As the film opens, we are met with soaring views and notes that are reminiscent of those used for the Day After Tomorrow and the Star Trek movies respectively, and the shadow of the flying saucer, so effective in Independence Day, is again used to good affect in Prometheus. Regular Sci-Fi fans like myself are thus drawn in and hearts are captured from the start by these simple cinematic techniques, and immediately a comparison begins between those epic productions and this: the stage is set for something great.
But what I'm hoping to do here is not a film review as such, but make some theological reflections on this work of Ridley Scott (RS) that is absolutely packed with questions:
where do we come from?
Where are we going?
What is the nature of truth? Of theory? Of faith?
Who are we?
Where does Science now fit in our society and where does belief come in?
How do we share our beliefs and how do we accept others?
and more.
My first questions about the film are regarding the 'Engineers' themselves: these alien 'creators' who appear as immense, pale, heavily muscled humans top and tail the film.
What is interesting to note firstly is the difference between the Engineers' ships at this starting point and then at the end of film: do the two different shapes, the former a disc, the latter a torc, represent something else? Or is this just artistic licence to allow RS to feed into Alien as the torc ship is reminiscent of the alien craft found on the planet LV-426. RS has alllowed definite allusions to Alien, despite remarking that this is not a prequel, for the letters of the Prometheus title appear in a similar way as they did for Alien. There also appears to be a morphological different between the Engineers: the one at the end of the film has neck ridges that appear to be part of his anatomy rather than part of the suit he is wearing: are these differences purposeful or accidental, or am I just mistaken (nothing unusual there). If the former, there is room to suggest that we are to be invited into a new world of Engineers for any future film in this Alien semi-prequel. Are there differences between Engineers who create and Engineers who destroy?
As the film turns, the Engineer, in the barren landscape of a seemingly new world (although fleshed with the green of plants) makes his was across the rocky platform by the cascades of a powerful waterfall: above him, the disc rotates into a more vertical axis as it pearces the clouds and gives us a perspective on the immensity of its size (seemingly larger by a magnitude than the torc later in the film). The Engineer takes some device from his robes and strips to the bare essentials. The device is some kind of container and, upon opening it, we see a cup with an organically moving chemical substance. He drinks of this cup (of sorrows) and immediately his body begins to break down as the substance spreads through his blood. As his body breaks in pain it collapses under him and he cascades into the water. As he falls, his body is broken into a cloud of molecules, particularly DNA. This seeding of genetics blooms into life and cells form and divide.
In interview with the blog 'If Only', Daniel Twiss, who plays the part of this Engineer, comments: "My character is that of a fairly young 'Engineer' who ritualistically sacrifices himself... [to provide] the first building blocks for new life to form..." Self-sacrifice to provide life. There is no good reason for this seeding of life to involve sacrifice: DNA can easily be created in the lab and then fed into any system. Thus the ritual and the sacrifice are deliberate ploys to cast our minds towards religion, towards faith: this is a film produced in the context of Christianity, for our faith has, at it's heart, a creator (God) who would sacrifice himself to bring us life. The pain evident on the young Engineer's face as he is torn apart turned my thoughts to the paintings of the crucifixion with Christ in the anguish of torture. And as the Engineer is ripped into molecular clouds, I cannot but think of the Eucharist and the words 'this is my body given for you, broken for you', and the very notion that the presence of Jesus is dispersed and concentrated in each of us as we receive communion as the Engineer's DNA was dispersed into ocean and concentrated into cells.
And thus begins my musings on Prometheus: with the incarnation and the death of our Lord that we call to heart and mind and soul every Sunday, every Eucharist. This is always where creation begins and where we find life.
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