<transcript>

(The crew of the Nostromo are gathered for dinner, with Kane)

1. (Kane stops eating, and is in some distress) 'Then—' "Ugh..." he grunts. "Kane?" enquires a crewmember.
2. (Kane's in more pain now) "Breathe deeply" he is urged. "I can't" Kane gasps.
3. "Breathe deeply—work at it!" Parker urges him, adding, "What's wrong? Something in the food?"
4. "Ohhhh... God, it hurts!!" Kane cries.

Commentary Below

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"Ohhhh... God, it hurts" [27]

"What's wrong?
Something in the food? "

It's starting.

I must have been really looking forward to depicting this disgusting scene.

"What is he doing in his bedroom?"
"Something - something - just too horrid for words. We'd better not go in.
Something with -
- biros."

"In the last ALIEN vs SAW VIII film they spat and gushed acid constantly. Meh"

Back in 1979, you got impregnated by a face-hugger - patiently waited for a few hours - and then WHAM! Out it came. Later in the series, you got impregnated and about 30 seconds later - WHAM!

God, just stop. Stop dluting the power of the great stuff that came before. It's like Shubert's unfinished symphony - finally finished by a manufactured pop act. When people watch the original film they'll shrug: "In the last ALIEN vs SAW VIII film they spat and gushed acid constantly. Meh."

Imprinting?

Mama!

"I was disturbed by that abuse of an impressionable young mind."

I hope Ridley will right the balance and exorcise the demons. I wonder if there'll be any face-huggers in the new Prometheus movie? There are what appear to be cannisters that stand-in for eggs. It suddenly occurred to me that the big head sculpture that looms over them might be to show the newborns who their daddy is. To imprint them. On an educational children's TV show in Britain, named Blue Peter in the '70s, They hatched newborn chicks and presented them with a toy fire-engine. They chased after it, instinctively (mama!). I was disturbed by that abuse of an impressionable young mind. Ironic or what?

Art Notes: Maintaining the rules

Sorry about the dark, heavy ruling on these pages. Nothing I can do about it, unless I rubber-stamp them all out in Photoshop. But it would take an age. Let's leave it just as it was: 30-odd years ago. It's the real thing.

Hurts

Kane still isn't played by John Hurt, but rather, some generic bloke. It doesn't matter now though - his minutes are numbered. It'll hardly matter what he looked like.

Film Notes

hurt scott skerrit

They used a closed-set on this scene. Everyone knew what was going to happen of course. Roughly. But they'd no idea how. The actors were told as little as possible, apart from John hurt. He'd been rehearsing it over and over all morning on the table, fake blood everywhere. They must had a devil of a time constantly cleaning the table and props up for another go, and taking polaroids for continuity reference.

Veronica Cartwright recalls: "When they finally take us down, the whole set is in a big plastic bag and everybody is wearing raingear and there are huge buckets around. The formaldehyde smell automatically made you queasy. And John is lying there..."

Guardian.co.uk

Ok then, see you on Friday. It can only get - worse.