An inexperienced Predator seeks to earn his honor on a dangerous planet, with the help of a Weyland-Yutani synthetic in Dan Trachtenberg’s just freakin’ awesome Predator: Badlands.
To be as direct as the film, Predator: Badlands is badass. Chock full of awesome weapons and vehicles, a zoo full of great creatures, and a heap of amazingly choreographed fight sequences, if you have the heart of a 13-year-old boy (whether deep in your chest or hidden in the basement), you’ll cheer. Badlands taps into a pure popcorn level of giddy enjoyment, like digging into an awesome comic book adventure, with Dan Trachenberg directing with a zip from Patric Aison’s economical script.
In Prey (also written by Aison), Dan Trachtenberg revived the faltered franchise with essentially a remake of the first film, but set three hundred years ago as a young Native American fought the titular alien of the Yautja species. This year’s animated Killer of Killers on Hulu continued his brilliance with the series as three warriors across Earth’s history fought their own. Now, with Badlands, Trachtenberg switches it up further by following a young Yautja as he seeks to prove himself on his own quest. And what a quest! Across 107 minutes, Trachtenberg stuffs the film full of one awesome creature, tech, weapon, and/or action sequence after another with a surprising amount of character to boot. We root for the young warrior, and root hard. It’s not often the critic-only screenings of a film have hoots and hollers at big moments, but it happened at mine.
So, who are we rooting for? For the first time on film, we’re following a Yautja as a protagonist. Dek is the run of his clan, small and seen as weak. It’s awesome to see a Predator who isn’t at the top of his game, fully skilled and ready to take on Arnold. After his father, riding up a freakin’ SLED MADE OF BONES, demands that Dek be killed, Dek ends up on the planet of Ganna. Ganna is one hell of a setting, stuffed with flora and fauna ready to try to kill, maim, and gut anything that moves. He’s out to take down a notorious monster, an “unkillable” creature covered with quills and loaded with more teeth than a nest full of Xenomorphs. Along the way, he meets Thia, a synthetic from Alien’s Weyland-Yutani Corp, missing her legs from her own encounter with the creature. Side note: even with the W-Y connection, there are no shoved-in obvious and eye-rolling easter eggs to the shared franchise. This is not a sly Alien Versus Predator 3.
It plays like a video game. In a good way. With “levels” across forests, water areas, a Weyland-Yutani base, and others, Dek figures out how to use and get past the obstacles and boss monsters. Heck, Thia even functions as a guide, sending him to places, filling in lore and details. But more than just an extended quest and chase, Badland’s makes a turn halfway through that brings a great shift, allowing the set-ups in the first half to pay off in satisfying ways.
And it is a deeply satisfying film. It’s a rush of pure excitement of comic book action. While he’s missing a good chunk of them (let’s not make it too easy), Dek has a great cache of weapons, both of the Predator variety and from his resourcefulness in the field. He fights an increasingly wild set of creatures and environments (mostly CG, but it’s damned good CG. It’s from WETA workshop after all); it’s a bulging bestiary of monsters trying to eat him in every moment. It all comes together with a heap of truly awesome fight sequences. From 10 Cloverfield Lane to Prey to Badlands, Trachtenberg has shown he knows how to stage a scene, creating an amazing tension and wow-factor. The combination of Jeff Cutter’s cinematography combines with Vincent Boullon’s fight choreography astounds (one word that will matter to those who know: legs). Badlands’s heaps of action build up as it goes to a hell of a fist-pumping climax. These sequences are a triumph of action editing, ramping up the bloody, gooey goodness of a great fight. Yes, bloody. True, the movie is PG-13, but don’t let that stop you: as it’s all monsters and robots, there is more wiggle room in the “lower” rating.
Elle Fanning shines, showing her considerable charisma and keen performance choices in making a motormouth droid, she’s missing her legs and not her always running mouth; charming instead of annoying. She’s gifted with a dual role with another synthetic of Tessa, oozing a chilling menace. Across from her is Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi as Dek. He gives an awesome physical acting performance. It’s not a silent performance, but it could be in how well he’s able to physicalize all of Dek’s fights and fears. But he does get to talk, selling the created Yautja language for the film with the ease of a born speaker. Alec Gillis’s fantastic monster suit fits like a glove, coming as real as if it’s his own skin. For the first time, the face is motion capture with CG overlay, allowing a new level of expressiveness for the alien.
Predator: Badlands is a bullet of a film, exploding from the pistol and slamming full speed into a giant monster, splattering goo and guts. Dan Trachenberg is three for three for his films in the Predator franchise with Prey, Killer of Killers, and now Badlands, re-inventing and absolutely delivering on the concepts in crowd-rousing ways. Badlands isn’t a deep film, but it’s popcorn entertainment of the best kind; a blast of energy with so much cool stuff and sequences that it’ll make the 13-year-old in all of us grin.