Entertainment

Out of this world

Scientist Noomi Rapace searches the universe for answers. (20th Century Fox Licensing/Merch)

“2001: A Space Odyssey” was about an astronaut named Dave traveling to the far reaches of the universe to find the secret to man’s origins on Earth. “Prometheus” is totally different: This time the spaceman is named “David.”

But from the opening shot of “Prometheus,” which is a direct quotation of the Stanley Kubrick magnum opus, it’s clear that Ridley Scott’s intense and engulfing adventure-horror-sci-fi flick is honoring its predecessors (including “Avatar” and Scott’s “Blade Runner” and “Alien,” to which this film is an unofficial prequel). Gorgeous set pieces thrill the senses, but there is philosophical inquiry as well. “Alien” was, after all, just “Jaws” in space, but “Prometheus” ponders where evil comes from and how it conquers its makers.

Kubrick wouldn’t have been quite so interested in all the flamethrower killings and exploding guts that entrance Sir Ridley, but Stanley could be a bit of a drudge. “Prometheus” is wickedly entertaining, scary, sinister and thought-provoking. But I’m not sure it will hold up on TV. See it on the big screen and in 3-D: As with “Avatar,” you’re paying not for rounded characters or a smoothly engineered story, but for a maximum-cinema experience — the majesty and wonder conjured up by a pop maestro who knows how to spend a couple of hundred million bucks.

PHOTOS: CHARLIZE THERON AND MORE STARS FACING OFF AGAINST THEMSELVES AT THE BOX OFFICE

We begin in ancient times, with a Dawn of Man sequence involving a giant alien and a Thermos of the Gods that serves as the monolith did in “2001.” In 2089, newly discovered cave drawings reporting the alien contact inspire a pair of scientists (Noomi Rapace of the original “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” and Logan Marshall-Green) to lead a mission to a distant nook of the galaxy to find the godlike “engineers” who got things rolling on Earth. The scientists are accompanied by a blond robot (Michael Fassbender) who apparently went to the same language school as C-3PO and has a fixation on “Lawrence of Arabia.”

Science has always had to defer to patrons, though, and the true boss (Charlize Theron, a human icicle) is the leader of the corporation funding the trillion-dollar experiment. The ancient, deceased founder of the company, who appears in a hologram (he’s played by Guy Pearce under a wall of makeup, and Scott squanders a chance for a tender human element by not hiring a genuinely old actor with gravitas), explains that, like Prometheus, who tried to raise man to the level of the gods, he was driven to uncover the ultimate secret. Who made us? Are they nice? And what exactly are the chances that scary acid-bleeding monsters in caves will shred us like lettuce if we should nose around asking a few polite questions?

The middle of the movie is too much of a monster mosh pit. By the time we get around to the mutant crab-man, it seems like the lads in special effects are just amusing themselves, and a soon-to-be-infamous scene illustrating how to do surgery on yourself doesn’t really belong. On the other hand, what kind of “Alien” movie would this be if gushing innards and ripped flesh weren’t on the menu? You want a Wes Anderson film, there’s one playing next door.

Another failing is Scott’s lack of engagement with character. David the robot (who is less like Dave Bowman than HAL 9000, with shades of Jude Law in “A.I.”) is the only one who gets a little time to show us who he is, and though the scientists, intriguingly, have Christian convictions which yield the thrilling (to fellow believers) line, “Where’s my cross?” Scott doesn’t do as much with science versus religion as he could have.

Like his writers Damon Lindelof and Jon Spaihts, Scott loves equally the colossal and the claustrophobic, but people kind of bore him. This didn’t bother me much because there is so much else going on. With its creepy caves and yawning space, “Prometheus” is on one level a somber dialogue between man the aspirant and man the mortal. Too often, a freely wandering soul discovers but a new kind of prison; our most protracted journeys take place in coach, between two screaming toddlers.