Recently, 'The
Predator' (2018) has been showing in the cinemas, leading to a renewed interest
in this iconic monster from the cinema. The whole story of 'Predator' started
with John McTiernen's 1987 film, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger in one of his
most famous roles. Now is the brilliant opportunity to look at the iconic film
that starts it all!
As you may have
noticed, the name 'Arnold' has already been mentioned a number of times in my
previous articles. Well, I would always admit that Arnold Schwarzenegger is my favorite
actor of all time. Ever since I have started watching most of his key films in
my teenage years, Arnold has always been a sort of cinematic superego (in the
Freudian sense) for me. True, I will never be as muscular as him - though I do
go to gym often - I want to be someone as humorous, open-minded and charismatic
as him. Personally, I think Arnold is an underrated actor - because people
tends to focus on what he cannot do as an actor instead of what he has
achieved. While I will never compare his performance to the greatest actors in
cinema, there is no doubt that Arnold has chosen and starred in some of the
most iconic films in the 20th century -
The Terminator series, Total Recall, Predator, True Lies, Conan the Barbarian,
Commando, even comedy like Kindergarten Cop and Junior. Not only these films
have shaped the way we look at modern action cinema, they have buried so deep
into the culture of our generation. Arnold is the god of 'cheesy one liners',
and I definitely love them! If you think they are silly, then just observe how
many time you hear quotes like 'I'll be back', 'Let off some steam' and the
joke 'Phased Plasma Rifle in the 40 watt range' recurs in so many comments on
the web. If you still need one more example of Arnold's intelligence, dodge
this - when he was in politics, in one occasion a commoner threw an egg onto
his face, expecting him to be embarrassed. 'Now you owe me bacon', that was
Arnold's response. With such a simple and improvised 'cheesy one liner', Arnold
defused the whole situation with a sense of humor. He will always be remembered
as someone significant in the history of cinema.
Indeed, 'Predator'
(1987) turned out to be one of Arnold's most iconic films. In the film, he had
to fight with something beyond human - an extra-terrestrial organism known as
'Predator'. I believe some of you may already have heard of this alien before,
but I will give the most important info about this species. The predators are
advanced organisms with a high intelligence, and they possessed a number of
advanced technologies, have camouflage ability, and are comfortable with space
travel. They have advanced visions, based on infrared and detect the thermal
signature of other species. One of their most sophisticated equipment is a
bio-mask which helps them to visualize things with a higher resolution and aids
their mission. It also serves as a portal to relay data back to the Predator
clan, to the head quarter’s server so they can analyze the information and
experience of the individual members - that kind of cloud computing.
Their most signature
aspect, however, is their innate aggression and the strong will to fight. The
predators have pride in their ability to hunt other organisms, and they are
even proud of the fact that they can hunt down those they believe are worthy
opponents. I wonder that if there is a UFC in the universe, the predators would
probably be like the Gracie family in this universe MMA championship. In fact,
for many young predators, a successful hunt is a rite of passage for them,
their way to show to the others they have grown up. Believing in a strong sense
of honor, if a predator failed in a hunting mission, or was severely wounded by
their enemies, they would commit a honorable suicide by activating the self-destruction
program on their portable computers, an idea quite similar to seppuku in the
culture of Bushido. Able to travel around space in their spaceships, predators
have come to various parts of the universe for hunting trips, to hunt down
various kinds of species they find challenging. Humans, unfortunately, have
always been one of their targets, and the story of the 1987 film is about
Jungle Hunter, a predator who attempted to kill a number of soldiers and
military officers.
When the story
commenced, a spaceship was seen travelling close to Earth and ejected an object
through the atmosphere. That was not a mere dot - it was Jungle Hunter, a
predator who planned to conduct some hunting trips on our planet. Finding a
paradise in a tropical Central American forest for his violent rampage, Jungle
Hunter has haunted many villagers around that area, because of both his
brutality and the added advantage he could render invisible to human vision
during his hunting attempts, making him an unseen and threatening enemy. Soon
after, a military rescue team, led by a veteran major Dutch (Schwarzenegger), arrived
there for a rescue mission. It turned out that Dutch's supervisor, Dillon, has
further intentions than using them as a rescue team - they are used as instruments
to carry out assassinations on a number insurgent fighters around that area.
After learning the truth of their mission, Dutch was really upset because he
could not believe Dillon, an old friend of his, has such a nefarious purpose.
But that's not the end of the story. Because an invisible enemy - the Jungle
Hunter - has already set his sight on this team of worthy opponents and started
stalking on them. Very soon, the platoon was aware that they have been followed
by some unknown enemy. The jungle became an arena for a game of elimination,
and eventually who could become the equal match to this warrior from another
universe?
Predator is certainly a
film about plenty of action, yet people often overlook the cleverness of the
plot. John McTiernen's heroes are not only strong, but they are also very
intelligent when they deal with crisis, especially when they are alone. The
more you look at a film like 'Predator', you start to see the intelligence
behind the film. Dutch is not only a muscular man with brawn, he also possessed
leadership skills, problem-solving skills, and a tremendous ability of
resilience. These aspects are what I will concentrate on here (sorry, not the
muscle!).
As I have pointed out
before, while individualism is often celebrated in McTiernen's films, the
filmmaker does not undermine the effectiveness of team work. The hero will
often have to blend in nicely to the team to bring the action forward. At the
point an unknown enemy was identified, Dutch called into the action an
organized hunt to find out their enemy. It was clear that Dutch's team worked
as an effective one, because they have successfully killed all the insurgent in
a very short span of time. Thus, when the body count started to increase in
Dutch's side, it was not necessarily their incompetency. At the starting part
of their encounter, the Predator had a number of advantages against Dutch's
team. First, he was rendered invisible during their first encounters, and the
Jungle Hunter has successfully killed two members in the platoon before a
massive fire fight broke out between the 2 parties. By hiding and jumping
effectively through trees, he successfully sniped a number of Dutch's men with
his advanced plasma weapon. True, someone can argue this is an unsportsmanlike behavior
(see later), yet from a military and pragmatic point of view, the Jungle Hunter
won this round because he would let the environment become his advantage, and
Dutch's men was stranded by Jungle Hunter's control of the situation. The heavy gun fire wounded the Predator on
his arm, and he bled with some luminescent green blood. Later when the team
investigate this weird material, Dutch uttered the one of the most iconic one-liners in all
of the Schwarzenegger cinema:
DUTCH
If it bleeds, we can kill it.
This line has become an
iconic line and it has been parodied or distorted by many. To me, we don't need
to over-analyze this, because the meaning is plain and simple. Dutch was
showing his neat problem-solving skill. The only way to crack a problem is to
identify the key point that leads to the solution. Isn't that the way we are
often taught when dealing with exams? There is a certain point that you have to
identify the keywords and the implications behind that. Then comes the Eureka
moment that will lead you to the direction for the solution. This is not
simplistic or silly, indeed Arnold has used such a simple and memorable
statement to show us the golden rule of solving problems. If bleeding is the
key, then just make him bleed more! Yes I know it sounds like a trash talking
line from John Travolta's character in 'Broken Arrow', but that's the case.
After this realization,
the team played with their next strategy - setting traps around the forest to
catch their enemy out. Not only the attempt led to the demise of a wild pig,
more characters were injured or eventually killed. Dutch soon found himself
alone in this ordeal, and he also came to the recognition that his enemy only
picked worthy men as opponents, hence the girl they have captured have never
been targeted throughout the process. Soon after the Jungle Hunter got his
hands on Dutch and wounded him. Desperately Dutch asked the girl to 'gettttt to
the CHOPPERRRRR!!' and he had to face this other-worldly enemy alone. While in the hot pursuit, Dutch accidentally
fell into a river and the mud has covered Dutch. Because that reduced his
thermal signature, the Predator could not see Dutch clearly through his
infrared vision with the bio-mask. Escaping the Predator, Dutch immediately
picked up this knowledge and knew the mud would be useful for him against the
Predator.
Now utterly alone,
Dutch has already learnt a lot from his experience. He understood that the
firearms the team has got was not effective enough to deal with the Jungle
Hunter, and he had to play the game with stealth because that was a strategy
the Predator has been using a lot during the encounter - a face to face
encounter would not give humanity any advantage in this case. Dutch started to
get prepared for the final showdown and he made a lot of traps and more
primitive weapons to deal with this situation. Knowing the mud would provide camouflage,
he covered himself with mud. He went as far to set fire and give a war cry - a
signal of challenge. Yes that might sound a bit corny but at least the Predator
liked it that way.
The final showdown
broke out between the two and that was as intense as any skirmish. Dutch has successfully
disabled Jungle Hunter's portable device, but to the Predator, Dutch was just a
piece of cake. Soon the alien gained an upper hand and cornered Dutch -
literally nowhere to run. Seeing the whole situation as a matter of honor, Jungle
Hunter decided to give Dutch one last final round. He took off all the weapons
that could give him advantages and engaged Dutch in a hand-to-hand combat
(that's why I mention UFC before). Clearly Dutch was no match for this alien
and he was knocked around by the Jungle Hunter. The affirmative thing, though,
was that even facing with such an unsurmountable rival, Dutch had plenty of perseverance
and resilience to come back, and he was calm enough to see that the Jungle
Hunter might step into the trap. With a sense of ego and hubris, the Predator
certainly thought he could squash Dutch like a grapefruit, and he started to be
over-confident and made careless mistakes. Indeed, Jungle Hunter could have
easily defeated Dutch using his advanced weapons and sniping skills, yet the
inflated ego of the alien meant that he saw all these unsportsmanlike, and he
wanted to beat Dutch in a fair fight. From these, Jungle Hunter underestimated
humanity’s potential and led to his own downfall. Dutch eventually saw an opportunity
and released a counterweight onto Jungle Hunter, and that completely destroyed
him! Bleeding profusely and dying on the floor, Dutch inquired 'What the hell
are you' to this ugly motherfxxker (that's a fair statement sadly), but Jungle
Hunter refused to comply. Displaying a final sense of honor, he activated his
self-destruction device and committed suicide - yet he decided to die with
Dutch together. Sensing an out-of-proportion explosion was brewing through the
Predator's creepy laughter, Dutch dashed away the faster he could manage and
escaped from the mushroom cloud that resulted from this massive explosion.
Humanity has affirmed
themselves by defeating such a formidable opponent from another universe. This
feat has then inspired more Predators to try their luck on the Earth, yet we
know that humanity will be up for the challenge!
by Ed Law
Film Analysis
