This movie was an absolute blast to watch. There have been a few Predator movies added to the franchise and most of them have been mixed with the Alien franchise. Most of them aren’t good. Prey is a return to form where the story centers on just a few characters, who are outmatched, in a battle for their survival.
Prey takes place a few hundred years before the original Predator film. It is 1719, in the Northern Great Plains, where we meet Naru, a Commanche. She is on a mission to prove herself to her tribespeople. She wants to do more than collect food and practice medicine, she has her sights set on being a warrior. She tells her brother, Taabe, that she is ready for the kuhtaamia–to hunt a dangerous predator solo. The ultimate test between apex predators. Despite her growing skills, he doesn’t think she’s ready. Her mother thinks she wants to do it for the wrong reasons. Others are far more dismissive, thinking she should stay in the role that the tribe culture has long established.
Naru, while out on her own in the woods starts to notice that something odd is happening. She’s finding strange tracks and dead animals killed in odd ways. She sees something in the sky and believes it’s a sign that her time is coming. When Naru tells others of what she sees, they brush it off. The more signs she sees, the more she believes that something new, not a bear or mountain lion that they normally deal with, is circling them.
This movie is smart in its presentation of the characters. It shows you far more than it tells you. You learn about Naru not just by what she says, but by what she does. You recognize that’s she observant and smart long before Taabe defends her coming along on a rescue mission to the other men in the tribe. The movie works so well because it gives you capable and fleshed out characters to care about in a believable environment. The character’s personalities come out naturally through all of the actions and subtle setups that are sprinkled throughout. All of these elements respect the audience’s intelligence, it doesn’t pander with too much exposition. You witness characters change amongst the threats that appear from all angles. The pacing of a growing threat is spot on, which propels the movie. And then when things pop off, it is so satisfying.
The script keeps the characters in the dark for much longer than the audience. We don’t see the Predator in full until far into the movie, but it’s clear what’s happening very early on. The filmmakers know you know what a Predator is. It puts you into the position of wanting the heroes to recognize that they are in danger as fast as possible so that they can come up with a plan to stay alive.
The action scenes are all awesome. It’s a pretty gory affair even with a lot of violence happening off-screen. The VFX are all largely very good and that sells what the Predator is and what it’s doing. Prey pulls all of the best parts of the first two movies, and puts it in a new era to make the journey new and interesting. Everything feels fresh, but familiar which I think is the ultimate goal of a sequel or prequel.
I have a few quibbles but none of them are really worth mentioning because they don’t detract enough from how much I enjoyed this. The trailer for this looked promising and the final film absolutely delivers.
