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August 15, 2004

Aliens vs. Predator

I'm back in Colorado Springs for a weekend with the family, so Amanda and I checked out some movies. I thought Alien and Aliens were two excellent movies in their respective genres, and they had the potential to really go somewhere. Unfortunately, the third Alien film threw away what they'd built by killing off the interesting characters they'd developed in the first two films, and the fourth film was, well, crap. Nonetheless, I couldn't resist checking out AVP, even though I'm not familiar with the Predator mythos.

Overall, I'd give AVP three stars: worth seeing as a matinee, but not at full price. Let's be honest: the point of this movie is to set up the fight between the Aliens and the Predator(s). Unfortunately, the film takes a little too much time setting up the premise, and not enough letting the film's protagonists get down to business. When the battle is on, it's well worth the hype. Unlike previous Alien movies, AVP offers the Aliens a foe that can actually stand toe-to-toe with them and even offer the possibility of beating the Aliens. The best scene in the film comes when a Predator takes on a single Alien. The film could have done with more of this, but you have to take what you can get. If you're a fan of the Aliens movies, you'll find AVP a decent addition to the series.

But the best thing to come out of the film is this poster.