Alien Vs. Predator

[Contact_Therapy]

Anyone seen this yet?

Here it is, after midnight on a Friday morning and I can't find one single positive review anywhere...

[Cheesesailor77]

yeah, anyone check it out?

Personally, Pual "Resident Evil" Anderson writing/directing the latest Alien film scares the crap outa me and it's gonna take a shitload of positive buzz for my to see it, but if it does I probably will (but it needs a LOT)

[Goblin]

I saw it. %90 capacity theater at about 3:45pm, hoping an opening day crowd would bring the energy to make what was probably going to be a bad film enjoyable anyway. I was wrong. Audience enthusiasm didn't help.

I actually like Paul WS Anderson's. Not many people do, but I thought "Event Horizon" was great. Wonderfully frightening. I thought "Soldier" was ok, but maybe I just think Kurt Russel should work more. I thought "Resident Evil" was alright, even though it was a zombie flick without much more than a couple drops of blood (MJ frontal didn't hurt my opinion of the flick any, either).

But I hate AVP. It's a complete waste of two very strong brands.

I mean, it's ok. Sort of. It's watchable. But... Without spoiling it...

Warning sign number one: Both franchises are rated R. This is rated PG-13. The violence and horror gore of both series is completely missing. It could air on broadcast TV right now, completely untouched.

Warning sign number two: The trailer has a guy say "You... ugly... son-of-" <cut away to something actiony>. If you put that in your trailer, man, I don't know. You need a guy right after that saying "I'm getting too old for this sh-"<cut to massive explosion>. And just wait until you hear the line in the movie. Oh my god... And then you hear it again later. Yay. I love quality dialog.

Warning sign number three: Lance Henriksen?!!? I love Lance. He's a genre icon. But why the hell is Bishop in this movie? Ok, he's Weyland, of Weyland/Yutani. So, hundreds of years from now one of the androids his company makes (Why does Weyland/Yutani suddenly make androids? I thought they were a mining and terraforming conglomerate, with a minor interest in exotic weapons?) will be designed to look just like the guy that started the company? Ok, I can buy that, why not. What the hell do Weyland and his company have to do with this film, though? Paul Anderson screwing around with mythology is about it. Just because he can.

Without going into information given in the film (Or, really, also, all of the information NOT given in the film that the characters suddenly assume is true... Someone must have shown them the other movies, given the assumptions they make.), or what happens in the film, I can't give any more warnings.

Ok, one more, with a very, very minor spoiler (if you consider camera shots to be spoilers). Skip it if you don't want to be "surprised" (read: annoyed).

Warning sign number five: Bullet Time Face Hugger. I'm not kidding. Bullet. Time. Face. Hugger.

And it only gets worse from there.

[Cheesesailor77]

well... um....that about sums it up i suppose... ;)

[smkoch]

yeah, I love the franchises, danny glover was great in P2, but this sucked that's all I have to say about avp for the rest of my life

[Contact_Therapy]

Saw it earlier today as well.

I think I liked it but I'm not sure. *There were a few problems.

(SPOILER WARNING! DO NOT READ ANY FURTHER IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THE MOVIE!)


1) Having the movie set on present day Earth was ridiculous. There is no reason why it couldn't have taken place on another planet is it was done in the original comic book series. The mythology stuff still could have stayed intact but having the ritual occuring every 100 years on a very isolated place on Earth was strange. How exactly could the Preds count on humans coming to that place every 100 years to be unwilling hosts for their prey? The script relied too much on coincidences.

2) The fact that it now takes minutes instead of days for chestbursters to pop. They could have made it more interesting if the infected were reassembled with the uninfected and then all hell breaks lose. It could have easily been included in the script. The shortness of it all cheapened the horrific feeling of having something alien living inside you.

3) The first two Preds died too fast and too easily. Even without their shoulder pods they should have been more of a challenge for the Aliens.

4) The PG-13 rating. I've heard that Paul Anderson made an R-Rated flick but the studio execs made him cut it. Here hopin there is an unrated DVD coming soon. You would think after screwing up the last two Alien flicks, Fox would get a clue.

5) The cast and the dialogue they were given were both very unmemorable.


There were many things I did like. The effects were all done extremely well considering the small budget. The Aliens never looked so good and actually seemed more menacing. The fight scenes between the Preds and Aliens were all well done.

Just my two and a half cents.

[Phil]

Warning sign number five: Bullet Time Face Hugger. I'm not kidding. Bullet. Time. Face. Hugger.

haha. that was funny. I thought this was going to be totally good, until I saw a preview fight scene...it was 2 puppets wrestling?? it sucked. Great review goblin.

[Phil]

Hey Contact...Did you shoot that JEM video?? That's great!

[J.R. Hudson]

Goblin

That was a pretty solid take. Im digging it. And the Rated R thing? I neber thought of that. So true.

[Contact_Therapy]

Hey Contact...Did you shoot that JEM video?? That's great!

Nah, I wish. *It was directed by someone named Honey.

[skippyfetus]

Overall, I liked the movie. I thought the plot was a bit cheesy. I'm glad they didn't over-do the fight scenes, because it was starting to look like Mortal Combat for a minute in that first fight scene. Alien movies have a tradition of featuring a strong female protagonist, so I'm not going to touch the black female in charge.

Sensitive Predators? Again, a little cheesy, but they made it work. It was a just a little too Hollywood for me, but all I wanted to see was some alien fighting and they delivered it. I wouldn't say it's a great movie, but I had fun and it was worth watching.

[Mike_Donis]

I didn't like it.

I enjoyed my time watching it, that's for sure, but I didn't think it was a good movie at all. It was amusing to be sure, but there just didn't seem to be the substance I wanted.


And I know, AlienvsPredator, substance, how can this be? But for a lack of a better example, I'll use another VS movie, Freddy VS Jason. I thought this took itself less seriously, and had a much lighter atmosphere, which made the ridiculousness of it work. AVP is just bad, IMO...