Review: Predator 2 (1990)

People in the Movie:  Danny Glover, Gary Busey, Kevin Peter Hall

Director:  Stephen Hopkins   

Pigeonhole:  Action / “Sci-Fi”

The Basics: Seven years into the future, during a very hot summer, Los Angeles is being torn apart by a gang war in between two drug cartels.  Lt. Mike Harrigan (Glover) is a shoot-first-ask-questions-later street cop, who, along with 3 of his detectives are trying to save the city.  There are even bigger problems, a humanoid-like alien, a Predator (Hall), is also stalking, hunting, and killing in the city, and he is not choosing sides.  

Recommendation: This is nice action film that reasonably succeeds as a sequel.  As a standalone (meaning you did not see the first film) it will work fine, in fact, it might actually “seem” better not having seen the first film.  “R” rating is for violence, language, and brief nudity.

My Take:  The idea of the Predator in the “urban jungle” works well.  The movie also follows some sequel good rules: the kills are more gory, the Predator has more diverse weapons, and the good guys are no better at stopping this Predator than in the prior film.  My only criticisms of the film lie in the casting, and the subplot of the government’s desire to capture the Predator.   

**spoiler alert** Let me start by saying that Danny Glover is a great actor, and I respect his place in Hollywood, as well as enjoying many of his films.  However, I did not like his role being cast as Lt. Harrigan in Predator 2.  The role called for an action character capable of taking on vicious street gangs, shrugging off politics and ultimately interference from the government, as well as physically taking down a Predator.  I accept him as the “rogue cop who can’t follow the rules” (a favorite movie moniker of my brother), but appearing physically able to be fighting the street gangs early in the film then taking on the Predator later – especially chasing him building to building as it is portrayed towards the end of the movie- is too much of a stretch for me.  Glover was just coming off his role in Lethal Weapon 2, where is portrayed as getting “too old for this”, yet he comes back and does this, an even more physically challenging role, and as a detective, no less?  Unfortunate. 

In addition, the whole subplot of a DEA group headed by Agent Keyes (Busey) attempting to capture the Predator was bordering on ludicrous.  Keyes and his crew supposedly have a bunch of intelligence and data tracking the Predator through Los Angeles, including information about the Predator who took out the Special Forces group in the original movie, yet they believe they can capture him by spraying him down with liquid nitrogen?  That is almost horror movie stupidity on display.  Fortunately, that stupidity is rewarded with the Predator dispatching Keyes and his team with haste.

In spite of these issues, it is still a good paced movie, with good action sequences, and even better is that at the end of the movie when more is revealed about the Predator mythology, specifically about their hunting and trophy collecting.  Harrigan has chased the Predator back to his ship where it appears he is going to escape, when Harrigan kills him with one of his own weapons.  Several other Predators de-camouflage witnessing the action.  Two Predators pick up their dead comrade, while another Predator then throws Harrigan an old pistol with “Raphael Adolini 1715” stamped on it – basically giving Harrigan a trophy for his kill.  This tells the audience the Predators have been hunting on Earth for centuries, and opens the door for all kinds of story possibilities.  Even more “exciting” is that while on the Predator ship, Harrigan sees a trophy room where mounted on the wall is a head/skull of an Alien, from the Alien movie franchise.  This obviously foreshadows what will become the Alien vs. Predator movies.   

Very good supporting roles are played by Ruben Blades as one of Harrigan’s detectives, by Bill Paxton also as a detective and comic relief, and finally Morton Downey, Jr. as a loud mouthed guerilla journalist.       

Final Thought/Extras/For Fun:  This was the first film to be rated NC-17 for violence and gore, NC-17 was new at this time from the MPAA, but the movie was re-cut (allegedly over 20 times) to have the R rating for theatrical release… The Jamaican drug cartel was based on real gangs in New York and Kansas City from the 80’s… The original Alien vs. Predator idea came from Dark Horse Comics, which were out around this time…