Alien

Description:
The commercial tug Nostromo is on its way home to Earth after a long journey to the planet Thedus. The spaceship has a cargo of twenty million tons of mineral ore and a refinery in tow and also has a crew of seven in hibernation on board. The spaceship suddenly receives an unknown signal from a moon on the ship's route, and the ship's computer wakes the crew from sleep. Following orders from their employers on Earth, the crew begins the procedure of uncoupling the refinery from the starship, then landing on the moon, resulting in the starship being damaged. Captain Dallas (Tom Skerritt), Second Commanding Officer Kane (John Hurt) and Navigator Lambert (Veronica Cartwright) set out to investigate the source of the signal. Meanwhile, officer Ripley (Sigourney Weaver), science officer Ash (Ian Holm),

Down on the moon, Dallas, Kane and Lambert discover that the signal is coming from an alien spaceship. Inside the abandoned spaceship, they find the last remains of an unknown alien whose body appears to have exploded from the inside. Meanwhile on the Nostromo, the spaceship's computer has partially deciphered the signal, which according to Ripley turns out to be some kind of warning. Kane discovers a large chamber on the unknown starship which contains many alien eggs, one of which releases an alien alien ( facehugger ) that attacks and attaches itself to his face. Dallas and Lambert carry the unconscious Kane back to the Nostromo, where Ash gives them access to the starship against Ripley's order to follow the starship's quarantine protocol.

The crew tries in vain to remove the alien from Kane's face, discovering at the same time that the alien's blood is a very strong corrosive acid. Eventually, the alien detaches itself from Kane's face and is later found dead on board the starship. With the spaceship fully repaired, the crew resumes their journey back to Earth.

Later, Kane wakes up and is apparently unharmed, but during a meal he has violent convulsions. Suddenly, an alien ( chestburster ) bursts out of his chest, killing him on the spot. The alien escapes into the spaceship. Although the crew does not have any real weapons on board the starship, they still try to capture the alien with home-made electric shock rods and flamethrowers. Brett (Harry Dean Stanton) follows the crew cat into a large room where a now fully grown alien attacks him and takes his body into one of the starship's air shafts. Dallas climbs into the air shaft to force the alien into an airlock where it can be sucked into space, but the alien tricks him into an ambush and kills him. Lambert pleads with the surviving crew members to join him in escaping the Nostromo with the help of the spaceship's emergency pod, but Ripley, who has now taken command, explains to him that the spaceship's emergency pod cannot keep the four people alive long enough to reach Earth.

Via the spaceship's computer Mother , Ripley learns that Ash has been ordered to return the alien to their employers, even if it costs the crew their lives. Ash attacks her, but Parker intervenes and decapitates him with a blow from a club, revealing Ash to actually be an android. But before Parker burns him, Ash predicts that the crew members will not survive in the end. The final three crew members plan to activate the Nostromo's self-destruct mechanism and then escape in the starship's emergency pod, but Parker and Lambert are both killed by the alien while gathering the necessary supplies for the escape. Ripley initiates the self-destruct sequence on her own and takes the cat over to the emergency pod to escape, only to find that the way is blocked by the alien. She unsuccessfully tries to interrupt the self-destruct sequence, but then returns to the emergency pod, where the alien is now gone. Ripley escapes in the emergency pod, while the spaceship Nostromo explodes.

As Ripley prepares to go to sleep, she discovers that the alien is aboard the emergency pod. She pulls on her spacesuit and opens the hatch, causing an explosive decompression that forces the alien out of the open door. The alien tries to crawl into one of the engines, but Ripley activates them and blows the remains of the alien into space. She then puts herself and the cat to sleep so they can be ready for the long journey back to Earth.