Predator-a-Thon, Part 1 - Predator (1987)

Director: John McTiernan

Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Carl Weathers, Elpidia Carillo, Bill Duke, Jesse Ventura, Richard Chaves, Kevin Peter Hall

Country: United States

Production Company: Silver Pictures

Rating: R

Run Time: 107 minutes

John McTiernan's Predator has always been a personal favorite of mine. Unlike many other violent 80's action films, Predator is one of the few that I have been watching since I was a little kid. This film and the very similar Aliens were two big staples of my childhood viewing. Surprisingly, these were the only R rated movies my dad allowed me to watch as a kid. I didn't get to see The Terminator or Die Hard until I was much older. Even though I have come to love Arnold Schwarzenegger for his many excellent action films, Predator is the film that introduced me to him at a young age. 

After revisiting Predator for the first time in several years, I can whole heartedly confirm that Predator is both one of the best action films of all time and one of Arnold's finest films. If Arnold wasn't in the two James Cameron Terminator films, than this would be his crowning achievement. Predator is an excellent pseudo sci-fi/action/horror that delivers so much. You get an excellent performance by Arnold Schwarzenegger, awesome shoot 'em up action scenes, a tense and terrifying survival horror plot, and an antagonizing alien creature. Science fiction fans and 80's action movie fans couldn't ask for more! Warning: spoilers ahead!

Arnold and The Predator face off.

Dutch (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and his team of elite specialists land in Central America for a search and rescue operation. Their mission is to find and rescue a kidnapped presidential cabinet minister. Upon landing, Dutch is met by his old friend Dylan (Carl Weathers), who is now working for the CIA. Dutch, Dylan, and his men locate the guerrilla forces outpost within the jungles of Central America and engage in an epic gunfight. After wiping out every single man (minus a captive woman) in the compound, Dutch realizes that he and his men were set up by Dylan. There was no captive cabinet minister. This whole operation was set up to rescue back two of Dylan's fellow CIA operatives and to take out numerous enemy guerrilla forces in the process.

As the men start to make their way back to their helicopter extraction, something in the trees begins to follow them with infrared eye sight. When the female captive escapes Dutch and his men, something in the jungle kills one of the men. The men suspect that the killer is another rogue guerrilla  in the jungle. However, they quickly realize that their enemy is not of this world as they are slowly picked off one by one. Dutch eventually becomes the "final man" as he and the creature go head to head in a final face off where Dutch pits his survival instincts against the creature's sci-fi weaponry and advanced cloaking system.

Predator is a tense thrill ride packed with awesome action scenes and one of the most memorable creatures in cinematic history. I cannot stress enough how tense and engaging this film is. John McTiernan found a way to make invincible muscular action heroes vulnerable as they go up against the one thing they can't defeat: an other worldly creature. Just like McTiernan's other action masterpiece, Die Hard, Predator is a subversion of action genre staples.

The film opens with an epic shootout where Arnold Schwarzenegger and several other bad asses of the 80's lay waste to dozens of soldiers. This opening raid on the guerrilla forces' compound is the kind of gun fight you would expect an action film to conclude with. And yet, here it is at the beginning of the movie. It kicks so much ass and gives you exactly what you expect from an 80's action film. But than Predator twists the action genre on its head by becoming a full fledged survival horror. These muscular bad asses are no longer the invincible killing machines that we think they are. Instead, we watch these hulking men get slashed to death by an invisible alien with far more brawn, weaponry, and skills than any of them have. If that isn't a subversion of the genre than I don't know what is.

If these guys can't take down a Predator, than what can?

I know that everyone knows Predator as an action film. But I think it's due time that some one reads this film as a "slasher" film. Released in the 80's, the heyday of the slasher genre if I am correct, Predator pulls quite a bit from the slasher genre formula. The final two thirds of the film are essentially a group of people taking on a masked killer in an isolated location. The slasher, the Predator, takes out each of his victims one by one and as quietly as possible. He even wears a mask like Michael Myers, Jason Vorheeves, and Leatherface (up until the very end).

Since there are no teenagers having sex, I am going to hypothesize that slaughtering dozens of bad guys in an action scene is what makes you vulnerable to being killed by the Predator. The film even ends with Arnold as the "final man" (my substitution for the well known "final girl" phrase). Arnold and the slasher than engage in a one on one fight that turns into a chase scene similar to what one would find at the end of Halloween or Friday the 13th. But unlike the slasher genre, the "final man" wins and defeats the slasher once and for all. The Predator doesn't get back up and return for a sequel. No, the Predator loses fair and square (until he whips out his self destruct device and proves that he is a sore loser). However, the fact that there are numerous sequels to this film proves that the Predator species could not be held down.

John McTiernan brings all of his action craftsmanship from Die Hard and Die Hard With a Vengeance to this manly as heck action film. The opening shootout alone is one of the great 80's shoot 'em ups. Arnold single handedly guns down over 40 guerrilla soldiers in this scene! After this shootout, the rest of the film is essentially Dutch and his men shooting back and forth with the Predator. Even though most people remember the opening shootout as the best action scene of the film, my money goes to the great scene where Dutch and his men mow down the jungle with their guns for a good minute. Literally, Dutch and his men stand side by side and fire away into the jungle as they try to hit the Predator upon first seeing it. This whole action scene is made better by Bill Duke's loud screaming and mini-gun blazing. 

Long before AvP, there was a time when the Predator looked this awesome.

The final face off between Arnold and the Predator is also great entertainment. After Arnold realizes that the mud on his skin can cloud the Predator's heat vision, he turns into a survivalist and sets up numerous traps alongside a lake. He than slathers more mud on his skin and screams for the Predator to come after him. It's one of the best cat and mouse face offs I have ever seen. Action movies don't get better than this.

I think that Predator contains the largest assortment of great one liners in action movie history. Look at the assortment of badassery spouted by these men.

"If it bleeds we can kill it."

"You are one ugly mother f*****."

"I ain't got time to bleed man."

"Knock knock, *bang!*"

"You're all a bunch of slack jawed faggots. This stuff will make you a god-damn sexual tyranosaurus, just like me!"

"Stick around!"

"You're ghosting us mother f*****. If you give away our position again, I'll bleed you. Real quiet."

"Get to the choppa!"

"What the hell are you?"

"They're dug up in there like an Alabama tick."

"Come on, do it! Kill me now! Come on!"

If those one liners weren't enough to certify Predator as action royalty, just look at the dream team of filmmakers behind this project. With John McTiernan (Die Hard) directing, Joel Silver (The Last Boy Scout) producing, Alan Silvestri (The Avengers) scoring, and Stan Winston (The Terminator) doing creature designs, Predator was guaranteed to be an action masterpiece. And just look at the cast! You get Arnold Schwarzenegger (Conan the Barbarian), Carl Weathers (Action Jackson), Bill Duke (Commando), Shane Black (screenwriter of Lethal Weapon), Sonny Landham (48 Hrs.), and Jesse Ventura (The Running Man). Predator oozes so much action royalty that it actually hurts a little bit.

Predator gives a whole new meaning to disarming an enemy of their weapon.

It would also be criminal of me not to mention Kevin Peter Hall, the man inside of the Predator suit. Hall's imposing stature coupled with Winston's masterful creature design makes the Predator one of the best science fiction creatures ever put to the big screen. Even though the Predator dies at the end of the film, Hall would return to play another lead Predator in Predator 2. It is also worth mentioning that none other than Jean Claude Van Damme (Hard Target, Universal Soldier) actually filled out the shoes of the alien for a while before Stan Winston and Kevin Peter Hall came onto the project to turn the Predator into a much more imposing and muscular creature. Sorry Van Damme.

I'm sure no one was aware at the time of making Predator that they would be kickstarting an entire franchise (an incredibly rocky one that is). What separates Predator apart from the rest of the Predator films is that the film takes its sweet time to introduce the Predator. McTiernan took a cue from Jaws by not revealing the creature until the absolute best moment. We get to see the creature's POV, his hands, and his camouflage for a very long time. The Predator doesn't fully reveal itself until about an hour into the movie.

Predator also establishes many staples of the franchise. The jungle setting has since become the most popular of all of the Predator settings (as seen in the return to the jungle in 2010's Predators). The film also introduces us to a few of the Predator's weapons. We get to see his cloaking device, his shoulder mounted laser gun, and his Wolverine styled wrist blades. I forgot how few weapons the Predator uses in this film. It won't be until Predator 2 when we get to see the Predator use his iconic net gun, retractable spear, and spinning razor blades. The film also establishes that the Predator will only kill people using weapons. This establishes that the Predator is only interested in the thrill of the hunt and will never kill unarmed innocents.

Predator is also bolstered by an incredible score by veteran composer Alan Silvestri. The score is incredibly dramatic and works as the perfect action movie score. Every tune in this film will embed itself into your mind and never leave you. Nearly every aspect of Predator will do this to you. It's that excellent.

"One ugly..."

That Predator was John McTiernan's very first big action film astounds me. He would shake the entire action movie community with the perfect one-two-punch of Predator in 1987 and Die Hard in 1988. And while Die Hard will always remain as McTiernan's magnum opus and most popular film, Predator is right up there in terms of pure filmmaking and craftsmanship. Predator is an excellent and masterful action/horror hybrid that packs shootouts, one liners, and a slashing alien creature all in one film. You really feel like you get two movies worth of entertainment out of this film (one being the mission to rescue the presidential cabinet minister and the other being the survival horror story involving the Predator).

Predator is truly one of the greats. The film is arguably Arnold Schwarzenegger's finest film (if not for the even better and far more iconic Terminator films). Like I said, the craftsmanship and filmmaking in this film is incredible. McTiernan wasn't just trying to make a good action film. He was trying to make an excellent film that any one of any genre preference could enjoy. And while Predator never received the box office dollars and critical acclaim of James Cameron's similar "men on a mission"-action-horror hybrid Aliens (1986), the film will always be beloved and held dear to all action cinema fans hearts.

Rating: 10/10 - They just don't make 'em like they used too. 'Nuff said.

Franchise:
Predator (dir. John McTiernan, 1987)
Predator 2 (dir. Stephen Hopkins, 1990)
Predators (dir. Nimrod Antal, 2010)

AvP Spin-Offs:
Alien vs. Predator (dir. Paul W. S. Anderson, 2004)
Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (dir. The Brothers Strause, 2007)