calmTECHNICALLY WORK SAFE
This is the original 1979 cut of the sequence, which means that it includes the moment where Dallas (Tom Skerritt) asks Mother about his chances; this scene features an effective reprise of the cue used during Kane's (John Hurt) funeral. Of course, most of Jerry Goldsmith's music for the rest this sequence, "The Shaft" on the soundtrack album, was jettisoned and replaced with cues from his own score for Freud. The 1999 DVD with the isolated score tracks synched the correct cue; Goldsmith's approach would have been just as effective if not more so than what appears in the film, but at least this music was still written by Goldsmith, and is less jarring of an intrusion into the movie that the sudden appearance of Howard Hanson's The Romantic symphony at the finale.
However, in all other ways, this scene works beautifully. The performances and the much-imitated set design lend the film a sense of reality that it wouldn't have otherwise had. Dallas' plan is a good one, but his execution is sloppy because he doesn't think tactically; he goes into this affair with a sense of doom, and the moment when he stops and desperately realizes that he has fallen into a trap is more frightening than the revelation of the creature itself.
