ALIEN VS PREDATOR
RATING: 5/10
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PLOT:
An underground pyramid has been discovered in Antartica and a team of
no-name
actors pretending to be characters that nobody cares about, head down to
see
what all the fuss is about. What they quickly find out is that they are in
the
middle of a sparring match between aliens and predators, two awesome
killers
from other, better movies. The battle between the extra-terrestrials
begins as
the humans take cover...and get slaughtered.
CRITIQUE:
First of all, a big "booooooooo" to Fox studios for hiding this film from
the
press before its opening. We're very rarely not given the chance to review
a
movie before it opens and it's usually because the studio believes the
film to
be a monster size crap-- so thanks for lowering that bar. That said, this
highly anticipated movie didn't turn out to be as great as I hoped it
might,
but also didn't turn out to be as bad as it could have either. It's
basically a
"blah" entry into the ALIEN and PREDATOR franchise list, most likely due
to the
studio's decision to rate it PG-13 and to clip from it, everything that
would
make an ALIEN and PREDATOR movie an ALIEN and PREDATOR movie, so that more
13-year olds can go watch a lot of people getting killed...well, watch a
lot of
people about to get killed, and then see the camera pan away. Another
example
of this is when a character in the film pays homage to Arnie's classic
line
from the original PREDATOR, but instead of completing their thought, says
only:
"You're one ugly motherf---" before being cut off. I guess they figure
teenagers have never heard the word "motherfucker" before. Friggin' MPAA.
The
one really great thing about this flick is (and thank God for that!) the
actual
aliens and predators. These friggin' beasts rule! Why the film spends
about an
hour or so building up to them, and then only half and hour with them, is
beyond my meek comprehension, but when we do get to see the aliens scrap
it out
with the predators, it's a barrel of sci-fi fun!
If only we didn't have to sit through moronic dialogue pieces about the
"Hunter's moon", listen to a character we don't care about go on about his
sons
(we get it...you're a dad...I give a shit!) and sit through, what seemed
like,
endless shots of the predators looking into their electronic gadget suit's
tracking of "The Hive"...oops, I mean the underground pyramid. I've never
been
one to bash director Paul W.S. Anderson, but I found that a lot of this
film
reminded me of his previous directing gig, RESIDENT EVIL, only with a
lesser
hottie as the lead, lesser slick kills and lesser overall action. Of
course, no
one in their right mind should be going to see a movie entitled ALIEN VS
PREDATOR for character development, so why spend so much time on them
anyway? I
recently watched the original PREDATOR on DVD (it still comes through) and
within the film's first 10 minutes, they were all locked, stocked and in
the
jungle, ready to kick mighty ass. This movie rambled on for too long,
spent way
too much time in the dark and started off with an action sequence that
barely
showed any of the action (there's quick cuts and then there's cutting a
scene
to the point of not being able to identify anything in it) Thankfully,
some of
the film's later fight sequences kicked ass, particularly the big one
between
the two beasts (although I had already seen it on the Net) and the final
confrontation. I also really liked the final shot of the movie, the quick
flashback background given to the predators/aliens' arrival on earth, as
well
as the lead character's trajectory nearing the end of the film (didn't see
that
coming) Lance Henricksen also provided a nice anchor to the story, the
special
effects were solid and not overdone and I loved the new predatorial
weapons
(but alas, they weren't used as much as they could have been)
That said, there were very few of the "kills" that I remember because the
camera cut away before we saw anything, nothing about the movie was scary
or
suspenseful and the lead actress had none of the charm, strength or bite
required for such a role. Sigh. Catch it on video so that you can
fast-forward
to the good parts and call it a life.
Where's JoBlo coming from?
The Chronicles of Riddick (7/10) - Event Horizon (5/10) - The Fly (8/10) -
Freddy vs Jason (5/10) - Pitch Black (7/10) - Predator (8/10) - Resident
Evil
(7/10) - Soldier (5/10)
Review Date: August 13, 2004
Director: Paul W.S. Anderson
Writer: Paul W.S. Anderson
Producers: John Davis, Gordon Carroll, David Giler
Actors: Sanaa Lathan as Alexa Woods
Lance Henricksen as Charles Bishop Weyland
Raoul Bova as Sebastian de Rosa
Genre: Science-Fiction
Year of Release: 2004
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(c) 2004 Berge Garabedian
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X-RAMR-ID: 38459
X-Language: en
X-RT-ReviewID: 1309059
X-RT-TitleID: 1134655
X-RT-SourceID: 573
X-RT-AuthorID: 1021
X-RT-RatingText: 5/10
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