The Original and Still the Best.

So I had a rare half hour alone in the house the other night, and I was flipping through channels, and there was the original Alien, which I've seen several times, but which I haven't seen in probably close to 20 years. Holy crap, is that a scary movie! I watched from Tom Skerritt getting killed through Ian Holm getting--well, disconnected, almost to Yaphet Kotto getting killed, and I have to say, this movie holds up incredibly incredibly well. Remarkably, for a science-fiction movie from 1979, it doesn't look hopelessly cheesy. And it's almost unbearably suspenseful: that scene with Tom Skerritt in the air ducts and the other people screaming at him to get out just about had me jumping out of my skin. And here's the thing--I knew exactly what was going to happen and when. And I screamed anyway. Yep, sitting there on my living room couch, watching a 29-year-old horror movie, I screamed at the appearance of the toothsome title creature about to devour poor Tom Skerritt.
Say what you will about Aliens, Alien 3, Alien Resurrection, Honey I Shrunk The Alien, Alien Vs. Freddy, and Aliens Breaking Training, and say what you will about Ridley Scott's post-Alien work (Uneven, and even the good ones aren't this good), but Alien is a freakin' masterpiece.