MovieChat Forums > Enemy Mine (1985) Discussion > Works great until the alien learns Engli...

Works great until the alien learns English...

posted 18 years ago by newsjunkie356-1
15 replies | jump to latest

...then he ain't alien anymore, just the standard BEM, one of the Bug-Eyed Monsters that decorated the cover of the old pulp SF mags.

The short story the movie was based on was much better.

The props, space ships and especially "Jerry's" side-arm look like they were cribbed from the sci-fi serials of the 30s.

But he didn't. He gives us the standard dude in a plastic suit. There's so little alien about the "Drac" (even the name! Drac, draco, dragon!?) the movie skirts parody.

Both Star Trek and Babylon 5, years later, would present us with truly alien aliens and not just BEMs. Surely the director of "Das Boot" could have done better than this.

Another this is, watching this movie 26 years after seeing it in the theater as a teen, how dated the special effects look. After the bar that George Lucas and Nick Meyer had set years before, surely the sfx could have been better.

And HD does nothing to improve how it looks.

After all, the sfx from SW IV-VI and "Wrath of Khan" still hold up even in this day of CG wizardry.

At 14, this impressed the hell out of me. At 35, I'm yawning.

"The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was making the world think he didn't exist."

[–] 18 years ago

[deleted]

[–] andreas-schmidt-pabst 16 years ago

I do not agree to you. I find Jerry pretty alien, for excample because he is a hermaphrodite and he has that lineage song.
And I like the design of the space ships and Jerrie´s gun.

By the way: Maybe "Drac" only is the human´s name for that species.

"Hooters, hooters, yum yum yum,
Hooters, hooters, on a girl that´s dumb!"
The Bundy credo

[–] HeavenlyC79 16 years ago

Well, I have to agree with you.. I really liked the movie until that scene when the alien learned english little bit too fast (imo). But although the movie was pretty good.. 6/10

"Is every person here a mental case?"

[–] andreas-schmidt-pabst 16 years ago

But at least Jerry has to learn English and there is not such nonsense like an universal translator.

By the way, in Nepal I´ve met natives who had been only a half of a year in Germany and spoke German nearly fluently and that´s, even though Nepales and German are totally different.
So apparently Jerry also is such a quick learner.

"Hooters, hooters, yum yum yum,
Hooters, hooters, on a girl that´s dumb!"
The Bundy credo

[–] lantzn 16 years ago

He was missing a total of 3 years. If you were only with one other person for a year or two that spoke a different language and had nothing to do but learn to talk with him you just might pick it up faster then normal. Also to be a pilot you'd have to have a pretty good memory. The Drac appeared to be a pretty intelligent pilot to boot.

[–] behamut 16 years ago

I agree somewhat. I loved the movie as a kid and saw it now and it wasn't quite up to the par I remembered it as. It was still really good though, so I don't know if I'd give it nearly the criticism you did.

I think the idea of him learning English is to show that even something that is completely "alien" to us is not that much different when the differences are put aside. I thought it was an effective means of demonstrating a point. The other thing I did like is that they both learned each other's languages so it didn't seem one sided. They just showed them speaking English more because, well, it's must easier for the audience to understand.

I also agree with another poster that Drac was probably the name humans gave them. If you think about it, Jerry's language was garbles and gurgles, so "Drac" wasn't even a sound they made.

By the way, agree with your signature 100%. Unfortunate.

[–] ganiscol 16 years ago

Your problem is, that at 14 you got the point of the movie. And at 35, it totally flew over your head. Nothing you wrote there matters at all. Which is kinda sad, for you.

[–] Forgotten_Hero 16 years ago

The computer effects look dated, but I find the costume used for Jeriba and the other Dracs to be extremely well made. As for him being alien, it isn't about making the character as inhuman as possible. It's about making him different. The whole film is metaphorical anyway. They could have been two humans from different planets who had to learn to coexist. They were on opposite sides of a war and held bigoted and nationalistic views of one another, especially the human character Willis. The reptilian appearance was simply needed to help drive home the point that the two are different.

Besides, how are the characters from Star Trek more alien? An asexual reptilian hominid is far more foreign than people with big ears or bumps on their heads.

[–] rhopmans 16 years ago

I AGREE WITH YOU
PEOPLE ARE TOO PICKY
THE COSTUMES WERE COOL.
THE CREATURES ON THE PLANET LOOKED REALLY COOL. THE METEOR SHOWERS WERE A COOL IDEA.I GIVE THE MOVIE 9/10. THE PLOT WAS WICKED. GREAT ACTING. PEOPLE COMPLAINING ABOUT JERRY LEARNING THE LANGUAGE IS SILLY. WE DONT KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT THEIR LEARNING CAPACITY. FOR ALL WE KNOW THEY NEVER FORGET ANYTHING SO NOTHING WOULD HAVE TO BE REPEATED. THIS MOVIE WAS AMAZING. JUST BECAUSE THE EFFECTS ARE DATED THAT DOESN'T MAKE THEM BAD. IF THEY WORKED BACK THEN IN THE 80S THEN THEY STILL WORK TODAY. I PREFER EFFECTS LIKE THESE AND EFFECTS FROM THE MOVIE CONAN AND GHOSTBUSTERS TO THESE NEW CG DISASTERS.
ENTIRE PEOPLE MADE OF CG FOR ENTIRE MOVIES LIKE JAR JAR BINKS.
IT LOOKS TERRIBLE AND I THINK THEY SHOULD GO BACK TO CREATURE EFFECTS AND COSTUMES. CG ALMOST NEVER LOOKS GOOD. InMyHumbleOpinion

[–] 16 years ago

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[–] MorbidKittyProductions 15 years ago

I have to agree with rhopmans that the CG these days doesn't look all *that* good & that if they went back to creature FX & costumes, the outcome would probably look that much better.
Other than that, rhopmans, turn off your CAPS lock - in internet-speak & etiquette you are ***YELLING***. Just FYI.
As for Jerry learning English too quick - um, they apparently were there for 3 years.... I never could tell just *how* fast the fast growing alien grew (um say *that* 5x fast) - but either way, 3 years would be long enough for 2 people isolated & trying to survive to learn another language... There's nothing else to exercise your mind with - like puzzles & games, so.... there ya are...
seems plausible to me

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[–] jones8557-1 14 years ago

I agree. Jerry has to have a good memory to memorize 300 years of lineage! So its possible for him to learn English very fast.

[–] Nutmeg95 14 years ago

"Another this is, watching this movie 26 years after seeing it in the theater as a teen, how dated the special effects look."

Gee, do you know why? You are no longer a teenager, you're perhaps not as easily impressed, but more importantly... You have seen other, newer movies with better effects, so you're scale of experience has changed entirely!
If you had never seen a movie, or a movie with special effects, I'm sure the effects from this movie would be as impressive to you now as they were at 14.

And I don't know if Jerry lived on that planet with Willy for 1 or 3 years before he died, but Willy was there for another 2-3 years after that raising Zammis.

I thought Drac/Dracon was a bit cliche, but the book was written in (or before) 1979, and how common was that name before then? I don't know.

"Ah! Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!"

[–] Natron 14 years ago

IMHO, the OP is just a troll.

[–] chouse1020 13 years ago

After all, the sfx from SW IV-VI and "Wrath of Khan" still hold up even in this day of CG wizardry.

The effects in Star Wars IV most definitely DO NOT hold up well at all. They were impressive for the time but do not conveniently forget the VERY visible matte squares around all of the spaceships in IV.

Maybe you couldn't see it on your VHS tape, but it was extremely visible on LaserDisc. It was so visible that it was shocking to be quite honest.

The remastered versions were mainly to fix that - as well as to insert random extra scenes that Lucas had either originally wanted to do (Jabba in IV) or felt that tied the saga together (especially the scenes in VI after the destruction of the second Death Star). Now those look great, but that WAS all CGI work.

Also in Return of the Jedi, watch the speeder bike chase again - but this time pay attention to the border of the bikes/characters... the matte lines are much closer to the bikes/people, but they're VERY visible and very distracting compared to modern effects.

As to Wrath of Khan they're not bad - until you get to the battle in the Mutara Nebula - those segments were rather weak and they used very few 'outside the ship' shots.