Alien VS. Predator

8/15/04 - Review

The two most dangerous creatures in the galaxy are about to do battle deep below the surface in frigid Antarctica. 

When wealthy industrialist Charles Bishop Weyland (Lance Henriksen) and his crack team discover a heat source deep within the ice of Antarctica they are anxious to see what is down there.  After a further review of the satellite findings, the heat seems to be related to an ancient pyramid-like structure.  Almost immediately, he sets up a team of archeologists and experts to embark on this fact finding mission, or “ground breaking history in the making.”  Weyland Yutani, the greedy corporation from the Alien films, gets the team together and world renowned guide, Lex Woods (Sanaa Lathan), to lead them.    

Upon arriving in Antarctica, the team learns this ancient pyramid has a mixture of three different cultures but that is where the intrigue stops.  After the pyramid walls start to realign themselves, the archeologists soon find themselves cut off from their colleagues.  The whole thing was a trap set by the Predators to lure humans into the structures only to have them sacrificed for the Aliens.  One by one, the humans are killed by Aliens and Predators alike and a small band of survivors remain.  To escape this pyramid of death, the human’s only chance of survival is to team up with the Predators and hopefully find a way out.  How ironic. 

Ever since these two iconic characters clashed in the Dark Horse comic books in the early 1990’s, fans have been waiting patiently for Aliens to go head to head with the Predators in a feature film.  Finally, after all these years, the fans got their wish. But was it worth the wait?  Probably not. 

When I first heard that Paul W.S. Anderson was on board as director, I cringed because his track record is very, very shaky.  I have to say that after seeing the movie that his directing was better than what I thought it would be.  I am hearing reports that Twentieth Century Fox came in and gutted the shit out of this movie to make it PG-13 for a “family-friendly” adventure.  I didn’t really have a problem with the rating of the movie, my biggest problem was everything else.  Though the movie doesn’t come close to comparing to any of the Alien or Predator movies, it is an entertaining popcorn flick. I never thought I would say popcorn flick and Alien in the same sentence. 

Let’s face it, at 87 minutes the movie definitely leaves us wanting more.  This is the shortest Alien movie by 20 minutes!  With that much time there is hardly any time for a real setup or any major character development.  The movie wants to get us to the Pyramid as quickly as possible.  Once we get there, the movie is non stop action, albeit sometimes cheesy action with a bunch of clichés and off the wall one liners.  The movie feels way too short so hopefully there will be an extended DVD release. Who the hell though that 87 minutes would be a good running time?  Hell, Anchorman was longer than that. 

The action sequences were fairly well done including some cool Alien and. Predator fight scenes.  I dropped my jaw in amazement as a single Alien took out two Predators. Here I was backing the Predator for the last several months and two of them die in two minutes.  The Queen made an appearance as well though she can’t really compare to the Queen in Aliens.  The Predators looked good and loved the background on them we got when Anderson took us on board the Predator ship.  I was hoping to have a look at how the Predator operates and I did get that.  Call it what you will but there was a Matrix-esque shot of two leaping face huggers.  I thought it looked neat but I heard some laughs coming from the theatre patrons. 

The only real character that gets any attention is Sanaa Lathan. Some of you will remember her from Out of Time with Denzel Washington.  Right away you can tell that she was copied right off of Ellen Ripley from the Alien series though she is really no match.  But hell, with 30 minutes left, she was the only one left.  I guess we have to root for somebody.

I was really disappointed with Lance Henriksen’s Bishop character.  Forget the story inconsistency; he was here to give us a friendly face from the Alien series.  He was underused and severely underdeveloped, but then the movie would have had to been five minutes longer.  What pissed me off is this guy is supposed to be the “face” of the greedy Weyland Yutani Corporation.  The same Corporation that could give a rat’s ass about the loss of human life as long as they get their precious Aliens for their bio-weapons division. It just seems that he was a bit too normal.

Problems with the movie?  Just name them because it is endless.  Plot holes and inconsistencies, lack of character development, PG-13, 87 minutes, and bad cheese, it just doesn’t end.  Plus I didn’t know that a face hugger takes only 15 minutes to gestate on a human, or even that an Alien grows to full adult status in the same amount of time.  I was kind of disappointed to see Anderson borrow, (steal), some of the same storylines from the comics and novels.  I knew that the Predators and Humans would team up.  You would have thought that in 15 years they could have come up with some new material.  

If you go in with low expectations, you’ll at least enjoy it.  Alien fans owe it to themselves to see it at least once.  But if you thought Alien3 or Resurrection were bad, you might think otherwise after this one.  One can only hope that James Cameron or Ridley Scott will return to end the Alien series on a positive note. 

In the end, Alien VS. Predator is another summer popcorn movie. I was expecting a lot from this movie and it really didn’t satisfy me. I found it entertaining nonetheless but as a fan, this movie could have been ten times better.  Sure I was hard on the movie but I am die hard fan of both series, especially Aliens and I expect a lot.  Though a sequel is up in the air, the ending alone makes this movie close on a high note.  Now I have to wait another six-seven years for another Alien movie. 

Grade

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