More a high five to low six for me. My thoughts:

I really wanted to enjoy Life more than I did. I've been fascinated by monsters since as long as I can remember. The Gorgons, the Chimera, Shelob... Xenomorphs. I first saw Alien aged seven, back then the chest burst scene was just about the coolest thing ever and now some years later its still way up there.I wanted Life to be like one of those old shonky but cool Alien rip offs, Forbidden World or Titan Find say, on a big budget and big screen. And it has so much of the right stuff in place. Classic opening of a craft hurtling through star pricked space, broken by debris. Quality production design and cinematography lovely fluid camera-work. A name cast (Jake Gyllenhaal, Rebecca Ferguson, Hiroyuki Sanada and Ryan Reynolds are the mains) taking it all admirably seriously. A great monster that begins eerily beautiful and grows grotesque and menacing. Ample suspense. But the action just isn't very well constructed. In some vital moments it isn't clear where characters are, what they're doing and why things are happening. As if odd key moments are missing. Decidedly frustrating, especially when the visuals are so fine in many places. Also there's an unfortunate lack of gore to make up for this issue, with the grisliest stuff happening fairly early on instead of towards the end when it should for tension's sake. Kinda mediocre climax too, and eye rolling capper. A bust then? Well, not quite. It's sincere and gripping, never dull, and much of it is pretty cool. It's generally pleasingly old school. Quite suited to a boozy, low expectations Saturday night viewing. Just not so much an excited Saturday afternoon. Bah.