If it weren't for "Jingle All the Way," "Junior," "Twins" and a few other steps off the action track, Arnold Schwarzenegger would be the "créme de la créme" of the action genre. That's Rocky Rococo for cream of the crop. When Arnold did star in action films, he was unrivaled in the realm of one-liners and kills. The man never approached Chuck Norris in the kill count column, but his intensity and level of violence are unmatched. Today we bring to you a review of another Arnold classic, "Predator."
Derek:
Early on we learn from Carl Weathers that Arnold is not the regular Army in this flick. Sent into the South American jungle under false circumstances, Arnold and his gang of Army irregulars wreak havoc on a military outpost in search of those who killed some of his fellow soldiers. What ensues once they discover the village can only be described as phenomenal. Arnold kills 29 men in less than three minutes with his fists, guns and knives. He is versatile, and that is why he demands the respect of both Weathers and Jesse Ventura.
However, Arnold's gang will soon discover that Venezuelan paramilitary forces are the least of their worries. The lone Native American among the soldiers soon begins to sense something. If this is not stereotypical I do not know what is. Like a scene out of "Dances with Wolves," the Native American soldier helps the white men survive. The only difference here is that you subtract Kevin Costner and add Arnold and Jesse Ventura.
Arnold seems to be the only one who takes any faith in the extra-sensory superstar and that faith pays off. Arnold is on high alert while the rest of his friends freak out, chew tobacco, make jokes about female genitalia and get torn apart and skinned by a jungle creature that nobody can see or even fathom.
Goat:
Welcome to the jungle, D-rock. Predator is gonna make you bleed! Sorry, I couldn't resist.
"Predator" really does feature an all-star cast of action legends, as Derek mentioned. Schwarzenegger and even Apollo Creed himself (Carl Weathers) are members of an elite military squad dispatched to the jungles of South America to bust some heads. And starring as perhaps the greatest member of the team is none other than Jesse "The Mind/Body/Whatever" Ventura. Toss in a Native American team member who tracks guerilla forces by deep-throating tree branches (no lie), a nerdy guy who constantly cracks jokes about genitals and the same great actor who starred as Cook in "Commando" and you've got the makings for a cinematic masterpiece.
They make their way to the jungle on helicopters presumably piloted by recovering alcoholics — the choppers are constantly weaving, almost crashing into one another the entire trip. It's during this trip that the dynamics of the team are first laid out — Arnold leads, everyone else puts on face paint, Cook shaves — during a helicopter flight — and Ventura sticks to chewing tobacco and churning out one-liners. Add to this the fact that he wears an MTV-emblazoned tank top and carries around a Gatling gun and you've got the formula for an amazing action commodity.
It's a shame Ventura never really got into action movies because it seems to me he could've been a true legend. Immediately after Arnold asks the team not to make a sound, Ventura pulls his enormous gun from its holster (not sure where he bought that one), blatantly disregarding an order from his superior officer. JV bows down to no man, though drops to his knees after the Predator blasts a few rounds through his chest — a worthy death for a mighty man.
Derek:
The Predator roams through the jungle with a cloaking device obviously stolen from the Klingons of Star Trek fame. How and why the Predator would make an alliance with them is beyond me. Something tells me neither of them liked the rendition of Rocket Man by William Shatner during a 1970s science-fiction convention. In any event, the Predator systematically guts, skins and tears apart the bodies of Arnold's men.
The tide begins to turn once Arnold discovers how to defeat the Predator's infrared senses. After jumping off a cliff into a river and tumbling over a waterfall, he pulls himself out of the river and into a cesspool of mud and filth. However, the Predator is right behind him. Arnold scrambles out of the muck and mud and into a pile of dead branches. With the Predator standing virtually on top of him, he discovers that the mud masks his body heat and makes him invisible to the Predator. Much like the appearance of Sloth and Chunk toward the end of "The Goonies" turned the tide against the Fertellis, the discovery of mud as a concealer was the final stake in the coffin for the Predator. Give Arnold an advantage and he'll show you a morgue.
Goat:
The sequence in which the troops storm a rebel camp is the peak action point of the film, with most of the kills and beatdowns coming during the battle that ensues. Arnold and crew wreak havoc on the quite unprepared rebels, gunning down at least 50 opponents in the fight. Everyone gets to shoot a few, though it's Arnold that dominates the death toll race. As Derek said, he clocks some 29 kills in around 3 minutes — if he'd held that number for the rest of the film we'd be looking at "Delta Force"-esque numbers. Sadly, there are only so many rebels to be thrown into the way of the troops.
But that doesn't stop the troops from tallying a few beatdowns and a couple of kills, as they clock one absurdly long environmental beatdown on the rainforest itself following the death of Ventura. Cook begins unleashing an endless stream of bullets from Ventura's Gatling gun by his lonesome, then the rest of the team joins in the fun of firing countless numbers of rounds into the trees and shrubbery — clearing out a large area of the forest. Cook himself also clocks two kills on animals, stabbing a scorpion with his knife and taking down a wild boar later in the film. Apparently Cook has some sort of strange vendetta against nature, and I certainly don't see him joining up with Greenpeace or the EPA anytime soon.
Derek:
The final battle pits Arnold and the Predator in hand-to-hand combat. For an alien, the Predator has many human traits. For one, when the two meet for the decisive battle, the Predator puts away his gun, masks and makes very obvious motions with his hands that he wants to fight. Arnold takes a beating for the first few minutes of the fight. I'm talking about the type of beatdown you get by Goro the first time you reach the final stage in Mortal Kombat. However, intelligence would soon trump brawn. That might be the only time I say this in reference to Arnold, but Arnold devised a trap that would eventually take out the Predator.
Using his muscles he constructs some kind of crushing device that is suspended in the air by a single very strong vine. Once the battle moves back to the position of the crushing device, Arnold snaps the vine and brings about the end of the Predator. Of course, the Predator can't die unless he blows himself up with a warhead packing an amount of power equivalent to that of a small nuclear warhead. And finally, in classic action movie ridiculosity, Arnold survives the blast without a cut, visible bruise or stream of blood. Damn.
Goat:
One-liners are plentiful in "Predator," with almost every major player having a few fun quotes. He tells the Predator that he's "one ugly motherf-cker" and, using his extensive knowledge of biology, notes, "if it bleeds, we can kill it." Arnold delivers a classic "Stick around" shortly after impaling a rebel with a knife and immediately thereafter shouts, "Knock, Knock" while storming another bunker. These back-to-back one-liners are a first as far as I can remember, with Arnold securing his spot as king of the one-liner.
Ventura has a few of the best lines found in the film, despite not being the lead character. On the flight into the jungle, Jesse claims that chewing tobacco "will make you a goddamn sexual Tyrannosaurus — like me." A bit later into the film, after a teammate notifies him that he's been shot and is bleeding, Ventura quips that he "ain't got time to bleed."
"Predator" isn't quite in the same league as some of Schwarzenegger's other films, but it stands the test of time to still be a great action movie almost 20 years after its original release. I give it a respectable score of two Chuck Norrises and a bonus Jesse Ventura.
The Last Action Heroes want to hear from you!! Which of Arnold's many action endeavors do you think is his best? Do you think the Predator actually the better action hero? Let Derek and Ryan know by e-mailing them at [email protected].
