purpose of the match story

Well, when we were children we were always told not to play with matches....

I think it was a subtle statement of confidence in the face of potential consequences. No pain, no gain...so to speak. "The trick Potter...is not minding it hurts." When faced with the power of a tool, and the potential danger of indulging in it, you can't mind it hurting or......what's the point in using it?

I find it curious that the scene stars with a story about "putting out fire" when the title of the movie refers to a God who gives mankind fire.

yes engr the point though is he stole fire from the gods and in return received the wrath.

I think Peter Wayland was flagging up his physcopathic nature. He is quite prepared to pursue his interests despite the cost to individules or the human society. It has been long debated that T E Lawrence showed physcopathic tendencies, extremely clear of thought and mission, not minding the pain/cost caused to get from A to B. Another interesting thing he mentioned were the cybernetic individuals that, in a few years, would become indistinguishable from humans. Ridley may be considering the merging of the Alien and Blade Runner universes and any sequal to Prometheus may also be the sequal to Blade runner!

Recall that Ridley Scott talked about Prometheus being as epic and grand as the film "Lawrence of Arabia". That movie is about T. S. Lawrence's military and political adventures and achievements in Saudi Arabia of course. Peter Weyland's story about the match is from T. S. Lawrence's memoirs.

The "match" story is a sequence that ocurrs early in LofA. It comes about as a result of boredom at a tedious job(mapreading) that under-utilizes Lawrence's intellect. The reference Scott made to LofA was to the grand vistas, the use of widescreen to dwarf the characters within the landscape they inhabit. The shot of the ship's (Prometheus I presume) con trail coming in among clouds and what looks like a stormfront is such a shot.

Absolutely correct skyguy1054! In LoA one of the all time dramatic cuts in movie history comes right after that 'the trick Potter ... is not minding it hurts' speech. It goes straight into the vastness of the desert where we see humans as mere specs on the sand. [url=http://herocomplex.latimes.com/2012/01/14/prometheus-damon-lindelof-ridley-scott-photos-alien-prequel/]From this talk with Damon Lindelof[/url] “The movie is definitely epic in its scope. One of the filmmakers that we ended up talking about to a fair degree of redundancy was David Lean, who directed ‘Lawrence of Arabia,’” he said. “We wanted to make the movie feel big by having the characters be small in big spaces. That connected to the larger themes we were talking about — that we’re all just these little gnats crawling around on our little planet.” IMO the match reference talk by Weyland also shows his utter determination in achieving his goals... not minding the pain...his or the pain of anyone who gets in his way...

David is built by Weyland. David will do Weyland's bidding. It is 'programmed' into him, same as it was with Ash. Whatever the agenda of Weyland is, David will carry it out. IMO David sees the technology of the SJ's (the bio-weapons), decides to 'steal the fire' from them. David gets contaminated....Imagine what a bio-forming weapon mixed with an android would produce - the face hugger started out as a long fingered hand and then developed - inner steel jaws anyone...?

Back to Lawrence and the match for a moment... Another aspect to the match scene in LofA is the insight it gives toward Lawrence himself. He is (at least at first) seen as a Stranger in a Strange Land, a fish out of water (in the desert), a misfit who will no more succeed in Arabia than he has anywhere else in his life so far. But his unique world view, as evidenced by the acceptance of pain along with pleasure, is part of what allows him to overcome expectation, sweep across the desert and amass an army of followers. This movie is worth a watch, for more than just its application to Prometheus my friends.

I have Lawrence of Arabia on DVD. Don't forget that Alec Guiness (Obi Wan Kenobi) appears in this picture too. I wonder how much of an influence LoA had on George Lucas' Star Wars Ep IV?

some very ineresting comments guys, i love the links with LofA its in my top 10 all day long, if prometheus can match it for grandure were on to a winner. films like that only serve to raise the bar for aspiring young directors like the zoetrope bunch and of course Scott.

@AlteredState [i]yes engr the point though is he stole fire from the gods and in return received the wrath.[/i] Of course, the most general reference is obvious. What I meant was "putting out fire" as opposed to giving out. If Weyland fancies himself a God who gives mankind new brand of fire, why talks about putting it out. I guess I could be reading too much into it. He basically means to say that you want to receive fire, you have to want to play with fire (experimentations) and "not mind getting hurt" or burnt once in a while (facing oppositions from fundamentalist, legal issues be damned etc). Well, he might get burned real good come June 8.....

Yeah i wasn't sure everyone was aware of the myth so i thought i would reiterate to keep my thread count up lol

I think it's about not revealing the truth, it's about Weyland keeping his secrets from the world. Weyland is Prometheus, he has already stolen from the 'Gods' but to the public he is a genius.