Review - The Predator

The Predator is the fourth movie in the Predator franchise, of which I've only seen the first film. That said however, I completely adore the first film and have only avoided the others so I didn't have that first film dragged down in my mind. Oh well, too late, here comes The Predator. The plot is honestly hard to remember, despite the fact that I saw it yesterday. I'm pretty sure it's about a Predator who comes to earth and then some science dudes try and analyse him and then there's another, bigger Predator who has Predator dogs and they kinda fight a bit and then in the middle of it there's some dudes who were on a bus who fight and runaway and fight the two Predators. If that sounds convoluted, that's kind of because it both is but also because it really doesn't matter because the plot is just a series of things happening that you have to sit there and accept. That's a damn shame when you consider how well structured the original film was but hey, you can't have everything. Or anything actually when it comes to this film.

Acting is another letdown here, with a pretty solid cast going to all kinds of waste. If you've seen the trailers, you may be surprised but there is actually a main character, that being Boyd Holbrook from Logan. He does a fine job but he isn't really at leading man level yet. It's just gruff voice with nothing behind it. Trevante Rhodes is a disappointment too, but he had a long way to fall after Moonlight. He played Chiron in the "Black" section of the film and was absolutely wonderful, playing a man with a tough facade but a sensitive heart. The Predator subverts that by just making him a tough guy, great job. There's another underwhelming performance from Jacob Tremblay, playing a kid with Aspergers who is just quite annoying. I'm going to run down a list of people who are here now because this is a big cast with a lost of waste: there's Sterling K Brown just shouting a lot, Keegan Michael Key making bad Mum jokes, Thomas Jane has tourettes and that's his character and Yvonne Strahovski is a wife character, pure and simple. Maybe worst treated of all is Olivia Munn. Now, I'll admit, Munn is an actress who I want to do well not because I think she's an amazing actress but because she's attractive and seems nice so watching a lot of The Predator was kind of uncomfortable. If you haven't heard about the actual sex predator briefly being in this film, look that up because that's rough too but inside the film, her character is forced to strip naked, falls off a bus in what is meant to be a comic moment and gets creepily hit on by every single one of the male soldiers. Her character has no depth either but I felt bad for her the most purely because of the awful stuff that keeps happening to her.

By this point of the review, I'm sure you're waiting to hear the thing that means the film isn't that bad, that there's something here that offers redemption. The sad truth is, there isn't much. When your film is an action comedy that isn't very funny and has poor action, what is there to celebrate? That fact is, The Predator is such a disappointment because of the pedigree behind it. Shane Black is one of the funniest writers and directors working today, winning my heart with classics like Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang and The Nice Guys and he was even in the original Predator so I was very excited to hear of his involvement but especially with the comedy, he just didn't bring it. In his films I mentioned before, the humour comes from smart, quippy characters throwing razor sharp dialogue between each other. Here, it's little comments after something dramatic happens or pratfalls and while those aren't inherently bad things, they're not done well here. That would be forgivable were the action any good, especially considering the action masterpiece that the original film is but it is not good action. It's all edited together sloppily and incredibly hard to tell what's happening between quick cuts and weird spurts of CG blood that only sometimes rise up into cool-ish gore. Maybe the only worthwhile thing that is carried across is that many of the scenes have a guy in an actual Predator suit and all that stuff looks really great. So you know, not a complete waste of time.

Despite coming out in September, The Predator epitomises the kind of movies we've had this summer. It is pretty much fine but it lacks a soul and is especially upsetting to me because of the prestige it had behind it and the legacy it shames. I cannot recommend this film at all really unless you enjoy being bored and a little upset, so I have to give it a