Review: Predators

[angelophile]

Just back from seeing Predators. No, not a Roman Polanski bio-pic, (topical!), but a sequel to the classic 80s sci-fi action movie.

So, what of Predators? What can I say? It's derivative, cliched, predictable and corny.

It's also probably the best sequel Hollywood's produced in the last ten years.

A bold statement, you may say. But what I mean by that is that Predators is the purest of any of the big Hollywood sequels that appear to be making the rounds at the moment. All across the board, 25 year old movie franchises are being revived, dusted off and given new treatments. Rocky. Terminator. Rambo. Die Hard. As 80s action stars' careers flag and studios run out of ideas, they're returning to their roots.

Predators is one such example. Taking the action movie franchise that's pushing 25 years old and giving it a dust off. However, unlike other recent revivals like Die Hard 4.0 or Terminator, what Predators really succeeds at is capturing the feel of the original. It doesn't feel the need to replace action sequences with overblown CGI and give everything the Michael Bay treatment. It's a sequel that could easily have been made in 1989. In that, it'll sit comfortably next to the previous two Predator movies and feel part of the same universe - something most revivals have horribly failed at.

Part of the reason Predators succeeds is the plain simple fact that they don't really try to add anything to the mix. The plot echoes the original movie - a ragtag group of heavily armed walking stereottypes are hunted through the jungle by invisible killers. There's a few twists along the way and a rollocking opening sequence, but rather than try and revolutionize or update the core concept, the director and creative team have kept it simple. Simple characters, simple plot, simple effects, straightforward action. By doing so they've basically recreated an 80s action movie in 2010.

There's a few misteps along the way. We're apparently meant to be rooting for one of the characters, despite them being revealed as being a serial rapist. Occasionally the dialogue slips from corny to outright laugh-out-loud cheesy, especially when delivered in Eastwood-esque rasps. The stereotyping and cliched characters do seem to be rather too stuck in the 80s - it's 2010, do we need the racial stereotyping? Sometimes Antal's and Rodriguez's determination to stay true to the original film means it slips from homage to repetition. And the major iconic shot from the trailer never actually materialized in the final movie.

However, where the original was a classy B-movie, Predators ably succeeds in bringing the thrills. Its characters are barely sketched, but anyone expecting more, despite a cast that includes Oscar winner Adrien Brody, Oscar nominee Laurence Fishburne, Alice Braga, Topher Grace and many other award winning character actors, from a B-movie has unrealistic expectations. What the characters do have is some snappy dialogue, despite the stereotyping. The action sequences are tight and often tense. Made for a relatively modest $40m the CGI's kept fairly minimal with costumes and animatronics, like the original, bringing the Predators to life. And it's fun to play the familiar game of trying to work out who in the cast is going to be the next to go.

So, if you go expecting to see a stripped-down and unpretentious B-movie packed with old-school action, characters and the feel of the original Predators movie and uncluttered by CGI or incoherent plotting, you're not going to be disappointed.

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