It’s raining F-bombs and turquoise-colored blood-goo in Predators, the sci-fi sequel that pits an insanely muscled Adrien Brody and his multiracial team of deadly malcontents against familiar dreadlocked aliens with giant fangs and nasty attitudes.
The movie’s not especially novel, but in this case that’s a good thing: Producer Robert Rodriguez‘s faithful reboot of the shopworn franchise succeeds as a profane, gory popcorn movie that restores some luster to the Predator name, which has suffered under the weight of increasingly silly movies that tarnished the memory of the 1987 original.
The action-packed saga, which opens Friday, kicks off with chaotic footage of Brody (Splice, The Pianist) free-falling through the air. He lands in the middle of a trial-by-elimination premise: Humans who have been parachuted into a mysterious game preserve must band together, fend off booby traps and try to figure out, as Topher Grace‘s doctor character says, “What the fuck is going on?”
The answer, once again, lurks in the jungle.
(Spoiler alert: Minor plot points follow.)
Laurence Fishburne stars as Noland, a veteran Predator hunter.
Photos: Rico Torres/20th Century Fox
Hungarian director Nimród Antal, who broke through with the strikingly claustrophobic Budapest subway thriller Kontroll, milks maximum suspense from Predators ‘ trapped-in-the-wilds predicament. As in Lost, many of Predators ‘ exterior shots were filmed in Hawaii.
Action sequences, underscored by composer John Debney‘s pleasingly old-fashioned orchestrations, often play to the same “now what?” reveals that made ABC’s long-running jungle drama so compelling. And though the script fails to generate any instant-classic, action-hero punch lines, writers Alex Litvak and Michael Finch wisely leaven the mood of impending dread with a regular infusion of tension-breaking wisecracks.
Before the inevitable alien splatterfest takes center stage, the R-rated Predators focuses on the bickering humans.
In a refreshing change of pace for Hollywood’s all-white-guys-all-the-time casting bias, the motley crew includes a Mexican thug (played by Danny Trejo), an Israeli sniper (Alice Braga), a Japanese Yakuza enforcer (Louis Ozawa Changchien), an African death-squad executioner (Mahershalalhashbaz Ali), a Russian soldier (Oleg Taktarov) and a white-trash serial killer (Walton Goggins).
It takes a while to to buy into the suddenly ham-biceped Brody as an action hero, but the Oscar-winning actor gets the job done as growling ex-military man Royce, who leads his badass crew through encounters with booby traps, rabid hunting beasts and hallucinating survivalist recluse (Laurence Fishburne).
The most formidable danger, of course, emanates from the Predators themselves. Created by KNB EFX Group, the alien hunters produce their cloaking effects and fire off plasma guns in classic style. Portrayed by Brian Steele, Carey Jones and 6-foot-5 Derek Mears (2009’s Friday the 13th), the trophy-taking extraterrestrial trackers show off classic Predator tech as well as new hunting skills. Plenty of slicing, dicing and decapitations ensue.
Predators ‘ final shot suggests the setup for a sequel, in which case we say: Let the 21st-century hunting games continue.
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WIRED Badass humans meet equally badass aliens.
TIRED We get it: The humans don’t get along with each other.
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