Ridley Scott is no stranger to seeing new talent step into franchises he created—he did it with Denis Villeneuve’s Blade Runner 2049, a movie he recently said he regretted not directing himself. The veteran filmmaker is still going strong at 85 with Napoleon and Gladiator 2 on the way, but he still made time to watch Fede Álvarez’s upcoming movie that continues another of his famous franchises: Alien.
As Variety reports, Álvarez dished on the feedback he received while speaking to Guillermo del Toro at the DGA Latino Summit 2023 (you can watch the entire conversation here). Scott is a lead producer on Álvarez’s film, which the trade notes is “reportedly” titled Alien: Romulus, and Álvarez—who is no stranger to stepping into an established cinematic universe, having directed 2013’s Evil Dead reboot—sent him his cut, an experience he described as “incredibly tense.”
Fortunately, this story has a happy ending. “Everyone gave me the heads up that Ridley is really tough … particularly if it has something to do with his movies,” Álvarez said. Though he was intimidated, he was determined to hear Scott’s reaction in person. “Even if he was gonna say, ‘You destroyed my legacy,’ I wanted to be in front of him and see him in the eye,” he said. “And then he walks into the room and he did say, ‘Fede, what can I say? It’s fucking great.’ … My family knows it was one of the best moments of my life to have a master like him, who I admired so much, to even watch a movie I made but particularly something like this … and talk to me for an hour about what he liked about it. One of the best compliments he said was, ‘The dialogue is great. Are you the writer?’ Yes!’”
That’s an encouraging endorsement for a movie we don’t know much about, other than it features an ensemble cast led by Cailee Spaeny (Priscilla), takes place on a far-flung planet, and involves a close encounter with you-know-what sort of hostile species. It’s due out August 16, 2024.
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