For a genre that’s renowned for being cool and free-spirited, these jazz bastards aren’t half uptight.

The best way to describe Whiplash would be Full Metal Jacket with drums. The film is basically a loud, rude, abusive teacher (JK Simmons, in the R Lee Ermey mould) bullying a wee little lamb who turns into something of a wolf (Miles Teller, mirroring a young Matthew Modine).

This is a gross simplification of the film but it’s still an appropriate comparison. Now for those of you who want a more contemporary parallel, think of it as a kind of Hell’s Kitchen deal. The Gordon Ramsay figure hurls a torrent of foul-mouthed abuse and the petrified student has to either sink or swim. Meanwhile, we sit there grinning with glee, because it’s not us getting abused. I’m not quite sure why we, as a society, get such a kick out of these relationships. If this kind of stuff happened between spouses, we’d be horrified. But because it’s between a student and teacher, we’re more likely to allow it. There’s a part of us that feels that this kind of stuff is character building. That to be upset by it is to be weak or wet.

The sick and brilliantly perceptive part of the film is that Neiman (Teller) thoroughly rejects his own father over this bully of a teacher. His dad is a little insipid and isn’t fully understanding of his son’s desire to be a great drummer, but he’s essentially a good man. He certainly provides him with plenty of emotional support. But he doesn’t push his son. Perhaps because of this, Neiman feels like his father is leading him to a life of mediocrity.

And mediocrity is one thing that Neiman doesn’t want. Like many ambitious young men, he has an insane drive to make his mark on the world - to be remembered. He becomes thoroughly obsessed with his drumming and dedicates all of his energy towards it. In one scene, he breaks off with his girlfriend because he knows that he can’t give her the time that she needs and that if he does give her time, he’ll only resent her. It’s a cruel scene, because he’s admitting to her that she’s less important to him than his drum kit, but it rings completely true. Especially the way that he thinks he’s being nice about it. He speaks completely rationally, explaining everything honestly and thoroughly, but the lack of passion for her is slightly chilling. She means nothing to him.

He’s also young enough to have the delusion that he’s going to change the world. Only when you’re in your early 20s are you arrogant enough to think that you’re bringing something fresh to your art and that you’re going to change things. And then a few years later you realise what an insufferable twat you are. But maybe, in the end, after his final performance, his arrogance is justified...

But it might not just be the arrogance of youth that’s at work with Neiman. There’s a hint or two that he might have Asperger’s or some other behavioral disorder. His girlfriend, at one point, notes that he doesn’t look the actors in the face when he goes to the movies. He’s also incredibly compulsive and trains so much that he rips his hands apart. And then in another scene, where he forgets his drumsticks, he gets into a car crash but still drags himself to his band’s competition. This is obviously not normal behaviour. But still, it might be a little lazy to say that Neiman has some kind of disorder. This behaviour might just be indicative of him being an obsessive young man.

The meat of the film revolves around Neiman and his relationship with Terence Fletcher (J. K. Simmons). Fletcher is firmly in the Sergeant Hartman mould. He intimidates his students, he curses at them and sometimes he even physically assaults them. He’s a horrible, wretched human being, but I can still understand the relationship Neiman has with him. He basically becomes a surrogate father. Neiman constantly wants approval from him.

That approval is almost impossible to obtain. Fletcher’s standards are scarily high and nothing short of being the next Charlie Parker will please him. But for an obsessive young man, this makes his approval far more meaningful. He’s like a kid with an abusive parent. The abused kid might get yelled at for any little thing, but any show of affection is more meaningful for it. It’s a completely wrong way of thinking, but I understand where it comes from. If approval is harder to come by, it somehow has a higher value. If you finally do get a ‘well done’ or a pat on the head or a nod of approval, you feel like a million bucks - you had to work really hard for it. For example, for Neiman, the love he gets from his father is easy and therefore, to him, cheap and meaningless. But Fletcher is giving nothing away. He even admits that there is nothing more harmful than saying ‘good job’.

To a certain degree, he might have a point. Praise should be hard earned but it shouldn’t be this hard earned. Fletcher is borderline psychopathic. In Neiman’s first class he bullies and bamboozles a kid into quitting his band just because he’s fat. A nice guy Fletcher is not.

It’s no wonder that there aren’t any women in Fletcher’s band. They wouldn’t put up with this kind of shabby treatment. But the guys eat it up and ask for more. One of the most amazing aspects of the film is the musical chairs that Fletcher plays for the seat on the drums. At one point Fletcher has three different guys vying for the place and spends hours torturing them in order to find his number one. How anyone can put up with that kind of abuse, I don’t know, but young guys can be stupid and easily manipulated.

What endpoint Fletcher has in mind, I’m not sure, but at one point he admits that he’s looking for the next Charlie Parker. So that suggests that he’s going to keep pushing and pushing and pushing until he eventually finds someone worthy.

The power struggle that drives the film culminates, like a sports movie, with a final performance. Neiman has been responsible for getting Fletcher fired from his teaching position, but still, like a moth to the flame, Neiman is drawn back to his old mentor. Fletcher recruits him for his new band. When Neiman gets there he has to perform a piece he’s never played before - he’s been set-up and flounders horribly before exiting the stage with his tail between his legs, much to Fletcher’s amusement.

Backstage, he gets hugs from his father, but this embrace doesn’t console him. He charges back onto stage and begins playing. With Fletcher fuming, he begins a new song and shows what he can do. But this is just an appetizer. After this he begins a frantic drum solo which eventually leads into the next song. Fletcher’s anger turns to interest. Neiman is finally ascending into that far off realm - Fletcher is impressed by his playing and the film ends with the two of them in harmony.

I’m not quite sure what to think of the ending. On the one hand, Neiman’s hard work and dedication is finally paying off. But at the same time, is this an endorsement of these teaching methods? The only way to become great is to be treated like absolute crap? I don’t think it’s quite that simple, but it’s certainly open for debate. I personally think that you don’t have to frighten and intimidate to get the best out of people, but at the same time, sometimes it works. Look at someone like Alex Ferguson (former manager of Manchester United). He would bully and intimidate his players. He would famously give them the ‘hair dryer’ treatment - shouting in their faces with such ferocity that it was like turning on a hair dryer. And he got amazing results from his players. He dragged some sub-standard squads to glory - teams that would flounder under different management. So there’s something to be said for this kind of teaching, but it’s certainly not the only way.

Regardless, the film is a powerhouse. The performances are amazing, the writing and direction are excellent and the music is superb. Well, superb for jazz. We all know that jazz is the lowest form of art. But here it’s actually tolerable. But I have to point this out again. Fuck me, these jazz bastards are uptight. Like, really, really, really uptight.

Thank the cinematic gods for pluralisation. ‘Oh, what’s that? Alien only had one critter? Well, let’s slap an ‘s’ on the end of the title and have hundreds of the motherfuckers. It’ll be great.’ And indeed it is.

Diehard fans of Alien may bemoan the different approach that Cameron takes – lots of guns and the Aliens themselves reduced to bugs to be blown to pieces by machinegun fire – but the film is true to Scott’s original while taking it in a new direction. It’s a perfect sequel.

The fidelity to the original includes the creepy atmosphere and the slow build-up, but this film has more action and more of an emotional pull. Indeed, it’s the relationship between Ripley and Newt that elevates it to something more than just an excellent action film.

The final act, which sees Ripley head off alone into the Alien nest in order to rescue what has become her surrogate daughter, has a whiff of absurdity to it. Skinny woman with a massive gun and flamethrower attached to her and she’s going to kick butt? Yeah, right. But because Sigourney Weaver and James Cameron play it so straight, and because you’ve become so attached to the characters over the course of the film, it seems like the only thing that could happen. You totally believe in Ripley. This is something she just has to do.

And it helps that there are no attempts to indulge in empty grandstanding. This is just a simple case of a mother going into hell to rescue her daughter. And as everyone knows, there’s nothing in the world you should fear more than a woman who’s trying to get her child back. Mothers are tougher than any Alien Queen, a point illustrated by the fabulous moment when Ripley burns the Alien Queen’s eggs. There Ripley is, just trying to get Newt back to safety. She’s happy to leave the Aliens alone. But then one of the eggs opens, and with a fantastic look from Ripley, one that says she’s going to kick the everloving shit out of you, she lets rip with the flamethrower. She burns the eggs, she shoots the Aliens and fires grenades at the Alien Queen. It’s a phenomenally good scene – aside from crackwhores and morbidly obese shut-ins, I believe any mother in the world would do this for their kid; they’d go into an Alien nest, rescue their child and fuck it up bad if any pissant motherfucker had the temerity to try and fuck with them. You just don’t fuck with a mum and her kid.

But back to grandstanding, one could argue that the ‘Get away from her you bitch!’ moment is an example of empty of grandstanding. But I’d strongly disagree with that. That moment is so iconic because of the sincerity of Weaver’s delivery and the truth inherent in the line – don’t stand between a mother and her child. But fair enough, it’s also iconic because the power loader is so damn cool.

However, the bond between Ripley and Newt was less explicit in the original theatrical version. But in the Special Edition we get a great scene where we find out, because she spent so much time drifting through space in hypersleep after surviving the Nostromo, that Ripley’s real child has died as an old woman. It’s a great little scene and gives more depth to the relationship between Ripley and Newt. I’m kind of baffled as to why it was cut out.

However, other stuff in the Special Edition doesn’t fare quite as well. The least successful inclusion is the scene on the colony where we see Newt’s parents find the derelict alien ship from the first film. It’s kind of pointless and it’s not particularly well filmed or acted – I can easily see why it was cut out. And plus, part of the joy of Aliens was not knowing exactly what happened on the colony. It was creepier when we could try and imagine it ourselves.

I’m also not a huge fan of the sentry gun sequences. Most people tend to love them, thinking they add to the tension. But to me they only seem to highlight the budgetary restrictions. You seem to see the same bit of footage of an Alien exploding over and over again. Plus, for me, there was greater tension when you saw less of the Aliens. The longer you have to wait for the attack, the bigger the pay-off because you’ve been wound up that little bit more.

But although the big attack where the Aliens come crashing through the ceiling is magnificent, I prefer the first encounter; the one where the cocky Marines are slaughtered in the hive. What makes the scene so fantastic is the way Cameron uses the Marines' cameras, the ones they have strapped to them, to add to the confusion of the attack. It makes it even more visceral - we see a lot of the action take place on a series of monitors.

But this use of monitor footage also serves as a nod to Alien. When Dallas and his crew head off to the derelict ship this technique is used to build tension. But Aliens takes the concept that little bit further.

Another concept in Alien that is developed by Cameron is the use of the motion trackers. Scott used it briefly in the scene where Dallas is killed, but here it’s a main feature of the film. It’s used all the time. And again it’s incredibly effective. It’s a tool that’s meant to help the Marines, a piece of technology that helps them do their job better, but it only makes them more paranoid and confused. They can rarely see their enemy. And even when they think they know where the Aliens are coming from, things are turned upside down because the Aliens will come crashing through the ceiling instead of through the door like they expect.

And it’s this unseen enemy, and the Marines' cockiness, that makes it feel like a Vietnam War film. The Marines start off with complete confidence and then are gradually broken down by an enemy that is less well equipped but that can adapt to its environment better.

But although the militaristic aspect of the film is always going to be reminiscent of Vietnam, it also feels a bit like a Western. The Marines keep getting attacked and they’re gradually running out of ammunition. It’s like the Indians are storming the fort – they can only be repelled for so long. But in that way it also feels a bit like the film Zulu – superior numbers will eventually wear down a well equipped force with fewer bodies.

However, going back to the way that Cameron builds upon the ideas that were started in Alien, I love the use of Bishop in the film. After Ash in the first film, we maybe expect another unhinged robot or at very least a company stooge. And at the beginning Ripley treats him like shit. But after hinting that he might be another android psycho, he turns out to be heroic. And it’s a lovely moment when Ripley finally tells Bishop that he did well. In a film that is relentlessly violent, it’s nice to have a moment that has such warmth.

A much smaller nod to Alien that I like is the use of a countdown at the end. With the reactor about to explode we’re told how long Ripley has to reach a minimum safe distance. It raises the stakes even higher when Ripley has to save Newt – not only does Ripley have to save her daughter from the Aliens but she has to do it before everything is blown to shit.

Aside from building on the concepts started in the first film, another one of Cameron’s strengths is creating memorable characters. No one gets lost in the mix. All the grunts stand out. My personal favourite is Hudson (Bill Paxton), the whinging scaredy cat who eventually grows a massive set of balls and kicks some serious Alien butt before being killed. Every line he utters is a work of genius. Then there’s Vasquez. I don’t know what it is about Cameron, but he always seems to be able to create believably tough female characters. Therefore it doesn’t ring untrue when she kicks an Alien in the head and shoots it in the face. You believe this woman is capable of doing this. And of course, then there’s Hicks. He’s probably the toughest Marine, but there’s also a sexual undercurrent between him and Ripley. Thankfully there’s no explicit romance in the film, but with the way that Hicks shows her how to use a gun and with the tracker he gives her, quipping that it doesn’t mean they’re engaged, you know it’s on the cards. And at the end Ripley, Newt and Hicks are like a small family. Again it’s another reason why the film works so well – you believe in the emotional connection between the characters.

But smaller characters stand out as well. Drake and the Sergeant are great in what limited time they have, and I love Gorman, the poindexter turned good. And then there’s Burke, who proves that a greedy company man will always be worse than an acid-drooling monster.