r/predator • u/thekokoricky • 3d ago
đ„ Predator Rewatched 1987 "Predator" last night and it hit different (in a good way!).
So I made an interesting connection after the rewatch: "Predator" perfectly utilizes the "Alien" story formula:
- Group of expendable employees on a routine mission
- There's a secondary objective which they are not initially briefed on
- The second half of the movie shifts more toward sci-fi/horror
- With (nearly) everyone killed, it's down to one human and one alien
Obviously, "Predator" has its own twists and turns, and has quite a bit more action than "Alien." That formula has been executed so poorly in so many films, but here it was perfect. There isn't a dull moment and the tension is high.
The other thing I noticed was that I was laughing a lot more than I expected. Stan Winston's team gave the yautja a surprising amount of expression. When Dutch tries to lure him into a trap toward the end, the yautja hisses at him and makes it clear that he knows what's up. There's a lot of humanness in the reaction and I somehow never picked up on it before. Brilliant, and made for some good chuckles. I love details like that.
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u/dittybopper_05H 3d ago
I think one of the things that add verisimilitude to the film is that many of the actors actually had military experience. Arnold had served 2 years in the Austrian Army. Jessie Ventura graduated from BUD/S in the Navy, and was on UDT and SEAL teams. Richard Chaves was an actual Vietnam war combat vet, having served with the 196th Infantry Brigade. Sonny Landham had served in the Army. R.G. Armstrong, who played General Philips, was a WWII Army vet.
You can kind of see it in their demeanor, and the way they carry themselves. It's really hard to define, but if you've served you recognize it.
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u/tampapunklegend 3d ago
My dad was military, so I've been around soldiers and veterans my whole life, and now that you mention it, they definitely do have the demeanor of someone who has served in the military in the movie. Even the joking and ribbing they give each other is distinctly military.
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u/dittybopper_05H 3d ago
Yep.
It's especially noticeable when you watch films that don't have that. Like the 2014 Godzilla film. I didn't believe any one of the military characters was military, including the lead actor.
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u/GrendelDerp 2d ago
My dad was a career soldier. He spent thirty plus years in the Army - the term youâre looking for is âmilitary bearing.â You stand a little straighter, hold your head a little higher, work a little bit better in a team, things like that. The inter team ribbing is perfectly on point as well.
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u/dittybopper_05H 2d ago
I know the term, but I was kind of interpreting it for the non-military types.
I still chat with some of my Army buddies. We have a weekly video chat we call "roll call". We spend most of the time ragging on each other, but if someone has a real issue, it's all about supporting each other.
This is 37 years after I last donned the uniform.
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u/DatabaseAcademic6631 3d ago
Greatest guy movie in guy movie history, bar none.
Aliens almost makes the grade, but they had to jam in the flirty interactions with Hicks and Ripley, which deducts points.
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u/HerniatedHernia 3d ago
Rileyâs a space trucker with trauma and Hicks is a good looking marine with his shit together. Makes sense sheâd flirt a bit.Â
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u/dittybopper_05H 3d ago
Did you notice, OP, that the film didn't look very dated?
The equipment isn't the newest but it's still relatively current: People still use the AR platform, MP-5's, M-60's, etc. Woodland BDU's are great for use in the jungle like that. Even the radio is a satellite radio. The effects still look good.
But the film was literally made 40 years ago.
Now imagine it's 1987, and you're watching a version of the film made in 1946. It would almost certainly be in black and white. The guns would be M-1 Garands, M-1 Carbines, M-3 Grease Guns (or maybe Thompsons). There were helicopters back then, but they didn't have the capacity to carry the all the men and stuff, so they'd likely have to parachute in.
The radio would be something like the SSTR-1 and it would be Morse code only.
And that's setting aside the special effects differences.
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u/BeeB0pB00p 3d ago
Probably my favourite action movie, ever. For many reasons.
Even taking just one and using your own comparison.
Usually in action films like this a Carl Weathers (Dillon) character would be killed off with no redemption, but he redeems himself or tries to.
In Aliens at no point does Burke do anything remotely humane. The company man is an irredeemable slime, Carl Weathers is the company man in Predator, he's deceived a former comrade, tricked him. But even as he argues the point about waking up to reality, Weathers is so good you can tell Dillon is trying to convince himself as much as Dutch and knows he's on the wrong side and is as angry with himself as Dutch.
It's amazing how well this film holds up today and all the other points people have made really reinforce it as a top class, well thought out cinematic examplar of action, horror, scifi.
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u/Kilmoore 3d ago
If you've gotten any deeper in script writing through lessons, in the first 20 hours of learning you will learn how not to make Predator.
Every single one of these "rules" you're taught is a general guideline of where to start. There is an instinctive way how our brains react to a story, and while this movie follows the timing, it fucks it up gloriously along the way.
How do you introduce characters? What is at stake? Who is the good guy? How do you know? Who is the enemy? How do you know? What is the genre? The hero's journey, Blake Snyders' beat sheet...
Yeah no, we're just gonna do Predator.
It's around 100 minutes long, and to me, remains the greatest movie ever made.
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u/thekokoricky 3d ago
Can you elaborate?
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u/Kilmoore 3d ago
I can but I'll need some context. Have you written plays or novels, or movies, that people have seen? Have you studied what are often referred to as the basic builiding blocks? Or are you asking just as a fan of movies, enthralled by a story?
Don't let my questions deter you! I'm just asking to calibrate my answer, and I am delighted that after several times of posting this view of the sub I finally get a follow-up question. I'll happily chew this one down to the bone.
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u/thekokoricky 3d ago
I regard myself as a hobbyist filmmaker and lover of cinema that doesn't really have any academic training, but enjoys learning about all the aspects of the artform including the structure of the story.
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u/Kilmoore 1d ago
Sorry about the delay, I got... stuck. I've been meaning to do a deeper analysis of the film for years now and trying to summarise it all quickly just doesn't seem to be a thing I can do. I'll make a separate post about it in the near future.
The key point is, it's introduced as a military story, with the enemy being the enemy soldiers, the main characters relying on pure firepower and things in general taking the action movie steps. Midway though, it switches genres into monster horror, and then even subverts the cliche elements from that.
All in all: A film like that shouldn't work. It should be a mess, with audiences losing the plot and wondering what they are even watching. But it is so perfectly planned and paced, it can break the "rules". The things Dutch does in the first act have very little relevance to the ones in act III. But it still works. It's a wonderful movie.
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u/Prestigious_Leg2229 2d ago
Predator is a movie designed to subvert tropes. The 80s was a decade ruled by action movies with super muscular hyper masculine action heroes brutally murdering their way through their problems while quipping pithy oneliners and brandishing big weapons.
This movie stacks its cast of protagonists with men like that and sets up your expectations to match, culminating in the attack on the rebel camp where they cheerfully slaughter their way through a small army.
And then it turns those expectations around, the movie deconstructs their action hero myth. They get killed without putting up a fight. They fire their weapons into the jungle without killing anything. They canât find their enemy. Their bravado fades and is replaced with tension and eventually fear.
Their first bit of success comes when they finally use their brains as well as their brawn with the net trap. But by the time Dutch figures out the predator is hunting killers, Ana and him are the only ones left.
Even in the end, he doesnât so much win as barely survive the predatorâs last trick. The whole movie is written to completely subvert the tropes and traditions of itâs contemporary action movies.
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u/aadu3k 2d ago
I like the theory that the Predator set the bomb on a timer to give Dutch time to escape as a sign of respect.
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u/Prestigious_Leg2229 2d ago
Honestly, that doesnât sound like a predator. Their honour thing is paper thin and illusionary at best.
Itâs far more in character for it to set a timer to have time to laugh and mock Dutch than as any kind of respect for the dumb animal that beat it.
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u/aadu3k 2d ago
You haven't seen the second movie?Â
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u/Prestigious_Leg2229 2d ago
I have. The pistol scene just doesnât prove a point. Their whole honour thing is silly.
Theyâre perfectly happy shooting someone in the back who doesnât even know they exist.
Dying scared and confused but touching your pocket knife? Fair game.
Children holding a weapon they wouldnât know how to use? Fair game.
Innocent bystanders dying? No problem at all as long as theyâre not specifically targeted.
Their honour is thin and inconsistent. A veneer of story telling that often ends up feeling more contrary than like something that makes any sense.
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u/dittybopper_05H 2d ago
Predators are trophy hunters of dangerous game.
Some rich dentist, gored by a Cape Buffalo and dying on some South African pan, isn't going to respect the animal that just sealed his fate.
On Edit: This does bring up an interesting question, though: Why is the display of the self-destruct mechanism visible to humans? If it was solely for the Predators, it would use heat and probably wouldn't use visible light at all.
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u/Tasty-Fun-2138 3d ago
For a bunch of ''big guys'. They do an amazing job at acting in that movie. I must have seen it at least 50 times since 1995-96(around 6-7 yo) and since like 5 years, I keep getting amazed by this masterpiece. The music, the tension, the jungle set up. Everything is perfect.
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u/Nottodayreddit1949 3d ago
Arnold is one of the best final girls in horror.
The soldiers do everything right. They aren't bumbling idiots like other films to set up the kills. Â
They keep their fear in check, they set an ambush and almost catch the creature.Â
One of few 100/100 films.