The Predator

THE PREDATOR (**1/2)

Incredibly loud and wonderfully stupid in its first hour, Shane Black’s THE PREDATOR is a stripped down machine in its opening setpieces but gets derailed by Predator backstory that is just plain stupid. I did not come here for Predator mythology; I came for the predictable Shane Black snark and gory fights between a ragtag group of military outcasts and space hunters. The first half of THE PREDATOR delivers on this; the second half loses steam quickly (despite Black keeping his big action film under two hours, which was much appreciated, the film does drag a bit at the end). The acting and the chemistry are perfect for a movie like this, and it’s one of the reasons why despite the soggy second half, THE PREDATOR is a lot of fun. Boyd Holbrook in the lead has charisma and when Olivia Munn is actually given something to do (which is just in the early parts of the movie) she’s quite good, too. The real standouts, though, are Trevante Rhodes (who has “action star” written all over him) and Sterling K. Brown (who takes a thankless role as the evil government agent and sinks his teeth into it). The beats are all here for fans of the original PREDATOR to recognize the winks and nods to the original, but by the end I just didn’t care that much to see this thing become franchise. But it does have predator dogs! 

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