I think the first time I
saw Predator
– the original one with Arnold Schwarzenegger – was at a friend’s
birthday party. I’m not positive
that’s right, but we saw a lot of R-rated movies at his house, so
I’m guessing that was it. His name was Wayne and his parents were
super cool. His mom spoke English as a second language and his dad
worked a lot, so there was a little less parental guidance in the
“what movies are appropriate for these eleven-year-olds to be
watching” department. Dude’s parents weren’t neglectful or
anything; stuff just slipped by a little more easily.
So at some point we
watched Predator.
Arnold Schwarzenegger was The Man. At the time I knew him from his
Conan movies. While I didn’t like Conan
the Barbarian
as much as I did Beastmaster,
I did prefer Arnold to Marc Singer. I don’t think any of us knew
quite what to expect from Predator,
which is an advantage the 80’s have over present day. What we got
was a bunch of badasses doing badass shit for about half an hour. I
remember how shocked and stoked I was to see Jesse “The Body”
Ventura in the movie alongside Arnold. The movie got right to the
point in establishing that these were some tough hombres that you
would not want to mess with.
And then they started
getting slaughtered.
Side
Note: As a clue to just how big a phenomenon Arnold Schwarzenegger is
try Googling “Ar”. His name was the first thing that popped up
when I did it.
Very much like wrestling
psychology, Predator
set Dutch’s squad up to be the biggest, baddest dudes around just
so that when the Predator showed up it would look that much more
impressive. Beat up a little guy and nobody gives a shit. But come in
and take out Brock Lesnar in your first match and people are going to
be amazed. And the Predator was taking out the equivalent of a
Survivor Series team of Brock Lesnar, Triple H, Hulk Hogan, The Rock,
Stone Cold, and… well… Jesse Ventura. All by itself.
You see, Predator
isn’t really about horror – though there are certainly elements
of that. It’s also not really science fiction, though that’s in
there too. This movie is about shock and awe. The best of the best –
the guys that the elite turn to when they are out of options – get
taken down, one by one, by an Unstoppable Force.
But eventually the
Unstoppable Force meets the Immovable Object, and that’s where Shit
Gets Real.
I’ll get to that in a
second, but first I want to mention the poor fellas that got fed to
the alien hunter before Arnie stepped up to bat.
I was so
fucking bummed
when Jesse Ventura ate it. He was one of the first heel wrestlers I
really liked and I hated to see him go. I had thought for sure he
would at least get to suplex the damn alien. But no such luck. He got
blasted from behind. But it was one of the nastier wounds in the
movie. Ribs all sticking out of the gaping chest wound and what not.
I was also bummed when
Carl Weathers died. He had yet to play the greatest character of his
career – Chubbs Peterson – but I knew him from the Rocky
movies. I can’t say I was necessarily a fan, but I was familiar
with the guy and the insane-o handshake from the beginning of
Predator
proved that he was at least close to being on equal ground with
Arnie:
I guess Billy was really
the only character that earned some death sympathy on his own merits
rather than being a known actor. He had that whole cool Native
American thing going on. He seemed like the guy who was most likely
to make it out of the jungle. But then he had to go and do the whole
mano-a-mano thing and suffer a death that was either too gruesome or
too embarrassing to show in the movie.
And that’s when it came
down to Arnold Schwarzenegger versus the Predator, which is where
everybody knew we were really going all along. It is an absolutely
amazing finale to the movie. Not only does it provide an almost
unbearable level of tension and action, we get to see just how
amazing the Stan Winston-designed Predator costume is. More often
than not when you have a dude in a creature suit, that dude is
somewhat restricted in what he can do. He can’t run, you can’t
shoot from certain angles for fear of exposing the seams, and he
certainly can’t engage in any meaningful physical interactions with
the human co-stars. Not so with the Predator. That thing does
everything you could think of doing in the big climax of an action
movie, up to and including engaging in fisticuffs with the former Mr.
Universe. To this day it is nothing short of astonishing to watch.
And then that helmet came
off and we saw just how uncanny that alien design was. I didn’t
even understand what I was looking at that first time. And while the
Predator looked so much more vicious without its headgear, that was
the point at which the tide turned. It had a face now – it was
mortal and vulnerable.
In the end Arnie won. But
he really didn’t. He lost his team, his friends. Even in defeat his
enemy came close to claiming the hero’s life with the Predator
equivalent of a cyanide capsule – an explosive device that clears
around three blocks worth of forestation. And the final image of a
burned, beaten, and shocked Major Alan “Dutch” Schaefer
staggering out of the ruined jungle is hardly victorious.
Predator
made a huge impact on me. It was everything I loved in one movie –
horror, sci-fi, action, larger-than-life heroes, soldiers (I was
still actively collecting GI Joe then, even as my friends were moving
away from toys) – and I couldn’t wait to see it again. Right up
until DVD came about I never felt like I could get a good enough look
at the Predator’s face. Sure, they had pictures in Starlog
(man, I miss that magazine a
lot)
and Fangoria;
but seeing it in motion on film was a whole different experience.
Still shots just didn’t compare.
And with that, I have
once again expanded what was meant to be an intro to a toy review
into an entire post. Come back tomorrow for that toy review. I think
on Wednesday I might do what I did here today for Predator
2. As a
matter of fact, I think this whole week might be for Predators…
-Phantom
Woohoo! Predator week is off to a good start, that was a fun read. I think Predator was the first R-rated movie I saw in the theater. I may have mentioned it before, but my parents did not really have a problem with us watching incredibly violent movies (as long as they didn't also have a bunch of nudity) because they felt their children were intelligent enough to separate fantasy from real life consequences.
ReplyDeleteI love them for that, and my wife is adamant that I do not raise our kids the same way. Anyway, we went because my Grandfather wanted to see it liking any movie that looked like it involved the military. I didn't really know what the movie was going to be about, but it instantly became my favorite Arnold movie (surpassing Running Man, probably equally inappropriate for a 6-year old to have seen).
Anyway, this theme week is coming at a good time for me. I just finished reading AvP Omnibus 1 and 2, and almost finished with Predator omnibus 2. I also just purchased and watched 'Predator' and 'Predators' on blu-ray and watched each one in the last three weeks. On top of that I'm anxiously awaiting my pre-order of Neca Predator series 8 to ship.
I love the Dark Horse AvP stuff. I'll be talking about those on Friday. I didn't order the new series. I'm definitely getting them, but I've had such good luck finding non-Exclusive NECA stuff at Toys R Us I couldn't justify paying shipping. I know at some point I'll probably miss a wave from something when TRU cuts back on the amount of NECA product they stock.
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