(Release Date: 7/9/2010)
I got to hand it to Robert Rodriguez, after the horrendous Aliens vs. Predator series – he invested his time and money into the near dead franchise, and made something even Arnold would be proud of. We start out in this 20 year coming, true sequel to find a bunch of tough Earthling warriors and killers falling from the sky into a lush alien planet. Having been seemingly plucked from different battle situations on Earth, the group, led by Adrian Brody, soon realize they were brought for one purpose-to be hunted.
Thank god, we finally get a worthwhile action movie. With a vibe right out of the 1987 classic- Predator, Rodriguez’s vision of these bad ass killers getting picked off one by one by the Predators is awesome. Sure some of the characters are duds, and some of the acting is not top notch, the storyline has a few holes in it and Adrian Brody has a horrible deep accent ala Christian Bale’s Batman. Yet forgetting these short misgivings, we have guns, blood, explosions and not just one but two types of predators. Hell on top of the original score, we even have a homage to the duel scenes with Billy from Predator 1, and King Willie from Predator 2- I won’t give it away, but let’s just say it beats the earlier duels by a long shot.
Besides the forced horrible accent, Adrian Brody is a good actor, and does well in his role as the lead actor. I’ll also give props to Walton Goggins, apparently fans of the FX series The Shield will know him, Walton gave some good psychotic comedy relief in the movie and it worked more often then it failed. The same can’t be said for Topher Grace, who’s typical wimpy comedy style just didn’t work for the film, although I’m halfway to believe that he was placed for an important reason, not just a bad casting call. Now the Brazilian femme fatale- Alice Braga did work for the film. Not too beautiful to be unbelievable, she has a tough quality about her that nicely flowed in the action scenes. I can be nitpicky about the humans all day and night but it’s the predators that steal the show. For this is a movie in which you just got to sit back and enjoy the destruction.
IMDb: 7.4/10
Rottentomatoes: 63%
MovieWiseGuys: 7.0/10