Aliens, directed by James Cameron in 1986 is a good example of a cross-genre movie. The original Alien from 1979 had cleverly mixed horror and sci-fi. James Cameron, who had not directed the original film but who had himself made the Terminator added the action genre to the mix with added elements of the Vietnam war movie sub genre.

This last is most obvious as we watch the marines in their ship approaching the planet. The military drumbeat signals this genre and is, if you think about it, almost comically inappropriate for this genre. The big guns are also emphasised and other clichés such as a black corporal shouting encouragement and an incompetent commander add to the effect.

At other times a science fiction feel is created. The shots of the spaceship and the synthesiser music which accompany it are reminders of a film like Bladerunner and the shots of a devastated planet in the darkness with broken down machinery are familiar from the director's own Terminator films.

The horror features of the film are probably clearest in the early sections when they first search the base for the aliens.

Here it is as if the soldiers think that they are in a war movie while Ripley recognises that this is horror. Like the protagonist in much horror, she is the one who sees and the camera constantly focuses on her: as the soldiers strut around with their big guns, we are made to watch her look of terror instead of being allowed to enjoy their misplaced macho posturing.

As they advance through the dark corridor, the tension is kept high by the fairly typical horror-style music and the clever use of the motion scanner. This was an original idea in the first Alien film but it does fit in with the typical nature of the genre- it is a device which tells us that the aliens are around before they can actually be seen accentuating even further the sense that we have in any horror that an alien is nearby.

A good example of the way that this is used is in the scene when they find the little girl, Newt. Here the tracker alerts us as well as the marines that there is something around- we both assume that this is an alien. As they explore, the music becomes eerie and typical of the horror genre- sometimes, as in the Shining, the music merges with soundtrack noises to create atmosphere. The soldiers are still behaving in the macho ways mentioned earlier, but the camera keeps on returning to close up views of Ripley so that we feel closer to her and her feelings- as if we share a secret knowledge which the soldiers are excluded from. The group find a laboratory where horrific specimens are kept in jars and this cliché of films such as Frankenstein still works to raise the tension as one of the Aliens jumps out of a jar. At this moment when we are already tense, the motion scanner begins to beep. Our recent fright means that we immediately associate the light on the screen with the Alien we have just seen so when something rushes out at them we immediately fear the worst- in fact it is a child.

There is much about this scene which is typical of the genre- the early scene in a film where our tension levels are raised without real reason is typical of the genre and in fact there is an almost identical scene in the first Alien film, on that occasion with a cat rather than a child jumping out. On the other hand the mix of genres that the film contains means that it is often far from predictable.

One key difference from typical horror is in the question of sympathy for the characters. The typical stock characters of horror are the victims of the monster who die for our enjoyment- the audience often feel no more sympathy for them then they do for the buildings knocked over by King Kong. This is because they fail to act against the monsters and are often completely unaware of them. Their deaths are pathetic and often comic. When you consider the soldiers in Aliens, they are very different. Despite the fact that we do not really get to know them as individuals and they are clearly presented as being less sensible than Ripley, their actions and deaths are heroic and self sacrificing- clichés of the war movie genre. On the other hand they differ from that genre in that the most heroic of them all is a woman, Vasquez.

If we consider the character of Bishop, the android, we can see the conventions of another genre- science fiction, being played around with. In the first Alien film, there was an android on the ship who was an evil character, trying to keep the alien alive at all costs so that the company could experiment with it back on earth. In Aliens, Bishop seems to be the same kind of character- his face is alarmingly skull-like and many shots focus on his frightening, staring eyes. In one scene, the camera catches him staring admiringly at the body of an Alien, as he looks up he says: "Magnificent, aren’t they." We are being set up for an android who will betray them as in the first film, but of course the opposite happens and our genre expectations are subverted as Bishop saves their lives and sacrifices his own at the end of the film.

So what kind of film is Aliens- horror, sci-fi, action or war movie. The answer, if there is one, comes most clearly if we look at the relationship between Ripley and Newt. In the second half of the film with guns blazing everywhere, Aliens seems to be most clearly fitting in with the action genre. Even though Ripley is, like Vasquez, atypically a woman, she is rushing around with an enormous machine gun "wasting" aliens like any of the men. However, in her relationship with Newt, we are presented by the director with another side of her personality- she becomes immediately the protective mother from the very moment when the girl is first found and the marines stand back to let her go in. This is the horror genre at its most essential- the mother protecting her child from the evil monster like in the Shining. The film makers seem to be aware that this is a cliché, and so they play with our expectations by mixing scenes of Newt helpless with others that present her as the "street-wise kid," who can survive alone. Nevertheless, the sympathy that is created for Ripley and Newt as a pseudo family is at the heart of the film and seems to me to suggest that the principal feeling that we have with this film is that we have seen a horror movie rather than an action or sci-fi film where weapons and technology are central.