GRcade

Cheeky Devlin wrote:
AvP2 ... The uncut version is actually watchable. It has some good effects, a lot of gore and action. Plus the Predator is the star of the film. It goes weird with a hybrid alien predator seeking out pregnant women for shock value. And the ending was done better in Return of the Living Dead. But, it's still gory fun.

The AvP movies are a weird one for me. I'm the opposite to most people in that I vastly prefer AvP: Requiem to AvP.
Neither movie is particularly good, but AvP is just dull. It's focused on the humans, it's got mostly rubbish fights (The bit where the Predator is smashing it into columns by it's tail is probably the best bit), a boring as strawberry float maze environment and stupidly large Predators that just look wrong. There's also a lot more obvious CGI. I've never rated Anderson as a director. Also having watched both this and Resident Evil again recently it's actually shocking how similar they are in a lot of ways. The details might be different but the structure is almost identical (Colin Salmon gets diced in both of them too).

AvP: Requiem I enjoyed a lot more. Again I rewatched it recently. The CGI is far less noticable and the Aliens and Predators all look much, much better. The Predator actually felt like a Predator. It's the right size, it's moves correctly and it's got some really cool sequences.
It's got some nasty strawberry floating kills in it as well. The PG-13/12 rating for AvP meant it could never really get too violent, the R/18 for this one meant that wasn't a problem. Arguably it's a little too nasty in places.

My main issues with AvP2 comes down to two thing.
One, it's far too strawberry floating dark. I get that it was to help mask some of the CGI work but it makes it so hard to see what's happening.
Two, literally none of the human characters are worth caring about. They're all utterly disposable. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I cared about none of them. So much so I strawberry floating cheered when the blonde girl gets nailed to the strawberry floating wall out of nowhere by the spinning blade.

Outrunner wrote:

Cheeky Devlin wrote:
AvP2 ... The uncut version is actually watchable. It has some good effects, a lot of gore and action. Plus the Predator is the star of the film. It goes weird with a hybrid alien predator seeking out pregnant women for shock value. And the ending was done better in Return of the Living Dead. But, it's still gory fun.

The AvP movies are a weird one for me. I'm the opposite to most people in that I vastly prefer AvP: Requiem to AvP.
Neither movie is particularly good, but AvP is just dull. It's focused on the humans, it's got mostly rubbish fights (The bit where the Predator is smashing it into columns by it's tail is probably the best bit), a boring as strawberry float maze environment and stupidly large Predators that just look wrong. There's also a lot more obvious CGI. I've never rated Anderson as a director. Also having watched both this and Resident Evil again recently it's actually shocking how similar they are in a lot of ways. The details might be different but the structure is almost identical (Colin Salmon gets diced in both of them too).

AvP: Requiem I enjoyed a lot more. Again I rewatched it recently. The CGI is far less noticable and the Aliens and Predators all look much, much better. The Predator actually felt like a Predator. It's the right size, it's moves correctly and it's got some really cool sequences.
It's got some nasty strawberry floating kills in it as well. The PG-13/12 rating for AvP meant it could never really get too violent, the R/18 for this one meant that wasn't a problem. Arguably it's a little too nasty in places.

My main issues with AvP2 comes down to two thing.
One, it's far too strawberry floating dark. I get that it was to help mask some of the CGI work but it makes it so hard to see what's happening.
Two, literally none of the human characters are worth caring about. They're all utterly disposable. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I cared about none of them. So much so I strawberry floating cheered when the blonde girl gets nailed to the strawberry floating wall out of nowhere by the spinning blade.

This sums up my feelings on AvP Requiem. It's not the greatest film by a long shot but I found it entertaining. Which is more than I can say for AvP. AvP and The Predator are the only two Predator movies that haven't enjoyed. AvP was dull and The Predator was really, really bad. I watched it for free on the plane and still felt ripped off.

My own ranking (until I get round to watching Prey)

Predator
Predators
Predator 2

AvP: Requiem


AvP





The Predator

Moggy wrote:AvP Requiem is the only one I haven't seen.

Preezy wrote:The Last Castle (2001) - 8/10

Hadn't seen this in a number of years but it still holds up really well. James Gandolfini and Robert Redford put in great performances and it's just a really solid movie. Some weird blurry camera effects in some scenes as well as some odd bluescreen (maybe?) distracts a few times, but not enough to detract from the experience.