Get to da chopper!!!

Right time to trawl back in time for another review and this one one of the classic 1980s action films, the sci-fi thriller, Predator, which was on its release not very well received but since then it has gained praise from critics as a suspensful action thriller.  So let's start with the usual stuff...

Right let's get the plot stuff under way (as I usually do) as the film begins in Central America, where Major "Dutch" Schaefer arrives with his elite force team, and he is given the mission to rescue a presidential cabinet minister who has been abducted by guerillas.  Dutch is also accompanied by an old friend of his, Dillon (Carl Weathers) a former military man, who now works for the CIA.  Dutch and his men are dropped in the jungle where they start their hunt and they soon come across the wreckage of a crashed helicopter.  They also find the dead bodies which have been hung upside down with their skin removed, and Dutch finds the tags of a soldier named Jim Hopper, who Dutch knew from his military days.  Later on the men soon find the guerilla base, which they storm and kill the soldiers and capture a woman, named Anna (Elpidia Carrillo).  Dutch is enraged when he finds out that there was no cabinet minister and it was a set up by Dillon, who reveals it was his men that were in the chopper that got hit, and that he was ordered to go in and find out who killed his team.  As the team make their way towards their extraction point, they are watched by an unknown creature up in the trees, which uses thermal imaging to track them.

As Dutch's team move deeper into the jungle, one of Dutch's men, Billy (Sonny Landham) is aware of something watching them in the trees, but he can't see it, after he shrugs it off, Anna tries to escape, and one of the team, Hawkins (Shane Black) chases after her.  When Hawkins catches up with Anna, the unknown creature, arrives out of the blue in camoflauge and stabs him and drags his body away, leaving Anna unharmed.  Dutch orders his team to search for Hawkins, however as they look around, one of the men, Blain (Jesse Ventura) is killed by the creature.  Another one of the team, Mac (Bill Duke) witnesses the camoflaged creature stand over Blain, and then runs off when Mac opens fire with Blain's minigun, and Dutch and the others soon arrive they open fire on the surrounding forest area, but there is no sign of the creature afterward.  Later that night, Dutch has his men set trip wires to detect any movement from the creature, and they have also put Blain in a body bag.  However one of their trip wires is set off and Mac is attacked by a wild boar, which he kills with his knife, but as the men arrive they look around and see that Blain's body is gone.

The next day Dutch realises that the creature, is hunting them like a Predator (I'll call him that from now on!) and is using the trees for cover.  Dutch forces Anna to tell them what she knows, and she tells them that it uses the trees to camoflauge itself and the predator always attacks during the hot summers in the jungle, and also that when Mac opened fire on the predator, there was luminous green blood on the trees.  Anna also says that the Predator likes to hunt for sport and in the past they often found men skinned and even worse, and the locals said it was "the demon who makes trophies of men".  Dutch then has his men set another trap using trip wires camoflauged with leaves and also a large net to capture the predator.  Soon enough the predator takes the bait as it is captured in the net, but it uses its laser weapon to free itself, and in the process, a large log of wood crashes down, hitting one of the team, Poncho (Richard Chaves) in the chest, leaving him badly wounded.  Mac, now almost deranged goes off after the Predator, and Dillon follows him, telling Dutch to go to the extraction point.  However soon enough the Predator tracks both Mac and Dillon and kills them both, and as Dutch hears Dillon's cries from far away, Billy drops his gun and makes a stand against the Predator, while Dutch struggles on with Poncho and Anna.  Soon enough we hear Billy's final screams as he too is bumped off by the Predator, who soon catches up with Dutch, and kills Poncho, and shoots Dutch in the arm.  Dutch yells to Anna to "GET TO DA CHOPPER!!!" and he runs for his life, as the Predator bares down on him, he slips into waterfall and into the waters below.

As Dutch wearily swims to the shore, he slumps face down in the muddy shore, when there is a splash noise and the Predator slowly emerges from the water.  However now that Dutch is covered in mud, its disguises his heat signature from the Predator who can no longer see him, and moves off elsewhere.  Dutch later on sets a series of traps, makes up weapons, and covers his body in more mud and lights a torch, and gives a big war cry to altert the Preadtor as the two of them prepare to do battle for the last time.

(PLOT STUFF OVER)

Although it wasn't that well received when it came out, Predator has deservedly gained a better reputation as a film as time has passed.  As an action film it is terrific, and there are plenty of suspenseful set pieces, especially once the Predator starts to hunt down the men in the jungle.  John McTiernan, who is no stranger to action films, does a great job here as he sets the perfect pace for the film with plenty of explosions and gunfire at the start of the film, and as things progress and we get deeper into the jungle, it all becomes more tense and claustrophobic.   

And undoubtedly one of the best things about the film is the Predator itself, as it really is one of the best sci-fi baddies in the modern cinema.  The Predator in many ways is one of the most formidable and fearsome enemies in any film, especially with its ability to disguise itself, and also the brilliant and rather creepy use of thermal imaging throughout and the terrific sound effects used for the Predator's heartbeat also add to unease of the film.  Its also an interesting enemy, as unlike for example the aliens from the Alien franchise, which basically just shags and kills, it hunts and kills for sport, yet the Predator will not kill unarmed people.  As Dutch at one point realises in the film, as Anna is about to pick up a gun, he tells her not to as it didn't kill before as she wasn't armed, and he says "no sport!".  So the Predator to a lesser extent is something of a moralistic antagonist, as it does have a sense of respect to its foes, as it shows to Dutch at the end as it challenges him in hand to hand combat, rather than just kill him.  The Predator's behaviour and attitudes would later be expanded on further in the underrated sequel Predator 2, and of course we all know what followed from there.

As for the cast, well things are pretty good here, and Arnold Schwarzenegger puts in a pretty good performance as Dutch, who he plays largely just straight laced and serious but he also get's some great dialogue.  Two of my favourites that spring to mind are of course, the aforementioned "Go, get to da chopper!" and of course the moment in the film where the Predator finally takes its mask off, reveals its rather ugly features, Dutch grimaces and says "you are one ugly motherfucker!".  Another memorable line he has is when Anna tells him that the Preadtor's blood was on the leaves, and he says "if it bleeds, we can kill it".  Carl Weather also puts in a fine performance as the duplicitous Dillon, and clearly he shows he has some pretty good acting chops, and its quite an amusing moment when he is about to drop in the jungle with Dutch and he says "I never knew how much I missed this, Dutch!" and Dutch replies "you never were that smart!".

The fine supporting cast also includes Bill Duke as Mac, who was previously seen in another Arnie action flick, Commando, and here he plays a hardened soldier as well as you can expect, given he has that rather stern demeanour.  Duke has some pretty good moments in the film, especially when he starts to lose it, chasing after the Predator, he sings a few lines from "Long tall Sally", and he repeats "I'm gonna have me some fun tonight!" over and over.  I also liked the moment where he quietly says to Dillon to come over to him, and he says to "turn around", when he puts his knife on Dillon's shoulder, who spins around to see Mac has stabbed a scorpion which was crawling up his back, Dillon says thanks, and Mac replies quietly "any time!".  And also another amusing moment is where he gently grazes a razor on his cheeks, but when he waits for the Preadtor to fall into their trap, he presses down too hard and we see blood start to appear from his cheek and the razor breaks.

Jesse Ventura is also quite amusing as the veteran soldier, Blain, and good friend of Mac, and Ventura himself was in fact a professional wrestler, and later a politician.  Ventura's best line in the film comes when he is on board the chopper just before they get dropped into the jungle, and he says to the others who won't take what he is eating: "there's a bunch of slack jawed faggots around here! This goddamn stuff will make a sexual tyranosaurus, just like me!".  And even though I haven't really mentioned Richard Chaves or Elpidia Carrillo at all, who are actually both fine in their performances as Poncho and Anna respectively, I thought I would quickly give them a mention.  Which finally brings me onto Shane Black as Hawkins, who is noteworthy as he at the time had written the screenplay for Lethal Weapon, and would later go on to write further screenplays for movies such as The Last Boy Scout and Kiss kiss bang bang.  Shane get's some funny lines in the film as well, which probably no doubt he had a hand in writing, as he tells some rude jokes about his girlfriend having a big pussy, "You know I'd like a little pussy" he says to his girlfriend who replies "me too, mine is big as a house!".

But the main star of the cast, next to Arnie is of course, Kevin Peter Hall as the Predator, who does a brilliant job as the main baddie of the film.  At 7 foot and 2 inches in height, Hall was without a doubt the best choice for the role, and he does a great physical job in potraying the predator, in what was apparently a very heavy body suit which weighed about 200 pounds!  Hall himself briefly appears in a small role as the chopper pilot at the end of the film which circles the jungle when they try to find Dutch below.  Hall later sadly died in 1991 just at the age of 35 due to contracting AIDS from a blood transfusion, not too long after the release of Predator 2.  

In terms of the production as I've already mentioned John McTiernan, but I also think that Stan Winston also deserves special credit as his design work for the Predator is just terrific, and with the Preadtor's rather grotesque features, he created a terrific alien, as well as the design of Predator's mask, body armour and dreadlocks!  Also worthy of mention is Alan Silvestri's score, which for the most part is quite good, although he is guilty of doing that thing he does in his film scores, where he overuses dramatic music passages that rise in pitch all the time!  But the title theme he does for the film is quite a memorable one.

So that's it for my look at Predator, which remains a great sci-fi action classic for its time and is well worth a watch, and it stands for me also as one of Arnie's best films.

And with that I shall bid ye farewell.

Oh and as a last thought on this post, its good to finally get something on Predator in this blog, given the cover photo of this blog! And its partner is coming up next!

Ciao the now!