Dan O’Bannon (1946-2009)

Stan Winston (born the same year) passed away in 2008, and in 2009 it’s Dan O’Bannon‘s turn.
Dude was one of those do-it-all guys from 70s cinema, a special-effects geek, screenwriter, actor and director. He’s in my pantheon for being one of the creative powerhouses behind 1979’s Alien. He co-wrote the original script that kicked the whole project into gear, and was the guy who pushed Giger at Scott as a creature designer. Others involved have not been entirely generous about O’Bannon’s contributions (Giler and Hill called it “a terrible script with one amazing scene”), and O’Bannon certainly saw himself as frozen out of the core creative process once the movie started rolling, but he stayed involved as an effects guy as the movie came into being.
Over at Coilhouse, Mer points out that “O’Bannon and Ron Shusett initially sketched all of the roles for Alien as generic males. However, they handed over their script with a note that explicitly stated: “The crew is unisex and all parts are interchangeable for men or women.” They were the first to suggest that traditional gender roles could be reversed, leaving the door wide open for Brandywine’s rewrite/production team, Ridley Scott, and casting.” I’m not sure quite how much of Ellen Ripley I’d lay at his door, but he does deserve some credit for sure.
O’Bannon’s chestburster idea (that one amazing scene) is one of the most iconic moments in all of cinema, and – I’m being serious here – is up there among the greatest artistic achievements of commercial American film. A deeply Freudian nightmare that reconfigures the relationship between human and non-human life, it had an indelible effect on those who saw it, and has only lost its power thanks to being endlessly copied and parodied since.
After Alien, O’Bannon had driving-seat roles in films like Heavy Metal, Lifeforce, and cult favourite Return of the Living Dead. He can be seen on the documentaries on my Alien DVDs. He was an interesting guy who did good work. Respect, Dan O’Bannon, respect.
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By the way, yesterday’s Avatar review has attracted some hefty disagreement in comments from my friends Conan and Jarratt. Spoiler-heavy, but worth a look if you care about that film, especially if you thought I was off-beam…