Enter the alien: the chestbursting scene, and its creation, is now cinema history. The scene was built of three set-ups: the scarlet cone erupting in Kane’s chest over the dinner table; then the bursting itself; before, finally, the creature zips across the table to its freedom. “From a technical point of view, we were more worried about it than any other effect in the film,” confessed Scott. “If we hadn’t got it right we might as well have forgotten the whole thing.” Did the cast know what was to happen? Inevitably, they did. But they may have not have been prepared for its severity. “Those six actors all happen to be sensitive actors,” relished the director, “all a bit queasy and therefore they did react very naturally to what they saw.”