Predators – Movie Review
Alright. Here we have the attempt to sort of revive something. I don’t count the ‘Aliens VS Predator’ movies as real ‘Predator’ movies. So for me the Predator 2 movie was the last real Predator movie. But that only my opinion. There was a lot of buzz on the internet prior to the announcement of the new movie and it got my attention right away. The guy who placed an ‘Alien’ head in the Predator ship at the end of Predator 2 must have been a genius. I really dig the design they established with the earlier movies and wanted to see more of that gritty sort of action movie style… with a touch of ugly faced alien.
I don’t have to say much about the story since it’s pretty much the same like in the Schwarzenegger movie. Some mercenary soldiers and other special characters of human society get shipped onto an alien planet and find out that they’re the prey for some hunting game practiced evil ugly aliens.
The overall casting reveals a very interesting mixture and all of the folks do their job nice. Topher Grace for example plays a good part in not revealing his true nature until the end of the movie. I didn’t really saw that coming for his character. Alice Braga does a nice job too in playing an isreali army sniper. Nonetheless the events that make her characters skills pop out seem a bit constructed. The other main guy is played by Adrien Brody. I was very excited for his part. He’s not exactly the type of guy/actor you would think could take such a soldier role. And again he surprised me by playing the badass in this movie. It may not be the most amazing performance but he plays believable. I guess he makes the best off of the script they had. His character is not necessarily the most likable but he definitely carries the movie. The Laurence Fishburne part was pretty unnecessary from my point of view. And Danny Trejo dies far to early.
The movie has some weird issues though. More than one time you see our heroes wander through the thickest rainforest and a few scenes later they’re in a totally different kind of forest with different sorts of trees and everything. Another example is that in one scene you have the ultimate dust storm in a pretty much no vegetation scene and one minute later they’re in a field of grass with lush trees in the background. I mean ok it’s an alien planet but that cannot be an excuse.
The VFX aren’t really amazing too. For a high profile production like this one, parts of the VFX are pretty weak. The only thing i found really nice was the integration of the alien dog things into the live footage. That worked amazingly well in an early ambush scene. Aside of that things could have been better. Especially the planet environment could have been a little bit more alien to really sell it. And by that i really don’t mean ‘Avatar’ like. Everything just looked too familiar.
Beside its prominent weaknesses it really was entertaining. The movie has a nice pacing from my point of view. It also creates some thrilling events when our heroes become trapped or ambushed. Good stuff.
A 7.4/10 from me.
