There’s a moment early on in the Robert Rodriguez-produced, Nimrod Antal-directed reboot/sequel/spin-off/whatever “Predators,” when Royce (Adrien Brody), a hardened mercenary, frees nerdy doctor Edwin (Topher Grace) from a tree. The two men, along with some other men (among them Danny Trejo, Walton Goggins, and Louis Ozawa Changchien) and one woman (Alice Braga), have been abducted and dropped via parachute into a mysterious jungle terrain. Edwin is strung up in his parachute. Royce simply shoots down the limb that he’s dangling from. The other survivors stare at Royce. “I got tired of waiting,” is Royce’s reply.
And in a way, this philosophy of smashing aggressiveness over nuance or thoughtfulness lies at the heart of “Predators.” There’s constantly so much stuff going on that there isn’t much time to slow down and focus on the intricacies of the characters, situation or plot. In a way, this is one of the movie’s biggest assets since it doesn’t allow the audience (or reviewer) to contemplate why exactly any of the stuff that’s happening, or how it’s happening logistically, since some other big moment of over-sized kick-assery is looming just around the corner.
While this may sound like a bad thing, it’s not; it’s economic and resourceful from a narrative standpoint and fully acknowledges that the filmmakers know exactly what kind of movie it is (even if there is an offbeat, Oscar-winning actor in the cast).
“Predators” frames itself as a direct sequel to John McTiernan’s masterful 1987 sci-fi/action hybrid. At one point they even mention the events of the first film, totally skipping over anything to do with its so-so sequel, 1990’s “Predator 2,” or either of the lousy “Alien vs Predator” movies. Instead of a ruthless alien predator coming to earth to hunt the most dangerous game (people) like in the first movie, the aliens abduct a bunch of human “predators” (the aforementioned mercenary, various army guys, a serial killer, yakuza enforcer, etc.) and drop them into a hostile alien environment, which may or may not be the predator home world (probably not).
Our human characters, each with their own ruthless M.O., get to know each other and then figure out their situation: they are being chased and hunted by the maw-mouthed, invisibility-cloaked, laser-loving creatures.
This is a nifty premise with echoes not only of the original film but of other “men on the run”-type chase movies like Cornel Wilde’s “The Naked Prey” and Mel Gibson’s berserk “Apocalypto.” It also serves as a fun riff on America’s obsession with alien abductions, which will undoubtedly cause audiences to ponder whether getting anally probed or hunted for sport is a worse consequence of alien abduction.
The fun of the movie, of course, is watching the ways in which the alien hunters fuck with our human characters, led by Brody’s affably off-kilter lead. The movie is lean, plot-wise, relying on a series of action/suspense set pieces that are only tenuously linked together. At some point Lawrence Fishburne shows up for a hot minute as a killer who has survived for a decade on the brutal alien world. This is a wonderfully whacked-out little interlude with Fishburne committing to full-on crazy, but it feels more like an expository lull than an actual story beat.
Amazingly, despite this all-killer, no-filler structure (or lack thereof), the movie never feels loose or strung together. Sure, there are a few choppy moments, but these are mostly when the film pauses to partake in some macho male bonding moments that do little to move the story forward but does offer some relief from the movie’s relentless pacing. You just wish that these quieter moments could have better served the characters, since they’re all so damn cool. But this is a movie in which actions speak much, much louder than words and characters are defined more by their physical properties and abilities, a la McTiernan’s “13th Warrior,” than dialogue or drama. When the stylish yakuza guy picks up the ancient samurai sword, you’re pretty sure what’ll come next.
Antal, who previously directed the subway-set thriller “Kontroll” in Hungary before moving on to above-average studio fare “Vacancy” and “Armored,” films the action beautifully, often employing long, swooping shots that orient us geographically in a way that most modern action directors shy away from. Rodriguez, who wrote a version of “Predators” way back in 1994, has taken on more of an advisory role here, which is great news because Antal’s distinctive visual style remains intact, straying far from Rodriguez’s singularly shoot-on-the-fly style. The movie appears to have been shot on a budget, but Antal and his Hungarian cinematographer Gyula Pados do a lot with little, giving the movie an expansive feel thanks to some on-location shooting (in Hawaii and Austin) and well-placed digital matte paintings.
It’s the motor of the story, though, the man vs. nature vs. dread-locked alien beasts hook, that keeps things churning along. Well, that and the wonderfully retro, pulse-pounding score by John Debney (fully acknowledging and occasionally borrowing from Alan Silvestri’s work on the original). The movie is fun, and not in the strained, test-marketed-to-death way that “The A-Team” was supposed to be. There’s something genuinely joyful about “Predators,” about the slime and the blood and the stellar reveals and twists that seem to have come from some yellowed paperback crime novel. The biggest thing Rodriguez brought to the project seems to have been a sense of freedom: both geographically and financially distanced from big studio Fox, he and his collaborators have made a vividly entertaining midnight movie that, we imagine, will be an absolute hoot with a packed, sun-baked crowd this weekend. It may not be high art, but it is a genuinely good time, and sometimes that works just as well. [B+]
