Time Traveling: Predator
Ed. note: TBTS’ “Time Traveling” takes a second look at movies or television you may have forgotten. Anything you touch in this column may change the future, so please use caution.
If you’re an American male aged 30-45, Predator is one of your favorite movies. If you are female, outside that age range, or not an American, please realize that I’m not saying that Predator isn’t one of your favorites. It very well could be. But if you are in the aforementioned group, it almost has to be. If you don’t believe me, approach ten dudes in their mid-30s, say “If it bleeds…” in a Schwarzenegger accent, and listen as eight of them respond (in the same accent) “…we can kill it.” The other two were raised in houses without HBO.
As a kid, Predator was already impossibly cool because it had Arnold, Jesse “The Body” Ventura, Carl Weathers, and Bill Duke. We knew them from previous movies or from wrestling, and afterward made sure we knew who Sonny Landham was. Predator introduced a lot of us to Little Richard, whose “Long Tall Sally” blares in the helicopters that drop Dutch (Schwarzenegger) and his commando team into the shit. The movie also introduced many young boys to the M134 “mini-gun,” a deceptively-named gigantic rotating six-barreled machine gun usually mounted on helicopters. We sincerely doubted such a weapon could be carried—much less fired from the hip—by a normal soldier, but neither Blain (Ventura) nor Mac (Duke) were normal soldiers. We also never realized that a mini-gun accompanied by other automatic weapons could be used for yard work. (Aside: we would fall in love with the mini-gun again four years later in Terminator 2.)
Watching Predator again recently, I realized how cheesy and ridiculous the first half of the movie is. The dialogue and acting are hammy (“Some damn fool told him you were the best,” “My men are not expendable.”). Almost every character is a perfect action movie stereotype: the straight-shooting gruff-but-protective leader with an abundance of horse-sense (Dutch); the awkward, nerdy, glasses-wearing communications specialist (Hawkins); the tobacco-chewing, cowboy-hat wearing, simple-but-deadly country boy (Blain); the quiet preternaturally accurate Native American tracker (Billy); the sharp-witted, religious Hispanic (Poncho); the duplicitous ex-commando “company man” (Dillon); the off-kilter, grudge-bearing lifer (Mac); the attractive rebel who undermines the mission but eventually comes around (Anna). Their assault tactics on the rebel base are, to be generous, unconventional and probably would not result in zero casualties for the home team in the real world. (Yes, I know it’s a movie, but I like a little verisimilitude, like carrying guns at the shoulder instead of the hip, not walking across open expanses during a firefight, etc.)
Predator still works, though. It would have been a good stand-alone action movie (the “Elite Military/Research Team arrives in a remote Jungle/Arctic Locale/Research Facility and is picked off one-by-one by an Alien/Demon/Giant Snake” template wasn’t exhausted until later), but the sci-fi angle really elevates it. Seeing the baddest of military badasses get their asses kicked by superior alien technology is a little shocking, and certainly adds the verisimilitude the first part of the movie lacked. The tone remains serious and not campy (bits of early dialogue excepted). The story itself retains suspense by gradually revealing the alien and its motives, and letting the viewers figure out some things for themselves. Predator also gave us some great quotes: “I ain’t got time to bleed,” “Get to da choppa!” (By the way, this paragraph also describes exactly why you loved Aliens, also one of your favorite movies.)
The Re-assessment: Stock characters? Impossible scenarios? Chest-thumping military bravado, tinged with a bit of jingoism? Yes to all, but Predator was, and honestly still is, one of the best movies of its kind. It’s a hell of an action flick, a hell of a science fiction flick, a hell of a lot of fun to watch. It was also nominated for an Oscar. It’ll stick around.
Time Traveling: Predator
Ed. note: TBTS’ “Time Traveling” takes a second look at movies or television you may have forgotten. Anything you touch in this column may change the future, so please use caution.
If you’re an American male aged 30-45, Predator is one of your favorite movies. If you are female, outside that age range, or not an American, please realize that I’m not saying that Predator isn’t one of your favorites. It very well could be. But if you are in the aforementioned group, it almost has to be. If you don’t believe me, approach ten dudes in their mid-30s, say “If it bleeds…” in a Schwarzenegger accent, and listen as eight of them respond (in the same accent) “…we can kill it.” The other two were raised in houses without HBO.
As a kid, Predator was already impossibly cool because it had Arnold, Jesse “The Body” Ventura, Carl Weathers, and Bill Duke. We knew them from previous movies or from wrestling, and afterward made sure we knew who Sonny Landham was. Predator introduced a lot of us to Little Richard, whose “Long Tall Sally” blares in the helicopters that drop Dutch (Schwarzenegger) and his commando team into the shit. The movie also introduced many young boys to the M134 “mini-gun,” a deceptively-named gigantic rotating six-barreled machine gun usually mounted on helicopters. We sincerely doubted such a weapon could be carried—much less fired from the hip—by a normal soldier, but neither Blain (Ventura) nor Mac (Duke) were normal soldiers. We also never realized that a mini-gun accompanied by other automatic weapons could be used for yard work. (Aside: we would fall in love with the mini-gun again four years later in Terminator 2.)
Watching Predator again recently, I realized how cheesy and ridiculous the first half of the movie is. The dialogue and acting are hammy (“Some damn fool told him you were the best,” “My men are not expendable.”). Almost every character is a perfect action movie stereotype: the straight-shooting gruff-but-protective leader with an abundance of horse-sense (Dutch); the awkward, nerdy, glasses-wearing communications specialist (Hawkins); the tobacco-chewing, cowboy-hat wearing, simple-but-deadly country boy (Blain); the quiet preternaturally accurate Native American tracker (Billy); the sharp-witted, religious Hispanic (Poncho); the duplicitous ex-commando “company man” (Dillon); the off-kilter, grudge-bearing lifer (Mac); the attractive rebel who undermines the mission but eventually comes around (Anna). Their assault tactics on the rebel base are, to be generous, unconventional and probably would not result in zero casualties for the home team in the real world. (Yes, I know it’s a movie, but I like a little verisimilitude, like carrying guns at the shoulder instead of the hip, not walking across open expanses during a firefight, etc.)
Predator still works, though. It would have been a good stand-alone action movie (the “Elite Military/Research Team arrives in a remote Jungle/Arctic Locale/Research Facility and is picked off one-by-one by an Alien/Demon/Giant Snake” template wasn’t exhausted until later), but the sci-fi angle really elevates it. Seeing the baddest of military badasses get their asses kicked by superior alien technology is a little shocking, and certainly adds the verisimilitude the first part of the movie lacked. The tone remains serious and not campy (bits of early dialogue excepted). The story itself retains suspense by gradually revealing the alien and its motives, and letting the viewers figure out some things for themselves. Predator also gave us some great quotes: “I ain’t got time to bleed,” “Get to da choppa!” (By the way, this paragraph also describes exactly why you loved Aliens, also one of your favorite movies.)
The Re-assessment: Stock characters? Impossible scenarios? Chest-thumping military bravado, tinged with a bit of jingoism? Yes to all, but Predator was, and honestly still is, one of the best movies of its kind. It’s a hell of an action flick, a hell of a science fiction flick, a hell of a lot of fun to watch. It was also nominated for an Oscar http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093773/awards . It’ll stick around.
The Brown Tweed Society 
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