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Predators review

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Mon, 12 Jul 2010 10:21a.m.

Oleg Taktarov in Predators

Oleg Taktarov in Predators

Reviewed by Daniel Rutledge

Producer Robert Rodriquez has been working on this for about fifteen years, saying he wanted to make Predators to Predator what Aliens is to Alien. He’s certainly failed in making something as classic as Aliens, but he’s succeeded in making a fairly entertaining sci-fi action flick that is the best Predator film since the original.

The great opening scene is fantastic. It has Adrien Brody, who plays a hardened mercenary, falling from the sky. His chute opens, he lands in a jungle, before other soldiers and killers from all over Earth land around him.

Sure enough, it turns out these unlucky humans have been captured by the dreadlocked extra-terrestrial headhunters made famous with Arnie in 1987 and dropped from an aircraft onto a game reserve planet. The humans have to discover what it is hunting them and then quickly develop ways of killing their hunters in order to survive.

This is a great B-grade action idea and the first half of the movie is riveting. There are other fun bits and a few brilliant kills, but there are a few things that go wrong and kind of mess it up.

Laurence Fishburne’s character is beyond ridiculous, he overacts so much it’s a joke. But his bits aren’t as stupid as when the Yakuza guy goes all Samurai, which is unintentionally hilarious. There are other smaller things that are just a bit lame here and there which let things down.

None of the action scenes are amazing enough to fully forgive the film’s daft moments, but it’s still great three star fun and should wash that awful AVP taste out of fan’s mouths. Here’s looking forward to Ridley Scott’s upcoming Alien prequel to complete the job.

     Predators
:: Director: Nimród Antal
:: Starring: Adrien Brody, Alice Braga, Topher Grace, Danny Trejo, Laurence Fishburne, Derek Mears
:: Running Time: 108 mins
:: Rating:  R16 - Contains Violence & Offensive Language
:: Release Date: July 8, 2010
:: Links: Trailer

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Comments

12 Jul 2010 12:16p.m.

SDC wrote:

I agree with most of your review, except I would say you were probably kinder to the new movie than it deserves. Predators has a very poor storyline, full of inconsistancies, interspersed in an almost random fashion with replicated scenes from the original movie that had little or nothing to do with the flow of the almost non existant story line.
With the exception of Alice Braga whose performance holds the only glimmer of hope for this movie, the characters and their interaction are wooden and easily forgetable.
To summarize I would say, if this movie had been released in 1987 in place of the original movie, the word predator in the context of movies would be meaningless to most people and it would have resided on the back shelf in the video store later to be sold off in the 99 cent bargain bucket, and would surely have never made it to the movie theaters.

12 Jul 2010 11:46a.m.

dave wrote:

I thought the new "Predators" movie sucked. As for the alien vs pred I, I thought it was great, the II was so so but still very entertaining..but when i left the theater of predators i was like what a waste... there was some neat ideas they couldve expanded on, ran with but to me the first hour was slow and boring and was predictable. For instance, when the mexican was yelling for help i knew it was a trap as well, but also knew they'd put a bullit in his head when the doctor kid (eric forman of that 70's show) asked what else can we do, i said aloud in the theatre put a bullit in his head... Just to predictable..
when we finally got to the predators in action they were boring... at least in predator II they interacted in everyday life like the subways, rooftops, making it fun since its stuff you wouldnt expect. On this game preserve it was just boring. And what is with the two different predators at war with each other... interesting direction in the story of the predators but they just didnt expand enough on it...
Did the guys that directed alien vs pred I do the directing on this one???
To me it was a waste of $7.50 ticket price and I wouldve been more entertained had I watched despicable me instead....