Apocalypse Then: Alien vs. Predator

Directed by: Paul W.S. Anderson
Produced by: Gordon Carroll, John Davis, David Giler, Walter Hill
Starring: Sanaa Lathan, Lance Henriksen, Raoul Bova, Ewen Bremner
Studio: Davis Entertainment
Distributed: by 20th Century Fox
Release date: August 13, 2004
Running time: 101 minutes

On this day, in 2004, the movie Alien vs. Predator was released.

It was the first of two films so far that have covered the famous rivalry, thought up back in the eighties in comics after the original movies Alien, and Predator- initially two separate series, and later made into video games, between the terrifying Aliens or Xenomorphs and the legendary Predators, hunters of the galaxies, and the humans stuck in the middle of the conflict.

AvP is a sequel to the Predator films and a prequel to the Alien series.

The cast was mostly all new and unknown except for Lance Henriksen, who played the android "Bishop" in the Alien series, specifically Aliens and Alien 3.

Despite a generally poor reception with critics and fans alike, the film was a financial success, and prompted the making of a sequel. If AvP was bad, then AvP 2 or AvP- Requiem was even worse, in my opinion.

James Cameron liked AvP though, surprisingly, although his initial reaction upon hearing about the project was bad. He ranked it as his third favourite “Alien film” out of the entire series. The first is likely Aliens- his film, which many regard as the best and one of the greatest sci-fi films of all time.

Ridley Scott, director of the first film, Alien, was quite indifferent, and Sigourney Weaver, who played Ellen Ripley in the Alien series, hated it. Arnold, who played "Dutch" in Predator, was too busy being the Governator of Cauliflower to notice.

I’ve watched the film a few times, and I thought that quite a lot of work went into it while filming, after reading up about it online. The story and some of the elements in it sort of made sense, but the end result of the film just didn’t win me over that much. Among things that I didn’t like were not many well-known or good actors, the “friendly” predator (the Predator should have killed the woman at the end- that would have caused a bit of shock and restored his edge and ruthlessness that we’ve come to know), and bad lighting.

You can pick up Aliens vs. Predator here. Otherwise you can also try Aliens vs. Predator- Requiem.

Apocalypse Then: Alien vs. Predator