Could have been so much more *spoilers*

Rating: 6/10 (13 August 2004)

Let me preface this review by stating that I enjoyed all of the previous six films that precede AvP.
There are 2 ways to explain this movie-
1. Anderson made a 2hr film (rating notwithstanding) and had to edit it down to 1hr 30min. This is my opinion of AvP. Many scenes from the novelization (book)and even some from the preview were not present. Every single thing in this film felt rushed from beginning to end. You are "introduced" (I say this sarcastically because unless you read the book you will not know 3/4 of the cast's names) to the cast and are in the pyramid area within 10 minutes of the film. The book didn't get there until it had introduced each character in detail and had given you enough back-story to each so that you could (whether or not you chose to) care about them when they are killed. In the film you don't have any idea who people are, -nor do you care. "Oh..that guy's dead" *shrug..move on*. Another reason I feel strongly that this movie was chopped was the quick edits everywhere. just about every scene in the film could benefit from another 30sec here, another minute there, and this damages the continuity of things (the biggest sin being the incubation period of the Aliens. What used to take many hours now goes from face hugger to full grown Alien in a matter of minutes!) From the introductions to the fights, everything was too limited and quick. If you were to blink during a fight scene, you would lose the ability (if you had it to begin with) to follow the jerky, poorly edited & irritatingly dark action. Which brings me to my next complaint- The lighting was not in the favor of the audience (maybe it was just my theater, because the "clips" on the net were much more detailed and well lit) everything (in the pyramid) was a struggle to see what was happening. I was sitting in the back row and it was like trying to watch from the front row. This combined with the blazing speed of the edits made the fights almost unwatchable. It was really a shame because the action scenes (and most scenes dealing only with Aliens and Predators) were the strong points of the film. I thought that the Predators for the most part looked pretty good and the Aliens looked great. Its just a pity we couldn't see more of them on some vicodin instead of the ritalin this film was on. The Predator vision was well done (they use different spectrum's for Aliens/Humans/other) and is consistent with past films. The Predator without his mask is a different story altogether- Stan Winston must feel pretty good right now because no one can top his Predator, it was the only one that looked real, Predator 2 and AvP look like fake rubber masks. This is by far the worst looking Predator face I have seen yet. The "Elder Predators" at the end looked better than the main character, Why? you tell me. The same thing goes with the Face huggers and just about anything showing flesh. It looks like rubber. Really too bad. I know that this would be a better movie if all the little gaps were filled in. And I don't mean violence or swearing (for a PG-13 it wasn't bad) I mean character development and filling out the quick edits. Heres hoping they do it on the DVD.
2. This was the movie Anderson actually made and it's crappy. He needs to learn how to write Dialogue and pacing into his film, action alone is boing and without proper character intros and good on screen dialogue any movie will fall apart. Perhaps this is the way Anderson chose to deliver a bad movie - make everything so blurry and fast that the audience wont be able to decipher the crap. I feel that Resident evil, Event horizon AND Alien resurrection were better than this movie.
Pros/Cons:
Pros: Predators (masks on) and Aliens looked great Action scenes were cool Queen was awesome settings and colors were good looking Predator vision was good Special effects were well done Violence was intact but not over the top
Cons: no character development at all really bad predator face/face huggers relies on the viewer to have seen the other movies. terrible fight editing obvious scenes missing/edited out/movie felt chopped EVERYTHING FELT RUSHED no down time at all nothing to make you care
In closing I would give this movie a 50% or 5 stars out of 10 It is 50% good for action and special effects And 50% bad for acting, character development and editing I truly believe that this was not the movie we were intended to see but it does little to help the quality of this film.
P.S. I am very open minded and feel that most people will HATE this movie. I did not hate it I just felt it was very incomplete. Most folks would rate this movie 20% or 2 stars out of 10 I would guess.