Predator 2

Predator 2 (1990)

Runtime: 108 minutes

Directed by: Stephen Hopkins

Starring: Danny Glover, Gary Busey, Maria Conchita Alonso, Bill Paxton, Ruben Blades

From: 20th Century Fox

Given that Predators came out this past Friday, I figured it’d be appropriate to talk about this film. The first movie, from ’87, is still pretty great stuff. You have the manliest of men kicking ass, then they run into the title creature, an ugly mother****** who is an alien that hunts various creatures across the galaxy, including the xenomorphs from the Alien series (more on that in a bit) and takes skulls as trophies. Eventually, Arnold Schwarzenegger is able to kill it (as hey, it bleeds) and that’s that. This movie takes place in an “urban jungle” of LA in 1997 rather than an actual jungle. That and no Arnold is probably the reason why this movie gets a bad rap in some circles and even quite a few fans of the first don’t care for this one. Do I agree?

Well, this past weekend I saw this for the first time in a long while via a Blockbuster rental. After seeing it now, I fully appreciate this film and thinks it doesn’t deserve nearly all the criticism that it’s been given. I mean, I say that any and all criticism should be directed towards the two movies involving the xenomorphs vs. Predators, which is Alien vs. Predator and Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem. Never see those movies. Both are awful. One of these days I’ll have to talk about both movies and why they’re so bad. Trust me, they are awful and are a slap in the face to fans and the franchises themselves, which is filled with quality films; I rate Predator and Aliens extremely highly on the scale of movies I love to watch and can watch over and over again, which is not that large of a list. If you want to see the title creature in action, see this, the original, and from most accounts, the new Predators, which at least sounds much better than the films involving it and xenomorphs.

This is about a hellhole of a Los Angeles in the near future (at least at the time), with rampant gang warfare and utter chaos, all during a stifling heatwave. We experience the movie through the eyes of a few Los Angeles cops (Glover, Alonso, Paxton, Blades), which are led by Glover’s character, Mike Harrigan, who is a “John Wayne type” that-while a good cop-goes out and does things with his partners despite orders from superiors not to. The movie starts off with a massive shootout involving the cops, Jamaicans, and Columbians (the latter two of which are feuding with each other). In a building, some Colombians get slaughtered and the cops believe that it must have been the Jamaicans, but… and some mysterious government types, led by their crazed leader (Busey; of course, “crazed” and “Busey” go together like peanut butter and bananas) state that they are now running things, causing the expected conflict. The cops soon realize that the mysterious entity which is wiping out both the Jamaicans and Colombians is some outside force, and the Predator actually plays games with Harrigan and that causes the dappily-dressed Glover to sweat even more profusely. I think he sweats more here than any other lead character in motion picture history! I don’t think I’m giving too much away when I say that there’s a final showdown with Harrigan and the Predator.

I’ll admit that this isn’t awesome like the first Predator is. However, for what it is, it’s a good time. You had good performances from quality actors. There’s more than enough in terms of exciting action sequences. I mean, the Predator raises some hell, that’s for sure. As fan theory online says, the Predator here is apparently a young and inexperienced one, which is why it raises hell in LA rather than some hot place in the middle of nowhere and Danny Glover can do combat against it. Still, you get to see it use new weapons/technology that it didn’t use in the first film. Sure, some parts are dopey and not that believable. But, if you can ignore that, it’s an entertaining time and it’s not nearly as bad as the reputation would suggest.

I’ll be back Wednesday night with a new review.