Alien 2: On Earth

A space module lands back to Earth after a failed mission, but the astronauts have been replaced by hideous creatures that can penetrate into people's bodies and make them explode. A group of speleologists are attacked by the monsters inside an underground cave.

For fans of Italian horror cinema, the most notable name attached to this movie is probably Michele Soavi, who plays Burt. Soavi has acted many times, but really came into his own as a director of such films as "Stagefright" and "Cemetery Man". This was one of his earlier film projects, before he became a protégé of Dario Argento.

The effects in the film are fairly simple but effective, and I really liked the music. If I had to make a complaint, it would be that the pace was a bit too slow at times. That, and it seems the person who wrote the script did not try very hard to connect the astronauts, caves and the psychic aspects.

They've got some nerve calling this film Alien 2: although certain elements have clearly been inspired by Ridley Scott's 1979 sci-fi horror classic, the film as a whole couldn't be more different…

Want tense, claustrophobic, space-bound, futuristic action? Not a chance. Sulla Terra, the film's subtitle, translates as On Earth, meaning that the film takes place on (present day) Earth, and under its surface in an admittedly impressive looking cavern. Unfortunately, this means we get endless tedious footage of the characters wandering around the cave, the director so preoccupied by the wonderful rock formations that he forgets all about telling a coherent story, throwing in such random nonsense as a telepathic speleologist just for the hell of it.

Looking forward to seeing a cool alien creature? Sorry. This film's extraterrestrial starts off as a blue rock, turns into a red hand puppet in a moment that rips off Alien's chest-burster (although I admit that the face-burster scene is pretty cool), and finally becomes a mass of indistinguishable and very unconvincing tentacle thingies.

Expecting ground-breaking special effects? No dice. This is a low-budget Italian production, so all we get is some grainy stock footage for scenes involving a space mission returning to Earth, and some cheap gore. Thankfully, the latter is pretty juicy: the aforementioned face-burster sees the victim's eyeball pushed from its socket before the creature erupts; one of the cavers has his head chewed off, the severed noggin (complete with assorted giblets) falling onto the rocks below with a satisfying 'thud'; and another guy's head explodes to reveal thrashing tentacles.

What about a thrilling finalé? I don't think so! After a couple of encounters with the creature, the last pair of survivors emerge from the cave to discover that the planet is totally deserted, with the exception of the alien, which chases them around for a while, director Ciro Ippolito employing dreadful alien POV shots. Eventually, Ippolito becomes as bored with proceedings as his viewers undoubtedly are, abruptly ending his film with a caption warning the audience "You may be next!". It's a lousy way to wrap up a fairly dismal film which is barely worth enduring for the gore (and a bit of gratuitous topless nudity from star Belinda Mayne).

If you have ever wanted to visit Italy's incredible Castellana Grotto, here is your chance to see the caverns. This gorgeous cave was discovered January 23, 1938, by Franco Anelli and Vito Matarrese. The photography of the Grotto is spectacular. Unfortunately the movie "Alien 2" is not so spectacular. It opens with stock astronaut splash down film footage, moves on to a bowling alley, then a beach, and finally the cave. Blue rocks that somehow turn into sock puppets are the "Aliens" that attack the group of spelunkers. Like I said, if you want to see the caverns, this is your movie. Simply ignore the ridiculous, boring story. - MERK

I have been trying to see this film for years as I love to watch old obscure horror films. They do not have to be good or considered classic for me to hunt them down, I just enjoy watching them whether they be good, bad or ugly. Upon finally seeing this one, I have to say it has some things going for it, but overall it is a bit slow and underdone. The film at the beginning talks about this space pod returning to earth, we have an interview with the star female of the piece where we learn she is apparently psychic. She then heads to the ocean where she meets this guy who I have no clue who he is or what his purpose other than to introduce us to the fact that our heroine suffers from fears of monsters. We are soon treated to a scene with a mother and small girl that ends very nicely in one of the few good scenes of the movie. She then goes to the bowling alley to meet up with her fellow spelunkers and they proceed to have a long drawn out drive. They end up at a little place where outside one of the group finds a beautiful rock he just has to pick up. They finally make it to the cave where we get the privilege of seeing every member of the group repel down a line in the dark with their headlamp shining. They then pitch tents in the cave, which silly me, I figure all one really needs in a cave is a sleeping bag. Finally, after more cavorting in the cave the alien attacks and general mayhem ensues. Well not really, we are treated to every second of a rescue then a slow moving camera going across a body of a female and then some more cool stuff happens followed by another long stretch of nothing. You can see the problem, I am afraid the makers of this film were so enthralled with the cave that they forgot multiple times that they were supposed to be making an alien horror movie. There is some potential in this one, as there is a great kill involving a guy losing his head, also a nice attack on a couple as the cave seems to be alive. All the on screen kills are pretty good, just to much padding. The finale is particularly weak as we do not get to see any more cool deaths only a woman running from a point of view monster that at one point looked as if the monster was running from her. The makers of this film really did not seem to have a vision on what they wanted their monster to look like. Suffice to say at its best it looked like snakes, at worst hosepipe. More cool deaths, a faster moving story would have helped here immensely as would have a more climatic ending. Seriously, they showed nothing at the end to make the end cool. So just a bit of a bore for the most part with some very nice death scenes scattered here and there and a very nice topless shot of the lead girl. And you find out the best way out of a cave too, it is apparently to run fast, then in slow motion all at the same time to the point the fast you far surpasses the slow motion you.

I've done my best to track down the worst "King Kong" rip-offs in the world, now I'm doing the same for "Alien". And some of the copycat offenders of this one are awful. But the good news is - this one's not bad.

After a brief intro about the return to earth of a spaceship where all the astronauts were dead and/or hideously mutilated (or something), the main action of the film gets going with a group of people exploring an underground cave. Among them are people involved with the investigation of the spaceship, including a (slightly) psychic woman who senses the presence of...something.

The reason the film entertains is because of the well made scenes set in the cave. We follow the cavers through lots of perilous exploration, which starts off with the usual terrors of ropes snapping, long falls, dead end tunnels, etc, but soon starts to move into "Alien"-type territory as an unseen menace starts chomping on the cast! Scenes are well shot and there is some tension in the scenes all the while it is not clear what is actually going on. There's also some surprising gore as the characters die in bizarre ways. My only disappointment was that the extreme darkness of some scenes obscure a lot of what is going on, but generally the darkness works in the film's favour.

Bizarrely, the film does eventually leave the confines of the caves, but in a baffling change of location, the climactic scenes are filmed in...a bowling alley (?)! I can only assume that it is very likely that the bowling alley was known to the film makers and they got a very good deal for filming there - apart from that there is no possible logic behind the choice - it's really not a scary place at all! Things that work are: The acting - even with English dubbing, the performances seem quite good. The music - a cheesy "BUM-BUM-BUM-BUM synth score amused me greatly. The ending - which is as unexpected as it is unexplained, and finally the monsters: it's a case of less is more here, so don't expect to see any big rubbery creations.

Made on the cheap I presume, but a lot of the low budget is covered up by keeping the project quite modest. It's definitely better than "Galaxy of Terror". I'm please to say I own the UK pre-cert video which has a really nice sharp picture and is reportedly uncut. A modest DVD release would be nice...