I was, like, floored by Kate McKinnon‘s dead-on inhabiting of Mika Brzezinski during last night’s SNL. Her sentence fragments and strangled gestures while Alex Moffat‘s Joe Scarborough explained the topic du jour, the looks of eye-rolling indignation, the stifled swordplay…perfect. Easily McKinnon’s most on-target bit since Hillary Clinton, and her biggest touchdown since stealing the Ghostbusters reboot.

I didn’t dislike Ridley Scott‘s Alien: Covenant — I hated it. And I’m not saying that out of some lazy-wrath instinct or pissy posturing or what-have-you. I’m talking about serious stomach-acid sensations here. Then again I mostly despised Prometheus so it didn’t take a great deal of effort to come to this.

If Prometheus rang your hate bell, you’re going to despise this one also. For Alien: Covenant, which runs 121 minutes but feels like 150, is truly a spawn of that awful 2012 film. Is it “better” than Prometheus? All right, yeah, I suppose it is. Is it therefore worth seeing? Maybe, but only if you like watching films that make you resent everything on the face of the planet including yourself.

I’m not going to tap out the usual story, character and actor rundown. All you need to know is that I didn’t give a damn about any of Alien: Covenant. Nothing. I was muttering “Fuckyoufuckyoufuckyoufuckyou” the whole time. Ten minutes in I was going “awww, Jesus…this already feels sloppy and reachy.” Of course it has a back-burster scene. Of course it was thrown in to compete with the John Hurt chest-fever scene in the original. All I could think was “the Hurt version was set up so much better, and delivered so much more…this is just Scott hanging wallpaper.”

I hit the bathroom during the the last ten minutes. You never do this if a movie has you in its grip, but I didn’t care.

Scott’s Alien (’79) had clarity, integrity — it was simple and managable, and it didn’t make you feel as if you had hornets in your brain. Best of all it didn’t explain anything in terms of backstory or motivation. The original Alien space jockey (I will love that elephant trunk and split-open ribcage for the rest of my life) was wonderful because there was no explanation about what had happened or why. It was delightful for what it didn’t explain.

Alien: Covenant is detestable for the exact opposite reason — for all the boring and tedious backstory gruel (i.e., all in service of explaining Michael Fassbender‘s malignant creationism) that it explains and clarifies, and then elaborates upon.

The Telegraph‘s Robbie Colin, who loves this fucking thing and cheers the fact that it’s “a million miles from the crowd-pleasing Alien retread 20th Century Fox [execs] have presumably been begging Scott to make,” calls it proof of Scott “operating at the peak of his powers.”

To me Alien: Covenant is a portrait of Scott as a giver of corporate neckrubs. And it grieves me to say this about the director of The Counselor, which I not only worshipped but which will probably turn out to be Scott’s last brilliant, hard-as-nails, close-to-flawless film.

Redesign guru Sasha Stone threw the switch from classic Hollywood Elsewhere to the newbie about three hours ago. (Roughly 4:30 eastern.) Except Sasha didn’t mention there’s no actual “switch”, but a series of marginal, step-by-step changes that add up to a switch after you’ve been finessing the process for 90 minutes or so. Or two hours. All to say HE was down while the transition happened, but things are mostly pretty good now. A few minor tweaks remain (I’ve made a short list in my head). I’m sure there are things that we’re not even noticing. Please tell us what’s bothering, what could be better, etc.

How many years did the DeMille (formerly the Mayfair) use that massive, two-walled, wrap-around billboard at the corner of Seventh Ave. and 47th Street? The Mayfair began in October 1930 and continued for nearly three decades. It became the DeMille Theatre when roadshow, reserved-seat flicks played there during the early ’60’s (Spartacus, The Cardinal, Barabbas, The Fall of the Roman Empire, Hawaii). So how many films were gigantisized? At least 150 or so, but I’ve only been able to find eight or nine decent shots in all my internet searches, which I’ve been doing for the last decade or so. It’s a shame. If I could get my hands on two or three dozen I’d create an HE sub-site that would be about nothing else.

For some reason I can’t seem to recall the name of David Michod and Brad Pitt‘s War…the second word won’t come. Not War Games, not War Dogs…what is it again? War Machine. For whatever reason it won’t settle in my head. Pitt’s white hair sticks. The Afghanistan part sticks. Looking forward to getting past this. The word on the street is that it’s “Strangelove-ian.” To me that means broadly funny but in a way that’s (a) dryly matter-of-fact and yet (b) perverse.

Brad Pitt as Gen. Glen McMahon, a character more or less based on General Stanley McChrystal.

Around this time last year I mentioned that I’d bought my usual Paris-to-Cannes train ticket, and that the cost was 185 euros. In the comment thread Bob Strauss said “that sounds like a lot for train fare.” I agreed that the cost was high, but little did I know that I was being charged that amount because I was a clueless American. This morning I discovered that French natives who order SNCF/TGV train tickets online pay a lot less — 67 euros for the exact same first-class ticket. Repeating: I just paid 67 euros for a ticket would have cost 185 euros for if I’d bought it at Gare de Lyon in Paris, as I did last year. This is repulsive. I was half-overjoyed that I’d just saved 118 euros, and half-furious that I’ve been ripped off like a schmuck the last couple of years.

I don’t see a beastly figure in the bathroom mirror. I see a healthy, relatively trim, moderately attractive hombre who bears…well, a certain resemblance to the guy I used to be. (Last night Glenn Kenny tweeted that I had marionette hair — a resentful observation if I ever heard one.) But whatever limited solace or comfort I get from my reflection, it all vanishes when someone snaps a photo. Once in a blue moon I’ll be okay with an iPhone image of myself, but the ratio of “oh my God, please delete that” to acceptable or semi-acceptable (from my perspective) is about 75 to 1.

Myself and the SRO, snapped sometime in March. Mask was bought in Venice, and in the same shop that supplied Stanley Kubrick with all his gargoyle masks for that orgy scene in Eyes Wide Shut.

New York weather was moist and cool when I arrived yesterday morning. Then it got a bit colder, and then a heavy rainstorm hit. It was suddenly early March. I was wearing two jackets and a scarf. My train arrived in Fairfield at 11:30 am, but I had to return to Manhattan on a 2:30 pm train to catch Alien: Covenant, and under near-typhoon conditions. Then the rain stopped and it was strangely warm again. Today it’s cool and sunny, but who knows what meteorological upheavals await? On top of which it’s cold and rainy in Paris (where both Jett and HE’s own Svetlana Cvetko and David Scott Smith are currently bunking).

I’m staying in Connecticut until early Monday morning, and then I’ll have three and three-quarter days in Manhattan and Brooklyn. Dropping my bags at a Murray Street pad and then catching a 10 am screening. Three more screenings follow plus a Tuesday interview with Long Strange Trip‘s Amir Bar Lev, along with some Jett and Cait hang time. It all concludes with a JFK-to-CDG flight late Thursday night (i.e., 11:30 pm).

One way or another, New York City’s subway system always manages to try my patience. I’m not even mentioning the aromas, and don’t get me started on the people. I thought hyena giggling was bad in Los Angeles cafes and bars — it’s worse on the A train.

I can’t post my reactions to Alien: Covenant (20th Century Fox, 5.19), which I saw last night at Leows’ Lincoln Square. But I’ve already passed along a view from a European movie-critic pal: “It’s a prequel to the first Alien, yes, but much more a sequel to Prometheus, delving very much into the same themes and also going into the creation of the alien, creation being very much on the movie’s mind.”

I can at least say that if you hated Prometheus, as I did, you’ll have an opportunity to savor the same stomach-acid sensations while watching Alien Covenant. So while waiting for the embargo to end…

Posted on 10.5.12: “Prometheus happened so long ago it doesn’t even feel like it came out this year. I saw it in Prague on a rainy afternoon. Mostly I remember the humidity and how warm it was in the lobby as all the journos and media people stood around and waited for the doors to open. And how I was sweating under my baseball cap and shades. And then wondering why the projectionist was showing it in 1.85 and not 2.35. And then trying to make sense of it…and failing.

Ridley Scott‘s Prometheus “is impressively composed and colder than a witch’s boob in Siberia,” I wrote on 6.1. “It’s visually striking, spiritually frigid, emotionally unengaging, at times intriguing but never fascinating. It’s technically impressive, of course — what else would you expect from an expensive Scott sci-fier? And the ‘scary’ stuff takes hold in the final third. But it delivers an unsatisfying story that leaves you…uhm, cold.

Dunkirk director Chris Nolan presented a longish highlight reel during last month’s Cinemacon. It was visually commanding and certainly gripping as far as it went, but this extended trailer, released today, has more sizzle, or should I say drizzle? I’m not detecting any implications of a story or thematic arc here. I’m sensing a carefully composed, super-costly IMAX variation on The Longest Day, or at least a similar espirit de corps feeling — a war movie that’s not so much about victory or defeat or a grotesque misjudgment (which is what A Bridge Too Far tried for) as much as brotherly love.

Here we are in the beginning of May, which is usually about blossoms and sunshine and light jackets or sweaters when you’re visiting Fairfield County, and yet the weather couldn’t be more miserable. Raw, rainy, chilly, blustery — it’s like early March. On top of which I have to train back to the city around 3 pm in order to catch a 5:30 screening of Ridley Scott‘s Alien: Covenant. Raincoats, umbrellas, scarves…thanks, Connecticut!