brilliantbrown

I watched Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem last night. Here’s my quick, and I mean REALLY QUICK, impression:

It’s a fairly predictable and, frankly, disposable film. AvP2:R good example of all that is wrong with Hollywood blockbusters. This is a film that’s designed to get butts into seats with little regard for their experience once the the ticket has been sold.

The film picks up immediately after the original battle between Alien and Predator races of AvP with the creation of a Alien/Predator hybrid on board a Predator spaceship. This new creature immediately kicks the snot out of everyone on the ship, causing it to crash land back onto Earth, but not before one remaining Predator can send off a distress signal.

Back on the Predator homeworld, the signal is received. Upon learning that something just took out an entire shipload of their dudes, they send a SINGLE FREAKING PREDATOR to investigate. Now if I were in charge of a warrior race and something just took out a whole squad of my dudes, I’d send at least a few guys to check it out.

But this is just the first in 90minutes worth of poor writing of bad decisions. The whole film just comes off as completely unbelievable and nonsensical. Additionally, the poorly written/acted characters never draw me into the world of story, leaving me completely unable to suspend disbelief. The result is that I spent and hour and a half second guessing everything that was stupid about this movie. Why not send more Predators? Why wouldn’t a small town Sheriff call the Feds in when a string of grotesque murders occur? Why wouldn’t you just leave town when the s*** hits the fan?

Why? Because then there’d be no reason to make this movie. This is a film that really has nothing to say outside of it’s (mediocre) action sequences. It’s action for action’s sake, which isn’t good enough if the action isn’t spectacular enough on it’s own.

This was supposed to be a quick review, but I hated this movie so much I had to keep writing. AvP2:R is the kind of film that rests on the laurels of better films that came before it, and I can’t stand that sort of thing. It’s counting on the fact that people will be familiar with the infinitely superior Alien and Predator films (written and directed by infinitely superior people than this drivel), and that this familiarity will put people in front of screens. It’s an attempt to cash in on the work of others.

However good the original films were, this is a film that (through poor writing and general half-assed-ness) turns out to be at best less than the sum of it’s parts and at worst poorly written fan fiction.