Prey (2022)
Directed by Dan Trachtenberg
When danger threatens her camp, the fierce and highly skilled Comanche warrior Naru sets out to protect her people. But the prey she stalks turns out to be a highly evolved alien predator with a technically advanced arsenal.
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In “Prey,” he shows the Predator’s infrared point-of-view juxtaposed with overhead shots of tall grass moving in a field, a reminder that what we can’t see is scarier like “Jaws” (1975).
Cinematographer Jeff Cutter gorgeously and harrowingly accents predatory instincts reminiscent to Jaws, The Lost World: Jurassic Park, and—picturesquely—the live-action The Lion King.
It’s a lesson that Steven Spielberg learned in making Jaws, and Trachtenberg paid attention.
She's not the overpowered, muscle-bound hero that we've seen in past Predator movies; instead, Prey presents Naru as a strong female lead with the same assurance of Ripley from the beloved Alien franchise, combining strength, determination, and intelligence into an underdog character with everything to prove.
Three sequels and two crossovers with the Alien franchise later, 20th Century Studios is giving us our first prequel to the series in Prey.
Expertly blending action and thriller elements with a superficially absurd sci-fi-horror high concept – a technologically advanced alien big-game hunter stalks American special-forces soldiers for sport – the film ingeniously inverts the right-wing fantasy of Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985).
*** It’s tempting to call Prey a “back to basics” entry in the Predator franchise, but it’s more of a prodigal return to a theme only implied in the steroidal, beautifully plot-light 1987 original starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Why? It’s another attempt to resurrect the Predator franchise, a series that started with brawny, two-fisted pugnaciousness in 1987 with John McTiernan ( Die Hard ) at the helm and star Arnold Schwarzenegger leading the way, only to be followed up by a series of sequels and spinoffs of varying quality, including 2004’s Alien vs. Predator , 2010’s Predators , and 2018’s The Predator .
Little does she know that the prey she's stalking is actually looking for a hunter to match its own skill (the Predator, obviously), leading to a vicious showdown between the two.
While the Predator films are far from being horror’s most inconsistent franchise (the Hellraiser films take that crown), the idea of a new Predator film in 2022 doesn’t necessarily inspire confidence.
The third act, when the film becomes the inevitable, rushed series of original Predator homages, is pretty good but never adds up for Midthunder.
Hunt or be hunted, says the new “Predator” prequel film, “Prey,” but don’t underestimate the threat level either, the movie often reminds us.
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With her commanding screen presence, Midthunder spends much of the movie in natural landscapes, accompanied only by her character’s rather adorable dog, Sarii—and the combination of hero-and-dog versus aliens recalls a similar dynamic in Riddick (2013).
In a moment when unpretentious genre-savvy craftsmen like David Twohy have receded from view, Trachtenberg, whose background is in commercial and video-game work, has similar gifts: At times, Prey displays some of the same ornery virtuosity as Twohy’s Riddick films, especially the underrated 2013 third installment, with its mostly dialogue-free opening passages pitting Vin Diesel’s loner against a host of carnivorous monsters.
Prey is the latest film from Dan Trachtenberg; who is best known for making sterling genre efforts like the contained thriller 10 Cloverfield Lane and the entry of Playtest in the anthology series Black Mirror .
Dan Trachtenberg ("10 Cloverfield Lane") directs, while Patrick Aison's script makes sure to copy and paste at least one iconic line of dialogue from the original "Predator."
Trachtenberg has worked on shows like “The Boys,” “Black Mirror” and directed the engaging sci-fi puzzle “10 Cloverfield Lane.”
The result is a surprisingly skilled stalker flick by Dan Trachtenberg, who directed “10 Cloverfield Lane” (2016) and TV episodes of “Black Mirror” (2016) and “The Boys” (2019).
Here, he is re-envisioning the Predator franchise and flipping the script with Prey (the 10 Cloverfield Lane filmmaker is also using a script from Patrick Aaison), an origin story that refreshingly focuses on the arrival of the extraterrestrial species and its matchup against an 18th-century Comanche tribe.
Just when I thought the Predator series was over for good, thanks to the god-awful abomination of Shane Black’s The Predator four years ago, the Disney-owned Fox studio refused to give up after all.
First, one needs to keep it high-concept, which most do (aside from Shane Black’s The Predator , which I still find pretty entertaining despite myself).
It's a coming-of-age period piece with shades of Mel Gibson's Apocalypto ; what I'm saying is it means business.
This is more of a small cousin to “Apocalypto,” in that the action (and by the middle it’s all action) takes place purely within a Native American world.
There are many similarities between Prey and Apocalypto, but Prey stands on its own due to its sharp storytelling and uber-strong performance from Midthunder.
It feels a little bit like a blend of the Predator franchise and both The Revenant and Apocalypto .
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I was very inspired by Mad Max: Fury Road for finally throwing the gauntlet down and saying, ‘You can make a movie that is all action and it still be a great film.’
To be honest, a lot of this movie reminded me of Mad Max: Fury Road .
It's even more telling that Prey is actually really good - easily the best Predator sequel and perhaps one of the most beautiful action films to be released by a major studio since maybe Mad Max: Fury Road.
Prey isn’t going to blow the roof off of the Oscars like Mad Max: Fury Road or Avatar , but dear god there is something to be said for a franchise film uninterested in a larger universe, existing solely for the sake of entertainment, and actually putting effort into it as opposed to just writing it off as “dumb fun” to excuse being lazy.
It’s not a serious drama or even cultural exploration like Salvador Carrasco’s “The Other Conquest,” or even “Dances with Wolves.”