Alien type Movie

Belinda Sallin’s documentary Dark Star: H.R Giger’s World offers a glimpse inside the gorgeously Freudian mind of the acclaimed Swiss sculptor and painter. The film was made with Giger’s cooperation and filming was completed right before he died, exactly one year ago today, at age 74. Much of it is devoted to the man, white-haired and stooped, trudging around his detritus-stuffed house in Zurich like a sweet old gargoyle.

And while the documentary spends much of it’s time depicting Giger’s home as a reflection of his soul (including his still-ripe pain over the 1975 suicide of his wife) it also pays attention to the reason that he is world famous—his Oscar-winning creature designs for the 1979 sci-fi classic Alien.

This exclusive clip features archive footage from that movie’s set, including director Ridley Scott describing his awed reaction to first seeing Giger’s 1977 book Necronomicon, plus Giger, looking like the cat that just ate the canary, explaining how Alien’s producers asked him to change the design of the film’s eggs so that they wouldn’t be so obscene. “Now they’re doubly obscene,” he smiles.

Dark Star opens in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Berkeley, and Providence, RI, on May 15. It expands to other cities throughout the month.

Image zoom Icarus Films