It’s evident from the opening scene of Predators, which features Royce (Adrien Brody) plummeting through the sky in free-fall, that director Nimród Antal aims to decorate the film with break-neck action sequences, and little downtime; It’s a method that’s extremely well executed. As luck would have it, Royce’s parachute opens in time to cushion his fall, and we viewers get an idea of the machismo our lead hero packs, as the confused soldier quickly shrugs off the fall and begins surveying the foreign territory in which he’s literally been dropped.
It’s mere moments before we realize that not only Royce, but a solid handful of rogue characters are falling from the sky, and screenwriters Alex Litvak and Michael Finch waste no time getting our key players acquainted with each other. The character structuring follows John McTiernan’s 1987 layout seamlessly, as we get a feel for a solid handful of personalities quickly, each of whom possess unique traits that make then memorable with little actual character development exercised; a challenging feat accomplished with seeming ease in this specific case.
The landscape resembles the original picture well, rather than depositing our story in a futuristic Los Angeles setting, or some archaeological locale, it’s back to the jungle. It’s a nice effect that conjures an unmistakable feeling of nostalgia, which most Predator fans should enjoy quite a bit. There are certainly differences between this jungle and the Central American foliage of McTiernan’s vision, but the similarities stand strong just the same.
Like the original Predator film, our group (which turn out to all be professional assassins of some sort) is isolated and picked off one-by-one. But this journey features some newly modified predators (that make the original hunter look like a bona fide alien sissy), some nasty looking “dogs” and a few other surprises for our protagonists to deal with. With the exception of a couple questionable shots of the CG “dogs”, these revamped villains look insanely cool and noticeably more menacing than the models of past.
There’s a handful of twists that separate Antal’s vision from past Predator directors, and a lot of the credit for said surprises is owed to the writing crew, who clearly took a step out on a limb; fortunately that limb held firm. I’ll refrain from dropping any serious spoilers in the case that you haven’t seen the film, but I’ll tell you this much: expect some sinister deception and human savagery that rivals the intent of the predators themselves.
Overall, the pacing of the picture is excellent, and the cast truly shines; Topher Grace turns in one of his best performances to date, former mixed martial artist Oleg Taktarov is great as the sympathetic Russian, Walton Goggins is a true diamond as the vile Stans, and, forgive me if you consider this blasphemy, but Adrien Brody is a far superior lead to Arnold Schwarzenegger. He may not be as big (though he did put on a very noticeable 25 pounds of muscle for the role) as Arnie, but what he lacks in size, he more than makes up for with high caliber acting chops.
Purists put your doubts away and open your minds, this is one of the best contemporary reboots to hit the market.
OVERALL SUMMARY
While most reboots tend to miss the mark with viewers, Nimród Antal’s vision of the modern day Predator is satisfying on a number of levels. The action is relentless, the cast is stellar, and the final product is on par with John McTiernan’s epic original. If you miss this one, you deserve to have your spine ripped out.
