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JWilson
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- Review count2
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- First reviewJuly 17, 2010
- Last reviewJuly 17, 2010
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- Average rating2.5
JWilson's Reviews
Overall rating
3
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5
A Worthy Sequel
PostedJuly 17, 2010
JWilson
from Chantilly, VA
It is about time someone does justice to the "Predator" franchise, a series which began in 1987 with a terrifically breezy, well filmed action movie containing some awesome characters, funny one liners, and nicely executed suspense. Now comes "Predators", conceived in the same wham-bam manner as it mercifully disregards the sequel that starred Danny Glover, and the spin-off "Alien vs. Predator" movies. Producer Robert Rodriguez and director Nimrod Antal have taken the material back to basics, and have created the kind of exciting, bad-ass action movie that I have thirsted and hoped for, and that I have now received.
The movie literally opens with a bang, as a man (Adrien Brody) wakes up falling in mid-air toward what looks to be a jungle-like terrain. He is strapped to a parachute that on a timer, and releases just in time. The wind catches him, and he rips downward through the trees and hits the ground with a loud thump. A black screen, and then up with the title, "Predators". Then, the movie begins. This is a fantastic opening sequence that informs us just how straightforward this experience is going to be. The falling man wakes up to find that he is not alone in this mysterious jungle, but that seven others have also fallen from the sky without any idea of how or why. The seven strangers also come to realize that they all have one thing in common: they are all elite warriors and killers, and they have been brought together to be hunted by the beasts called predators.
Among the other warriors are Isabelle (Alice Braga), Stans (Walton Goggins), Nikolai (Oleg Taktarov), Cuchillo (Danny Trejo), Hanzo (Louis Ozawa Changchien), and Mombasa (Mahershalalhashbaz Ali). The one person who doesn't seem to fit is Edwin (Topher Grace), a suburban doctor who is fairly scrawny and stands out like a sore thumb beside the likes of Trejo and Taktarov. This is a terrific group of actors working to create the kind of atmosphere and character interactions that the first film had, and although Adrien Brody is no Arnold Schwarzenegger, he surprisingly ends up being an inspired choice to play the tough, gravel-voiced anti hero Noyce. It is cool to see such a brilliant actor as Brody let loose and star in an old-school action movie.
I have heard some complaining about how the actual Predators don't make their first appearance until about forty minutes into the film. This is a complaint that I both disagree and agree with. On one hand, the suspense that builds as the humans try to figure out what's going on is good. It leaves a lot of time for wandering and dialogue that strongly reminded me of the first half of the first film. We mustn't forget, "Predator" started out like "First Blood" and evolved into something like "Alien". So does this movie. On the other hand, I was very unimpressed by the hog-predators, which seemed unnecessary and silly. There are also some sluggish parts in the first half of the movie, which weigh it down and prevent it from being as breezy as the first movie was. The pace indefinitely picks up once the gang runs into Noland (Laurence Fishburn), a longtime survivor of the hunts who has a few screws loose, and who has himself killed two or maybe three predators. His scenes are very interesting, and I don't think I have ever seen Fishburn portray a character quite like this one.
"Predators" ends when it has nowhere else to go, and I am perfectly fine with that. You get your fill of action and gore, humor and one or two twists, and then go on you merry way. Rodriguez has a tremendous knack for bringing us movies that remind us that an action movie doesn't have to be self-serious and seriously stupid. With his entertaining "Mariachi" trilogy, and the masterfully crafted "Sin City", he has proved again and again his talent for dealing with the genre. This time around he is in the producer's chair, however his influences on the final product are evident. I've not seen any of director Antal's previous work, but he does a relatively decent job here. It is the sequel that "Predator" has always deserved.
Yes, I recommend this movie.
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Overall rating
2
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5
Vampires Practicing Abstinence
PostedJuly 17, 2010
JWilson
from Chantilly, VA
The sparkly bloodsuckers and shirtless wolf-boys are back, and they have never been more sparkly and shirtless than they are in "The Twilight Saga: Eclipse", the third entry in the "Twilight" franchise, a series that seems no closer to becoming interesting or worthwhile now than it did two movies ago. For the most part, "Eclipse" seems to be a rather tedious and exhausting advertisement for abstinence. It is a commercial that promotes the goodness and decency of... waiting.
And boy, can that pale vamp wait and wait and wait-he is, after all, over one hundred years old. The movie begins with some confusing action, followed by a scene with the two lovers, Edward (Robert Pattinson) and Bella (Kristin Stewart) gazing into each others' eyes and dryly reciting poetry and other lines written to emphasize their "eternal love" and such. Meanwhile, there have been a series of brutal slayings occurring in Seattle, which Bella's father Charlie (Billy Burke) is trying to figure out, to no avail. I guess they don't cover vampire homicides in police training.
On top of the murders going on, which involve the redhead villain Victoria (Bryce Dallas Howard) trying to build an army of vampires to destroy the Cullen family and Bella herself, the young couple tries to work through their troubles and through Bella's lingering infatuation with Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner), which creates a bland, quasi-love triangle. Interestingly enough, Lautner, who was absolutely dreadful in the previous movie "New Moon", is the most entertaining part of "Eclipse". He has almost reached the point of being so bad that he's good-almost, but not quite. Nevertheless, he at least brings all of his energy into the movie, which is vastly more than can be said for the other flat-liners moping around on screen. It may be misguided energy, B-actor energy, but it is still energy, and if it weren't for him, the movie would have been completely dull.
The flat-liners are Pattinson, who always speaks in a drowsy whisper, and who always has time to style his hair, and Stewart. This couple really puzzles me. How can there be a vampire romance without any apparent lust, desire, blood, passion, or mild violence? Even in PG-13 land, some of these feelings and emotions should be lurking around somewhere. Without any of these, the relationships between the three angst-filled teens are just filled with monotonous conversations and futile arguments. It also seems fairly predictable to me, even at this point, where this story is going, which removes any suspense that may have existed within the plot.
The same woman, Melissa Rosenberg, has adapted all three movies so far, and it shows. I am certain that the source material is crummy to begin with, so a film adaption is cursed anyway, but Rosenberg's script is one or two notches above comatose. The director this time around is David Slade, whose "Hard Candy" was quite good. I haven't seen "30 Days of Night", his first encounter with vampires. The special effects here are not memorable, and are downright lousy in some scenes, as are the sceneries, which many times look like movie sets and murals. There's a snowy scene where the snow looks like it is coming right out of a snow machine. Continuity also goes out the window in this movie, as the vampires break apart like porcelain when killed, an effect never used in the other movies. I suppose that is the result of changing directors each time.
I don't have any confidence in the fourth and final movie, which will be released in two parts in 2011 and 2012. I will most likely see both parts, and I will go in with a decent attitude, but I am saying right here and now that I believe they will simply put a miserably lackluster franchise to rest. Lets just hope that the author Stephanie Meyer is finished with the book series, so that Hollywood doesn't get any more ideas.
No, I do not recommend this movie.
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