Movie reviews: AVP Alien versus Predator (2005)
I must admit that I really like the concept of a “vs.” movie. Taking two or more iconic film characters and letting them loose against one another really works when the story and setting work, not to mention choosing the right icons to go at one another. For example, I really enjoyed Freddy vs. Jason, although I am not really a fan of either individual franchise. The two, while both slasher horror villains, are complete opposites in the way the go about their “business.” Freddy is the wisecracking, humorous villain who is tougher than he looks (and only completely effective inside a dream state) while Jason is the large and imposing no nonsense killer who stalks his prey with a cold efficiency. It’s possible that a Michael Myers would have worked playing off of Freddy, but a Michael vs. Jason film, for example, could never really work because the two killers are so similar in nature. Throw in a hero, such as Ash from the Evil Dead series with a Freddy and Jason or Michael, and you’ve got all the fixing for a fabulous “vs” film. So, where does a film like AvP fit in? Pretty well, actually. When compared against the entirety of the Alien and Predator franchises, I’d have to rank it smack dab in the middle. It’s better than the final two Alien films and it also surpasses the second Predator movie, but, obviously, fails miserably to compete with the likes of Alien, Aliens, and Predator.
Besides Aliens and Predators, Alien vs. Predator stars Lance Henriksen (The Terminator) as Charles Bishop Weyland, multi-billion dollar robotics magnate and inspiration for the “Bishop” series of androids as seen in a couple of the Alien films. It happens that one of his satellites picks up a heat signature from a remote and supposedly desolate island in the antarctic. He assembles a team of fodder, I mean scientists, led by cold weather terrain expert Alexa Woods (Sanna Lathan, Nip/Tuck). According to the fodder’s findings, this may be the very first pyramid ever built. It combines elements from Cambodian, Aztec, and Egyptian architecture. Once the team manages to get inside, the temple becomes a transformer, and it would probably fit right in on Cybertron but it comes off as a little too much here. We already have two awesome villains to chew the team up. Why turn the temple into a transformer, then? A weak explanation is given, but suffice it to say that as the story moves along, the fodder is killed off one by one by both species, and our heroine will have to “choose a side”