What Debt Does Alien Owe David Cronenberg’s Shivers?

This article originally ran onDen of Geek UK.

At first, they might look as different as night and day.

One is set in deep space, the other in a luxury apartment block on terra firma.

Cronenberg madeShiversfor approximately $130,000 in 1975.

Could it be that this low-budget shocker inspired what is still considered to be the ultimate space horror movie?

Lets take a look at the evidence.

The storys trigger is that reliable genre staple, a mad scientist and his foul creation.

In this instance, the scientist has engineered a new kind of creature part parasite, part venereal disease.

Too late, Hobbes tries to staunch the spread of his creation by killing his mistress and then himself.

you might probably guess the answer to that question.

ThroughoutShivers, you could readily sense at Cronenbergs glee at tearing down the decadent structure hes built up.

Nevertheless, the similarities betweenAlienandShiversare easy to see.

So what does Cronenberg make of the apparent similarities betweenShiversandAlien?

Well, the directors talked about the subject several times in interviews over the past 35 or so years.

Cronenberg recalls that he gently corrected the gentleman in the audience by stating thatShiverscame out four years beforeAlienwas released.

The audience member said.

Now we know who the thief is!

Its the same basic thing.

I know Dan OBannon knew my movie.

In a case like that you wouldnt mind a little credit for it.

Alien was just a $300,000 B-movie with a $10 million budget.

Cronenberg counters that John Landis had been around OBannon when hed talked about Cronenbergs Canadian films.

So what are we to make of all this?

IsAliensimplyShiversin space, or is there something more complex going on?

The 1970s was also the era of the womens liberation movement, the Vietnam war and the Watergate scandal.

If free love really existed, Cronenberg seems to say, Isnt this what it would actually look like?

Alien, on the other hand, is a pure nightmare about physical violation.

InAlien, the fear of impregnation seems to loom up everywhere, like a gargoyle.

They came up with the natural-sounding dialogue where workers grumble over bonuses and low pay.

They came up with the idea of Ash, the ships scientist and closet android.

And make no mistake,Alienreally is a Frankensteins monster of disparate parts.

Ridley Scott citedThe Texas Chain Saw Massacreas a direct influence when it came toAliens grubby realism.

The Terror From Beyond Space,which were both about space explorers meeting hostile aliens.

Going back further still, and there are clear echoes of HP Lovecrafts novellaAt The Mountains Of MadnessinAlien.

As OBannon once put it, I didnt steal Alien from anybody.

WhetherAlienborrowed fromShiversor not, Id argue that both stand up as two key genre films of the 1970s.