet a good movie taken on it's own, but it just doesn’t glue with the rest of the Alien universe.

And finally the real crux of the matter 3D.

Ah 3D my old friend, when Ridley Scott who arguably has the best eye in the business, uses stereoscopic, and the only thing I can think of is “that didn't distract too much” I know there is something wrong. I'm not denying it, it could be that I'm a Luddite, but the whole point of 3D is that it's supposed to immerse you in the picture, but it achieves exactly the opposite effect, your brain is constantly reminded, that you are watching some kind of trick, and that pulls you out of the movie.

Now let's picture us a best case scenario here, the 3D glasses are gone, we have solved that issue, and I have watched enough 3D material so it's the new “normal” for me, so I don't think about the effect anymore. But then what's the point?
The only thing we have achieved is to double the data rate, and for what? A bit more ”depth perception” that we probably won't even notice because everything is in 3D, and that's assuming that the brain actually can get used to stereoscopic, which I'm not too certain about.

So what's the answer? I don't know, but we need to try something different for stereoscopic 60/120 FPS Omnimax perhaps, maybe that will have the desired effect, but as it stands right now 24P 3D with glasses is a dead end. So to sum up, I wish we could all take off our glasses for a moment and see that the emperor's new clothes, was nothing more, then a mere optical illusion after all...

[Tom Lowe]

Man, you guys are a tough crowd. What recent sci-fi films do you guys who are criticizing "Prometheus" actually like?

This film had big ideas and big mythology and big, epic visuals and great acting. Finally, a hardcore, R-rated sci-fi film for adults! The execution from Scott was fantastic. Were there a couple of dud dialog scenes? Maybe a couple, but that was a small part of the film. I think the beings that are encountered in this film are some of the most interesting sci-fi beings I've seen a long, long time. The entire last act is a crazy roller-coaster ride. My only real criticism of that part of the film is that the trailers gave away too much. I can't wait to see where the story goes next.

[Petri Teittinen]

What recent sci-fi films do you guys who are criticizing "Prometheus" actually like?

I'm a huge SF nut. I read 30-40 SF books each year. Made the script issues even more unpalatable, to be honest.

[Bill Anderson]

Love Sci Fi but have to admit the good ones are very few and far between.
And in spite of the many great attempts, I think Bladerunner is still the grandaddy.
Still looking forward to seeing Prometheus though. Oh, and I loved the ad concept and execution: Ted Talk and David's intro. Clever stuff. On that note, I like the idea of serials for the Net: maybe in the form of 2 or 3 min self contained films that ultimately make a cohesive whole. Kinda like comic book cells ( but not necessarily visually/stylistically similar) where each one can have an appeal of its own. ???