In his masterclass given at the Cinémathèque on the sidelines of the wonderful exhibition dedicated to him, James Cameron paid tribute to his actress Sigourney Weaver. “She’s the one who made the queen in Aliens credible,” said the director.
Since April 4 and until January 5, 2025, the Cinémathèque dedicates a fantastic exhibition to James Cameron. Rich in hundreds of artworks and preparatory drawings made by Cameron himself, the exhibition also highlights accessories, costumes, photos and interactive technologies developed or adapted by the filmmaker over the course of his career. Suffice to say that if you love the master, the exhibition is absolutely unmissable.
Alongside this, he also gave a masterclass, recounting some memories of filming and creations of his works. If he retold the anecdote concerning the creation of the Terminator, born in a dream while he was in the grip of a high fever in 1981, while he was in Rome, he delivered a lesser known one regarding an inspiration for Aliens. She also born from a dream, which will ultimately find its way in a key scene of the film.
A dream of killer wasps for Aliens
“I had a dream that was related to the queen from Aliens, or at least I derived a scene from it from the film. I was in a very dark room, I came to the center of the room and looked at everything around me. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I saw that the walls were covered with wasps, and that if I moved even an inch, they would attack and kill me.
I used that feeling to create the scene where Ripley is with Newt. Suddenly, she freezes, turns around, and discovers that she is in the worst possible place, the alien queen’s nest with all the eggs. When you make a horror film, it’s obviously to go into the darkest corners of the unconscious. This moment when she turns around is a pivot in the film.”
Here it is again in (splendid) images, for the memory…
And Cameron slips in this tribute to his actress: “if Stan’s special effects [Winston] are very good in this scene, it’s really Sigourney, with her acting, her look which is so convincing, which makes the queen credible. She got an Oscar nomination for the film, which was very rare at the time for a horror film.”
We take this opportunity to remind you that if you are equipped with 4K Blu-ray, the film was released on this medium on April 29!