Have we seen Prometheus, yet?

Have we seen Prometheus? I’m not so sure. To confirm, I have seen the film, now, though I believe (or am really hoping!) that we haven’t seen the version of the film Ridley Scott intended (and is hopefully sat waiting to be put out there, maybe Blu Ray?). I enjoyed the film, though I don’t love it. Yet. It is beautiful to look at, sounds great, and is a fantastic two hour ride that never seems to stop. But I think this is the real issue with the film – it’s too short. There’s a lot going on (this film is absolutely loaded with some really profound ideas) but there just isn’t the time to think about, and more importantly, develop these ideas and how they affect the characters and so on. ‘Here’s an idea, think on that. No wait, forget that, here’s another idea. And another. How does that motivate them? Does that change their approach, their philosophy? Forget that, here’s another idea…..’ I have seen the criticisms of the film and understand them, but I think it all points to one thing – development. That is development of the plot, the film’s themes, the characters, their motivations – all of it. There just isn’t enough time to give us, as an audience, the understanding behind why somebody does what (some characters seem far too willing to die – why?). There isn’t enough time for us to absorb many of the huge ideas put forward, or how they relate to the characters or story or what they even think of them. There isn’t enough time spent building up any suspense, so the ‘scares’ fall flat. We can see an epic journey on screen (just count all the ‘events’ and action beats, there is a LOT going on) we just don’t feel it. This gives us a lot to think about after the film, and it has been rattling around my brain since I saw it, which is normally a great thing, but I think Prometheus is going to give us more. Watching the film I constantly felt like I was missing something. I kept thinking ‘why did he say that?’, ‘where did that come from’, ‘why did he just put his hands up and say ’I want you to do it’?’. In many scenes I felt there was an earlier scene which we’d missed, which gave us the ‘pre-loading’ to understand the importance of a given, later scene - like the ads, that basically showed you the whole film, I believe and hope the ‘theatrical’ release is just a taster for the actual film that Ridley intended, and which, in time, we will get. And it will be epic. This may be wishful thinking, based on (slight) disappointment and what I thought I saw the film could be, but I think there is a definite case for this, especially if we look at how Ridley releases his films. Directors cut? Surely no question. The film as it is, is just too brief. It seems to rely on what I call movie shorthand, in that some films rely on film ‘rules’, conventions, even clichés to hint at something and then let us fill in the rest. As an example, we can be shown that a character may not be what they seem, by way of music, lighting, camera angle etc etc but left to figure the rest ourselves. We know the film is telling us something isn’t right, but what? I know this may not be a great example, since it is a vital tool in most films, but in a lot of modern films we are given a cue, and then our film knowledge fills in the gaps so the writers don’t have to spend time developing character and so on, since we already know the rules! This often just seems lazy to me, but in the case of Prometheus I think the film has been squeezed down to two hours so all the development, the ‘thinking time’, went out the window. I know we don’t want it all spelled out for us, but what this film misses is the ‘quiet/thinking time’. A good example must be the ‘scares’. They are too quick and we don’t have those valuable few seconds of build up to the scare – they just seem to happen and we are left thinking ‘I know that should be scary, but it wasn’t!’ We aren’t given the time to settle into a scene, so that we are at least surprised. I’m rambling, so let’s get to the point. Ridley Scott is very clever on the business side of films. There is a general ‘rule’ that a ‘theatrical’ release should not be more than two hours long and Ridley has stuck to that, however we know he practically invented the director’s cut. This is generally because studios have pretty strict control over what appears on the big screen, and this is often not what the director, especially Ridley, intended. Now films have more life after the theatre and directors have the ability to put out what they really wanted, though results obviously vary! I believe Ridley makes directors cuts for the right reasons – i.e. ‘this is the actual film’ as opposed to just trying to make more money – and would quote Kingdom of Heaven as the perfect example. This suffered very similar criticisms as Prometheus, and felt the same to me in that it was too brief and characters weren’t fully developed. Then came the directors cut with another 40 minutes of footage and it all made sense! While I’m not a huge fan of KoH, it was vastly improved and suddenly became a proper film with proper characters. Also, look at how Lord of the Rings was released – 2 hour theatrical versions, followed by the full versions - as far as I know purely because no studio wants to put out 3 hour epics in the cinema. Just run time alone will limit an audience for a film like that. Back to Prometheus, I have watched the 3 hour long version in my head, and it was superb (give me a shout, Ridley, if you want any help putting it together). It didn’t change the plot, but everything was developed just that little bit more, time was spent on the characters so we understood more about how they behave, how the events affect them, more time on David and his back story – all of it just giving us that little bit more information and therefore more importance (and more questions!) placed on later events etc. All of it changing the mood of the film, making it something on a higher level than the current version. So, I think it’s a given (even obvious) that there will be a directors cut, but I am hoping that it will transform the film, and it will give us the time (while actually watching it) to absorb all the concepts and characters in the film, allowing us to invest in it and empathise more, pontificate and analyse, instead of flying through a story with so much going on that so much is just forgotten about! So far, we are still in the marketing phase, being readied for the ‘actual’ version to come. Please hurry up.