Excellent Movie, one of my all time favorites

Rating: 9/10 (29 September 2009)

When I saw this movie for the first time, it literally scared me to the point I had to keep a light on at night. Of course I was way younger then. In my opinion this is one of the most brilliant, well thought out creatures I have ever seen. We are given a full scale setup of the lifestyle of this monster. John McTiernan did an excellent job at building tension for this creature. The way it killed people was something new and it all seemed to serve a purpose. Stan Winston defintately delivered on building this creature. Kudos to the late Kevin Peter Hall for delivering an excellent performance in a suit. When looking at the rest of the movie, you have to consider what it is and why this movie works so well. The commandos led by Arnold Swarzenneggar are true 80's action stars which shows in the gun fights. They can shoot at the hip and seem to hit there targets no problem. They barely ever reload, and seem to all come out without much harm. Now this seemed like it was done purposely to deliver on the Predator turning there world into a nightmare. Suddenly they are dying one at a time in a sick toying matter. The gun fight where they all had to reload and pretty much level a Forest without killing anything pretty much took the movie out of the typical 80's action movie style. It was great! This is one of Arnold's few 80's action movies where he didn't dominate. He got lucky and still had to run for his life to make it out alive. How many times did Arnold really have to do that in a movie? Not many. When looking at the making of this movie you cannot help but wonder what would of happened if Jean Claude Van Damme was still playing the predator and if the original design still took place. Makes you think doesn't it? This movie could have been very very bad. I mean look at Commando. Sorry guys it just wasn't good lol. This movie is definitely worth buying the 2 disk DVD. You can see the full documentary making of this movie, plus a look inside Stan Winstons work and the creature. Some really good stuff. A classic in my eyes.