Predators Review

After spending 23 years out of the jungle, the Predator franchise is back to the roots that made it famous to begin with. Since the first film, the series has been taken to Antarctica, small town America, and wherever Predator 2 took place. Now we find ourselves with a new bunch of characters on a new planet. While Predators in one part refers to the alien species hunting our characters, it's also referring the people themselves. All of them are killers, some far more deadly than others, and they all have their own demons.

Jumping right into what I like and don't like about this movie, it has quite a few of the things I'm looking for on a dull Summer evening. Gory, humorous, fun, and compact entertainment in an air conditioned theatre. The film does have a bit of sluggish reveal, taking half an hour before revealing where the characters are, another ten minutes before we catch our first alien creature, and close to an hour in, we finally get our look at the title beast. The action sequences pick up the pace at times, and supply some bloody nice visual effects.

There are quite a few problems with the film, the first being that slow pace. In the middle, when Laurence Fishburn comes into the film, it stops dead cold. I could've lived without that ten minute segment. The characters lack anything that will allow you to empathize with them, as they're mostly murderers and psychopaths. It is occasionally funny watching them deal with each other, but you don't feel anything for them when they die. There's also a new kind of Predator that doesn't look a whole lot different from the old one, and it's not really necessary.

John Debney gets the musical score for the film completely wrong, occasionally not knowing if their in Hell or Candyland. The cinematography isn't great, but it doesn't give you any headaches. There's not a point in the film in which I feel like ripping the throat out of the cameraman, so I'll let that be. Overall, if you have already seen Toy Story 3 and don't want to see it again (I can't imagine why), this film will probably keep you tided over until Inception comes out on Friday.

B