Rakka

Dir: Neill Blomkamp

2017

****

I like Neill Blomkamp and I stood by him through 2013's Elysium and 2015's CHAPPiE - which I thought was brilliant actually. I don't want a samey Alien film a samey AI film or just another action film. Blomkamp always brings a real human element to his sci-fi films that give them the edge over other contemporary films in the genre. You may not like Die Antwoord but the fact of the matter is that Ninja and Yo-Landi Visser brought something new to the table, they felt authentic and real, and they were the right kind of performers instead of just beautiful actors made to look like cyber-punks. I thought it was great anyway, a future cult-classic, mark my words. So when Blomkamp was announced as the new Alien director I was pretty pleased. Alien was Ridley Scott's baby, fair enough, if he wasn't finished with it then so be it but Prometheus was stupid, he should have left it there and, in the fine tradition of Alien films, a new director should have been handed the baton and Blomkamp was, in my opinion, the right director for the job. What's done is done. Blomkamp clearly hasn't got the alien thing out of his head though and his short film Rakka feels like a 'Look at what you could have had' tease. While the concept doesn't strike me as particularly original, its realism certainly hits home - disturbingly so. A hostile alien invasion, if it were to ever happen, would be unimaginably horrid and Rakka goes a long way in visualizing just how horrid it could be. It's pretty dark. Computer games have been playing with this idea for some time and it looks as if film is about to catch up somewhat. If you're still not sure whether Rakka is Blomkamp making comment on his Alien dismissal then the inclusion of Sigourney Weaver might just convince you. Again, her appearance makes the story feel somewhat unoriginal but I would argue that Rakka goes some way in give the audience something new as well as a bit of what the fans want, and indeed, expect. I was thrilled, I want to see the feature length version and lots of sequels. I'm not sure which direction these shorts will go or even if another short is expected (I think I read somewhere they'll be more) but I certainly like what I see. It certainly feels like an introduction into something that could be big with many possibilities so I await the next instalment with enthusiasm.