What made me think this film would actually be worth the time I spent in the theater?

Rating: 2/10 (25 August 2004)

*Spoilers ahead  like they are going to be any surprise*
I should have known this film would suck as thoroughly as it did, so why was I surprised at how bad it turned out to be? Paul W.S. Anderson outdid himself with 'Alien Vs. Predator', a 101 minute crap-fest that had me struck dumb with its idiocy. The alleged 'story' is that there is an archaeological expedition of a pyramid that is 2,000 feet below the surface of Antarctica. No, its okay  you read that right. A billionaire, played by Lance Henriksen, (oh the irony!) has commissioned a crack team of explorers, archeologists and scientists to 'discover' this pyramid  because we find out after he conveniently starts hacking up a lung that he wants to 'make his mark before he dies.' Luckily, that happens in the near future, along with pretty much every other sap that goes along on this bogus journey. Back to the original 'plot', however  buried deep within this pyramid are the legends of two great movie franchises of the late 1970's and 1980's  the Aliens and the Predators. Little did we know, after sitting through a handful of their respective films, they turn out to have a history together, and it's a little embarrassing, in that the Aliens, thousands of years ago, were basically bred to be the Predators' cannon fodder  they were hunted by these great dread-locked beasts who have masks like Silons, only without the cool red light moving back and forth. The humans become the bait in order for the Aliens to come out and play with them, and they in turn are then hunted by the Predators.
The tagline for this film is 'Whoever wins We lose.' Truer words were never spoken. I found myself, within the first minute of the appearance of the Aliens/Predators not even caring who won or lost  I wanted every human on the screen dead, and I wanted the movie to be over as quickly as possible. There isn't even a point to listing why this film was so crappy, because I somehow don't think that the studio will pay for my carpel tunnel surgery. I would have even been satisfied with some good fight scenes, but the one and a half scenes that actually gave the title of the film any credence were so jumbled and shaky that I was longing for a battle between Gamera and Baragon or something. Japanese guys in rubber suits would have been more satisfying than anything this film had to offer. The only thing that 'saved' this film from getting a tepid three millimeters incline of 'thumbs up' and instead got it a whopping four millimeters was the fact that I got so many laughs out of it. Unfortunately, they were not during the moments that Anderson wanted the audience to laugh, (I think during the ceremonial rite of carrying off one of the fallen Predators while one of the remaining humans that teamed up with it to fight a big Alien looked on (yes, you read that right too) was supposed to elicit a more serious thought than 'At least they could offer to drop her off  they have a spaceship and she has no way to get home.') Because I howled in some spots, the film gets maybe one star as opposed to a half star. MAYBE one star  I'm feeling a little nostalgic for Mystery Science Theater 3000 at this point and am therefore a little softer.