Since Piranha 3DD entered pre-production, almost every new announcement makes me more excited about it. We know from PBF’s review of the first that Piranha is not a watershed moment in cinema history, although I can’t say I’ve seen a 3D penis get eaten in any other movie.
Yesterday, it was announced that the resident batshit crazy man Gary Busey was joining the cast of the next chapter in the Piranha saga. He joins an already rounded cast including Danielle Panabaker (The Crazies), David Koechner (Anchorman), and Clu Gulager (it’s fucking Clu Gulager!). Let’s hope this is more a Feast reunion as opposed to a Feast 2 reunion with director John Gulager and writers Marcus Dunstan and Patrick Melton.
The one thing I am disappointed of is the release date: November 23, 2011. The piranha are back only this time at a water park. I am sure there will still be buckets of blood and gore and ample nudity but why release this at Thanksgiving? I understand the need not to rush things but this is a late summer type of movie through and through. Oh well. If they can squeeze in a Elizabeth Shue cameo, all will be forgiven.
When I first saw Scream in theaters with my dad almost fifteen years ago, I did not care for it. I can’t really say why but the first viewing did nothing for me; I didn’t hate it but I was mostly just ambivalent towards it. Later that year, Digger had a copy on VHS which I watched again and fell in love. Here was a horror movie that was not afraid to pull punches, was not bogged down in some ridiculous backstory (see the Halloween entry from the prior year), and had a sharp wit to it. Since then, Scream has been in constant rotation of the movies I randomly watch.
Mainstream horror in the mid-90s was not in a very good state. I’m sure there were plenty of indie or straight-to-video releases of whatever installment the Hellraiser or Puppet Master series were on but all of the big franchises were either completely finished or creatively drained. Scream came along to fill the void in a way that is still astonishing that it hadn’t been done before (at least not to the same degree of success). Featuring the script which started a bidding war in Hollywood by a new-comer and directed by a veteran (of mixed success) to the genre, Scream very well could have been quickly swept under the rug and died before registering with movie goers of all kinds. According to Box Office Mojo that almost was the case before positive word of mouth actually increased the box office take in its second week, a rare feat for any movie, let alone a horror film.
It is commendable that writer Kevin Williamson is able to create such a rich story on the backs of horror movie staples that predate the film by decades. Helped tremendously by the legendary Wes Craven as director, Scream elevates itself as something more than “just a slasher film.” On the surface, Scream is just another slasher film and the glut of teenage-based horror movies in its wake probably did the film no favors. But Scream stands out with just one mention of its trump card: The Rules. Effectively deconstructing every previous slasher movie, horror nerd Randy lays out the key to survival in these movies in just three simple declarations. No sex, no drugs or alcohol, and no announcing your imminent return. Of course no one pays any attention but no one ever does in these movies.
Considering that this was the first movie (that I ever saw anyway) that featured horror movie characters who are, for the most part, completely aware that they are horror movie characters, it was a big success considering that it made over $100 million. A movie series like Friday the 13th almost depends on the interchangeable killer fodder that appear on screen. The virginal final girl Sidney has some family trauma which keeps her distant from her kind of creepy boyfriend. Her father is absent. Her friends are mostly self-absorbed. In a typical slasher, that is basically the extent of any character development. Even if I don’t always care for the underlying story, Williamson has always been able to create characters that are fully fleshed out and even sympathetic to a point.
Another big part of Scream’s success was the way it is able to handle the awkward pairing of horror and comedy. It helps that the backbone of the film is satirical which lends itself to poking fun at not only other movies but also itself. Even some of the non-horror elements are written and delivered so perfectly such as the requisite bitch Gale Weathers berating her cameraman or the subtle sarcastic remarks muttered off-screen about the absurdity of the events. The actors too are easily able to handle the Sorkin-lite verbiage about youth, life, and horror movies (most of the time at least).
Neve Campbell as Sidney starts off rather meek and reserved but transforms into a full-fledged heroine with seemingly minimal effort, even though she had the most bumpiest of the performances. Everyone else played wonderfully but especially the typecast-shedding Courteney Cox, the goofy gumshoe David Arquette, and the nerdy everyman Jamie Kennedy. Of course, these are the characters who not only lived the longest but had the most support from fans. Also of note is the score from Marco Beltrami who is not as regarded as say John Williams but can manage effective music to fit every scene with perfection (except those random parts of Halloween H20).
Just as I mentioned in an early episode, Scream is a comfort movie for me. Everything fits together so well and the characters are so genuine that you can’t help but be sad when the film draws to a close.
Glengarry Glen Ross is quite brilliant. David Mamet (screenwriter, the film is adapted from his play) loves dialogue, and if an actor cannot handle it, it’s very easy to tell. There is no issue of that in this film. Everyone in this film execute his words perfectly.
Basically, the film is the story of four real estate salesmen who work for Premiere Properties (played by Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, Alarn Arkin and Ed Harris). The owners of the company ask Blake (Alec Baldwin) to come in and “motivate” the salesmen. He explains that the top seller for the month will win a new Cadillac, the second place salesman will win steak knives and everyone else will be fired. He gives a quite HR inappropriate, vulgar, insulting and yet entertaining speech which scares and pisses everyone off except Roma, (played by Pacino) who is not required to attend the meeting, as he is top salesman. Blake shows the salesmen the Glengarry leads, which are “gold.” Levine (Lemmon), whose character is the inspiration for the Simpsons character Gil Gunderson, begs Williamson, the office manager (Kevin Spacey) to give him one of those leads, as the salesman are of the opinion that the current leads are weak and they cannot close them. The film depicts 2 days in the life of this office; the night of the meeting and the following day in which it is discovered that the office has been broken in to and the leads have been stolen. What results is an awesome character study, and highly satisfying film.
David Mamet has a very firm grasphold of the way people actually talk. This is prominent in pretty much all of his films and plays. That being said, and as I mentioned before, if an actor cannot deliver this dialogue very well, they will stand out like a sore thumb in a Mamet piece. Once again, this is not a problem in Glengarry Glen Ross. Every single actor, not matter what the size of the role, deliver Mamet’s lines with excellence, and firm believability. Alan Arkin is especially great. He seems to have the same masterful understanding of the English language as Mamet does, and his performance seems like it was rudimentary to him.
What’s most impressive about this film, is that Mamet can take the same talent that makes his plays so engaging (strong dialogue) and apply it in to a film. A lot of film goers prefer some kind of “eye candy,” whether it is an explosion, or Vin Diesel. Mamet films will almost never deliver that.
The casual movie goer does not understand the “mechanics” of film. They do not isolate line delivery, blocking, or the tightness of an ensemble cast. They just see flashiness. If you are one of those people, you will hate this film. It is a showcase of superb acting, directing and writing. Yet, it does not insist upon itself. It just exists, waiting for appreciation, which it very much deserves. It’s highly quotable, and simply watching this (or reading Mamet in general) makes a writer suddenly want to write something fantastic. Awesome picture.
As I walked around the office today telling people that I had seen Piranha 3D…well, let’s be honest, bragging that I had seen it, every single person said the same thing to me: “Oh, that movie looks terrible.” Well, yes. Yes it is. It’s fucking Piranha.
As if the plot mattered, this incarnation of Piranha starts with Richard Dreyfuss playing Matt Boyd drinking an Amity beer. If you see this and don’t immediately understand that the following film will be nothing but a tongue in cheek, referenced ladened gore fest, then leave the theater immediately and go see Dinner for Schmucks. You obviously need your humor unfunny, and force fed to you. An underwater earthquake occurs and releases a swarm of a particular species of piranha that has not been seen in millions of years. Meanwhile, above the water at Lake Victoria, thousands flock for Spring Break, providing the obligatory hedonism required before a masked killer or hungry fish lay waste to the area. Loud music, wet t-shirt contests, booze, drugs, and a Girls Gone Wild type video being shot all provide the soon to be blood splattered red canvas that Alexandre Aja uses to paint the awesomest magic eye picture I have ever seen. That’s right. Awesomest.
Inception has an interesting defense against supposed plot holes. There is one interpretation of it in which the entirety of the movie takes place in a dream, thus making plot holes, not holes at all, but rather part of some bizarre dream. Piranha 3D has a similar defense against its flaws. They’re supposed to be there. Bad acting? It’s Piranha. Formulaic horror tactics? Piranha! It’s because of this that it would be a waste of time to point out any flaws in this film. It’s part of a package. The gratuitous nudity and gore, the bad dialogue, the Jaws references. And while the 3D didn’t necessarily enhance the viewing experience, it was a genius move to convert it. This is the perfect movie to do that with. It was like the blood red bow on the package. I will admit, however, there was one instance in which I jumped due to a flying object coming at me. I remained motionless amidst dozens of decapitations and entrails galore, but a 3D object made me jump. All the acting was just above distraction level so as not to take you out of the film, but also so that there was no pointless deep characterizations. It’s all surface. I mean, really, the best advice I can give you is, don’t take the film seriously at all. Go into it expecting over the top ridiculousness. The audience Puck and I were in were clapping at some of the most disgusting things (when they weren’t yelling “1.21 gigawatts!” every time Christopher Lloyd was on screen).
Aja is fast becoming one of my favorite directors, what with High Tension, his remake of The Hills Have Eyes, and now this. This film delivers pure mindless entertainment and will most certainly leave its mark on you. Highly Recommended.
I hate to quote the same thing in less than a week but Digger posited in his previous marathon that Predator is “without a doubt one of the greatest action movies of all time.” Die Hard certainly deserves a spot on that list as well and perhaps not coincidentally is directed by the same man: John McTiernan. You all should know the story very well so I’ll keep the synopsis short. John McClane is a NYPD cop. His estranged wife lives in L.A. and works for a powerful foreign firm. McClane flies in for Christmas. Terrorists take over the building which houses a shit ton of money. Pure entertainment for the next two hours ensues.
It may not be your go-to movie for Christmas like Elf or the Muppet Christmas Carol but Die Hard is not only an awesome Christmas movie in its setting and references but also a damn near flawless action movie. In fact, I would almost consider this the anti-action movie in that the normal conventions and clichés that are commonplace today are nowhere to be found here. The plot is solid, the terrorists are not simply one-dimensional, and the one-liners aren’t corny. It helps that Die Hard is lauded for pioneering some of the more outlandish action stunts in succeeding movies but the point still stands.
Unlike the mindless popcorn, ‘shoot-em up’ movies we suffer through nowadays, Die Hard is always on its A game. Bruce Willis‘ McClane is not the supercop that the later sequels made him out to be. Here he is just a guy in a wife-beater with no shoes stuck in a perilous situation, with nothing more than his cunning wit and whatever ordinances he swipes from the folks rendered dead by his hands. While the effects are extraordinary, there is nothing (save for Karl’s Christ-like resurrection) that strains logic or pokes at your fragile suspension of disbelief.
Besides McClane and Alan Rickman‘s chilling classically-trained, high class Hans Grueber, the rest of the supporting actors are crafted in the vain of actual human beings, not disposable plot contrivances. The fact that the main baddies have more depth and personality than most anyone in … Zombie Strippers(?) is commendable and even Al Powell (Reginald VelJohnson) has a more satisfying arc than characters with an entire two hours devoted to them.
Given that it was made in the ’80s, Die Hard does not look or feel dated other than the terrorists that look like they could start a pop band called “The East German All Stars.” (There’s a reference there by the way.) Of course, there are standard movie elements like the requisite douchebag characters, namely Ellis and the police chief, but even they get away with lines and delivery that are on point with some of the funnier movies I’ve seen. In fact, I could probably watch Paul Gleason‘s delivery of the line “For chrissake, he could be a bartender for all we know” on a loop and not get tired of it.
It’s unfortunate that I haven’t watched this movie in so long because it is, in the simplest terms, a veritable masterpiece.
Original publication date: July 18, 2010
If you read this site or have watched any of our episodes, you will know the level of respect and … love we have for Chris Nolan. Yes, PBF may have a sick fascination with Weekend at Bernie’s but even he does not particularly laud Robert Klane because WAB does not equal Dark Knight, Batman Begins, Memento, and now Inception on any level. Here we have a rare movie from a gifted filmmaker that is able to transcend multiple genres and their corresponding cliches and deliver one of the most intellectual films to overshadow anything else this year and probably many years’ films to come.
Even after watching the damn thing, the plot of Inception is rather dense but it boils down fairly simply even though it strips out the very nature of the film. Cobb is a theif trained in the art of extracting thoughts and ideas from a person’s head while they dream. However, he is tasked with a job that even many on his team describe as impossible: implanting an idea into one’s head that is conceived to be genuine by the subject. As a much more complex task than simple extraction, Cobb and his team go to great lengths to create multiple landscapes to coerce the subject into accepting the notion and considering it one of his own.
Like Nolan’s previous film, Dark Knight, Inception works on a great number of levels. The casting is spot on with each member of the principals bringing a grounding seriousness which normally is desperately needed in a film as ambitious as this. Leonardo DiCaprio portrays Cobb as a man who is both confident and broken, a teacher and yet still a student when it comes to affairs with Mal, his wife played by Marion Cotillard. They have a complicated relationship to say the least but the two exert a fierce chemistry as they mingle in the dreams. Everyone else including Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ken Watanabe, Ellen Page, and Tom Hardy play their respective roles with poise and confidence that truly sell their characters and the skills they bring. The one thing that Nolan can be faulted for here is the utter lack of development that the characters receive other than Cobb and Mal. We see the inner workings of the group and how they react to each other but Cillian Murphy as the main target for their job receives far more heavy-lifting in the way of depth than the rest of the crew.
That does not really matter much as even though the film is billed as a tale of thievery, it is mostly about Cobb and his redemption. Cobb wants nothing more than to be reunited with his remaining family after a terrible incident and planting a seed of thought inside Murphy’s head is the only way to achieve that. DiCaprio superbly manages the barrage of emotions needed to sell this point of the story in his quest. Very subtle lines of dialogue that seem superfluous at first glance become very telling of Cobb and his guilt of the consequences of previous journeys into this world.
Visually it is quite stunning, likely even more so if any of you are lucky enough to see it in IMAX. Though the majority of the movie takes place either in the real world or in a dream state designed similarly, various effects infiltrate the dream world with pretty spectacular results, a good deal of which have been shown in the previews. The grounding of the dreams in reality makes for pretty cool effects as buildings crumble, water rushes through, and Gordon-Levitt has a zero-G fight with a henchman. Each of the stages of dreams are filmed in stark contrast with one another which not only alleviates any confusion that might be had but also gives a stark contrast between a metropolis during a storm, a swank dimly-lit hotel, and a vast snowy outpost, each populated by minions of the subject’s unconscious who act as our disposable bad guys trying to stop the team.
Unless you are in a Nightmare on Elm Street film, moving through the dreamworld does not often pose many risks. This is even acknowledged early on as one of the characters is killed in the dream only to wake up unharmed in reality. However, during the task as the characters are heavily sedated to prevent the destruction of the fragile dreamscape, they face an eternity of solitude in limbo if something bad should befall them. This clever workaround elevates the story from the simple failure of a mission to a lifetime of abstract despair as the unnamed thugs lurk with large caliber weapons. This as well as many other facets of the script show the care in which it was created, not only to create a fantastic sci-fi concept, but to move beyond a simple tale of dreaming to one with a true emotional core for our main protagonist.
I was worried that the narrative would be dense and as hard to crack as your normal David Lynch film called Lost Highway. However, the story is relatively easy to follow throughout with a nice dash of flashbacks and recollections to further develop the Cobb and Mal relationship. This is not however a film that you can check your brain at the door as elements are introduced, observed, and then jettisoned as the complexity of the storytelling increases. Of course, this is one of the smartest high-concept summer blockbusters in years so you should not dare miss a minute for fear that a key element will be shown which will change the outlook of the film.
Is Inception a perfect film? Not at all but Nolan’s biggest strength lies in creating an engrossing tale that will make you forget about any shortcomings during the picture as you are too damn entertained to care. I worry that, just like Dark Knight, subsequent viewings will show the cracks in the foundation and oversights in the story. These things though will not stop you from enjoying the film. Really, Inception really does not need validation of its efforts by random people on the interwebs like myself. The caliber of everyone involved should seal the deal.
On the third of November, 1954, unsuspecting Japanese audiences were introduced to a character that would become the most recognizable movie monster of all time. Gojira (Godzilla to Americans) stomped his way into the popular consciousness throughout the next five decades. Godzilla has starred in a total of twenty-eight films (not including the crappy Roland Emmerich version) the latest of which is possibly the craziest of all. Godzilla: Final Wars was released on Godzilla’s 50th anniversary and, as the title implies, was meant to cap-off the latest series of Toho’s Godzilla films. We start off seeing a military unit from the Earth Defense Force that is engaging Godzilla at the South Pole. The strategic importance of defending the South Pole is up for debate, but a war ship named Gotengo launches a volley of missiles to bury Godzilla in an avalanche. Then a narration describes a brief history of Earth, stating that near constant warfare and pollution has released or created many giant monsters that terrorize mankind. We get to see some stock footage of a the few monsters in Toho’s stable that won’t make an appearance later in the film. The greatest of these many monsters is none other than Godzilla himself. The film goes in to a little about the EDF and Shinichi Ozaki (Masahiro Matsuoka) one of the mutant soldiers serving in it. Ozaki is sent with U.N. biologist Miyuki (Rei Kikukawa) to the ancient corpse of a monster of alien origin. When all of the various monsters around the world attack several major cities, the EDF deploys to contain the carnage. But, ultimately, a group of seemingly benevolent alien visitors calling themselves Xilians trap the many monsters in an energy containment field in their ships.
The Xilians attempt to sell themselves to the people of Earth as wanting to help the planet avert a major disaster involving a gigantic meteor on a collision course. I guess Ben Afleck isn’t available to blow this one up. Anyway, Miyuki discovers that the genetic information from the ancient monster Gigan that they found is identical to that of the Xilians, as well as many of Earth monsters and the mutation that enables the enhanced abilities of the EDF’s mutant soldiers. As usual, people should never trust an alien as the Xilians turn out to be evil and are secretly trying to take over the world. When the Xilians are outed on national television for capturing and impersonating the head of the U.N. the evil aliens release all of the monsters under their control to destroy all of Earth’s major cities. Ozaki, who is the only mutant soldier able to resist the Xilian’s influence, takes Miyuki and legendary EDF Captain, Douglas Gordan (Don Frye) the only American actor in the film, and they take the warship Gotengo to release Godzilla from his icy prison in hopes that he will not be able to be controlled by the aliens, as he was created from nuclear fallout. When Godzilla is freed, he goes on a rampage and fights giant monster after giant monster on his way to Tokyo to take out the Xilian mother ship, and that’s what the audience has been waiting for the whole time. The second half of the film is almost entirely monster on monster violence, and even though most of the individual confrontations are pretty short, the sheer volume of monsters smacking each other makes it worth while. Most of the creature effects are shot with traditional monster suits and miniatures, but a few of the shots use computer generated monsters, like the giant mantis Kamacuras and the snake-like Manda. This is a bombastic send off to the franchise and goes overboard on action TO THE EXTREME! It has people fighting people, stuff exploding, a monster with giant chainsaw hands, lasers blowing up cities, aliens kung-fu fighting at super speeds, sword fights, and of course, Godzilla being a supreme bad-ass, and it is glorious.
H.P. Lovecraft is called the father of modern horror and is credited with creating the Cthulhu Mythos and the ‘weird fiction’ sub-genre. Although there have been several adaptations of his various stories (most of them directed by Stuart Gordon) the highest any of those films have ever climbed in the mainstream consciousness is the movie Re-Animator, and that’s not a very well-known film. In 1995, the fans of John Carpenter (one of the more iconic horror directors working today) were treated to the giant H. P. Lovecraft tribute film In the Mouth of Madness. The movie opens with Sam Neill as a raving lunatic in a straight-jacket being dragged into a padded cell. Doctor Wrenn (David Warner) is called in to find out what made Sam’s character, named John Trent, go insane. John, who has covered himself and the walls of is cell with the images of crosses, sits down to tell Wrenn about his most recent case. John was a private investigator that specialized in cases of insurance fraud, and he was called in to investigate the disappearance of a best selling writer named Sutter Cane (Jurgen Prochnow) who vanished with the manuscript of his latest book. Trent is convinced that this is not a real missing person’s case, but a publicity stunt and, through some diligent research, discovers clues in the cover art of Cane’s previous novels that create a map to the fictional town of Cane’s stories called Hobb’s End. Trent departs to locate the town, which he believes is real in spite of it not existing on any map, with Cane’s agent Linda Styles (Julie Carmen) who is interested in locating the manuscript.
While Linda is driving at night, she experiences all kinds of crazy occurrences like passing the same young bicycler several times, and aging each time, and seemingly driving through the sky. Somehow, she stumbles across Hobb’s End, where even more bizarre tings are happening. The two visit the Black Church, a dark monolithic structure mentioned in many of Cane’s stories that is entirely out of place in a small New England town. Their, after many of the townsfolk show up with weapons, Sutter Cane appears in the church, and sends some primeval attack dogs on the town’s people. As Linda and John try to come to terms with the strange scene they just experienced, Linda comes clean with John, saying that this was originally supposed to be a publicity stunt to promote his new book, but the town and its residents are not supposed to exist. The people, places, and creatures from Sutter Cane’s fiction are coming to life in the real world. As one of John Carpenter’s entries in his unofficial Apocalypse Trilogy, it’s a safe bet that this film won’t end well. The earlier parts on the film rely on a lot of shock scares involving John Trent having vivid nightmares about people turning into gnarly-faced monsters. The whole crux of the movie relies on a blurring between the lines of the movie’s meta-reality, which is pretty much the same as our own reality, and the fantasy world of Cane’s creation, which draw heavily on H. P. Lovecraft for inspiration with all kinds of hideous slime beast and tentacle demons that, wisely, only show up on screen for a few select seconds. The sparseness of the monsters makes their brief flashes on screen much more memorable.
In sharp contrast to yesterday’s DeepStar Six, today’s film is well written, well acted, well paced, and enjoyable from top to bottom. Tremors is a modern monster classic that carries the spirit of fifties science fiction and perfectly balances horror and comedy. It is directed by Ron Underwood and stars Kevin Bacon as Val and Fred Ward as Earl, two down-on-their-luck handymen trying to escape their dead-end existence in Perfection Nevada. When they try to leave their tiny, isolated town, Val and Earl discover the body of a resident high on an electrical tower, dead from dehydration. The deaths outside the town begin to pile up as the surviving residents try to piece together just what exactly is killing so many people. Burt (Michael Gross) discovers a snake-like creature attached to the back of Val and Earl’s truck that had stalled it out previously. With the only road to the closest signs of civilization blocked and all communication outside the valley cut off, Val and Earl try to make it to Bixby (the closest town) on horseback, but are attacked by one of the monsters. Not only are these creatures much larger than the two previously thought (about 30 feet in length) with the smaller snake like creature from earlier being only the full creature’s tongue, the monster also travels underground, able to move quickly without being seen and ambush its prey. The pair heroically run away from the creature upon seeing it and fall into a cement trench, where the monster tries to give chase, but kills itself by running head first into a cement barrier. A grad student named Rhonda (Finn Carter) who is studying seismology finds the two men and the dead creature and determines, thanks to her monitoring of the local seismic activity, that there are three more creatures in the valley.
Unlike a lot of other monster movies that try to pad out their running time with go-no-where dialogue scenes and thin character development, Tremors actually contains a lot of genuinely humorous dialogue exchanges between interesting and well developed characters, mostly in the beginning of the picture before the monsters are revealed. Although the film does make us wait for a creature ‘unveiling’ a good thirty-five minutes into the movie, once the monsters are shown, we get to see them a lot and the practical effects are not disappointing. This is one of the movies I saw in my childhood that I really latched onto for its fast pace and well thought-out story, and of course, the monsters. I am happy to report that Tremors still holds up after two decades and many repeat viewings. It’s a treat to watch every time and I cannot stress how much you should stop whatever you’re doing right now and see this movie.
Arnold Schwarzenegger has had several notable costars in his movie career, such as James Earl Jones, Michael Ironside, and Tom Arnold. But his most memorable costar, for me anyway, was a seven-foot tall alien with a crab-mouth and dreadlocks. Predator is, without a doubt, one of the greatest action movies of all time. It has an all-star cast of thick-necked dudes headed up by Arnold as “Dutch,” Carl Weathers as Dillon, Bill Duke as Mac, and Jesse ‘the Body’ Ventura as Cooper. The movie opens much like John Carpenter’s The Thing, with an alien ship cruising through space, the dropping a pod as it passes by Earth. Man, Earth is like the all night truck stop to the whole galaxy, apparently. A random alien flying by sees our planet and thinks “That looks like a good place to stretch my legs, maybe grab a bite to eat.” Anyway, we soon cut to Dutch and his commando team being flown in to a military outpost in Guatemala. He was called in by his old friend Dillon to find a U.S. Cabinet member whose helicopter went down in hostel territory. His team is dropped in to the enemy’s end of the jungle, but before Dutch can locate the Cabinet member, he finds the skinned bodies of another U.S. strike unit that was sent in before him. Even with all of their combined jungle fighting experience, none of his men had seen anything this gruesome before. This is when the film starts to shift to the point of view of something in the trees that is stalking Dutch’s team. The P.O.V. shots show Dutch and his crew in the infrared spectrum, meaning that whatever is watching them sees their body heat.
The team soon locates the rebel guerrillas’ base camp, and Dutch and the gang make short work of it in spectacular fashion, with big, loud guns, even bigger, louder explosions, and arguably the greatest one-liner in movie history. After finding out that the missing cabinet member was a cover story to recover some CIA intelligence, and taking a single guerrilla prisoner (Elpidia Carrillo) the team treks back through the bush toward their extraction point. It is here that the groups invisible tag-along (Kevin Peter Hall) starts to make his presence known as he starts to pick off the commandos one by one. This movie is overflowing with amazing action and special effects (the special creature effects are the work of Stan Winston). It is one of those movies where it takes a while for the monster in question to finally show up, but there is so much else going on in the movie with gun fights and such that it’s not very bothersome. I do like the fact that the film is not just a dumb action movie, but has some very interesting themes woven into it. For example, none of the soldiers are able to take on the alien with their firearms or military training as the ‘predator’ uses more advanced technology and is much more physically capable than the soldiers. In the end, Dutch has to resort to a primal cunning to fight this monster, forsaking his guns for a bow, arrows, and primitive traps. You have no excuse for not finding this movie and watching it right now if you haven’t seen it already.
Note – I decided to show off the Italian movie poster for Predator, as it looks much cooler that the U.S. poster.
When I first saw 
I hate to quote the same thing in less than a week but Digger posited in his previous marathon that Predator is “without a doubt one of the greatest action movies of all time.” 
