Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018)

Director: J.A. Bayona

Starring : Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Rafe Spall, Daniella Pineda, James Cromwell, Toby Jones, Justice Smith. USA. 2h 9m.

So once again we learn how dangerous dinosaurs are, and that includes mutant dinosaurs.. Because the old school variety just aren’t as scary as we thought… Jurassic World introduced a slightly different take on the “let’s make a theme park with dinosaurs”, Chris Pratt became a new lead with a group of modified raptors including his darling Blue. But the sentiment is quickly launched out the window for a fast paced non heel breaking action flick. All that pent up emotionalism returns in this even quicker paced often silly sequel.

Opening with a group of mercenaries trying to collect dinosaur bones to build more beasts, as their island is destroyed by a volcano, they are soon despatched by a few lose dinosaurs. A montage follows the world is divided, let the dinosaurs die or do they have a right to life and should we save them? Claire Dearing  (Dallas Howard) is determined to save as many as she can, after hooking up with Owen they are summoned to the mansion of Benjamin Lockwood (Cromwell), who was there when the first dino’s were extracted and with the help of his associate Eli Mills (Spall) they have set up a sanctuary. All Claire and Owen have to do it fly to the island, gather as many dinosaurs as possible and get them back to the sanctuary. Claire and Owen do their “thing” without their feelings get in the way too much.

The Predator (2018)

Director: Shane Black.
Starring. Thomas Jane, Boyd Holbrook, Keegan Michael Key, Sterling K Brown, Trevante Rhodes, Alfie Allen, Jake Busey, Yvonne Strahovski, Olivia Munn USA. 1h 58m

For a while I had a lot of faith that after Shane Black’s death by the hands of the original Predator back in the 80’s cult classic jungle sci fi mayhem epic adventure, and his subsequent career as a director, that he could be trusted with this remake. But then I remembered he’s Shane Black and you cannot trust this man! To be fair Shane is totally okay and I still regained some faith but the writer, Fred Dekker was an odd choice. His previous classics are cult but for very different reasons, Night of the Creeps, Monster Squad (written with Shane Black) were high for their levels of comedy antics. Dekkers contributions for House (1986) gave the film a surreal and yet again comedic undercurrent, and his more recent work included Robocop 3 which ruined the trilogy by adding in some cute kids and morals… this is when I knew someone has fucked up.

Commando (1985)

Director: Mark L Lester W: Jeph Loeb P: Joel Silver
Starring: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rae Dawn Chong, Dan Hedaya, Vernon Wells, David Patrick Kelly, Bill Duke, Bill Paxton. 1h 30m. USA.

Starring Arnold Schwarzenegger as a retired  United States Special Forces Colonel John Matrix doing this best to raise his daughter Jenny (Alyssa Milano), the two live in a secluded cabin in the hills. One by one his old team are assassinated by unknown mercenaries in violent and unsuspected ways. When his ex commander visits to warn him; they are met by same mercenaries who kill the men posted to protect the family and kidnap Jenny. John is presented with a task from a ruthless south american dictator who needs him to carry out a political assassination in Val Verde, reluctantly he accepts in order to protect his daughter. But john has other plans..After killing his entourage his escapes the plane to the remote island, thus giving him 18 hours until they realise he’s escaped and thus to find and rescue this daughter. Following the vertically challenged Sully (Kelly) he teams up with reluctant Cindy (Chong) and eventually the two work together to locate the missing girl.

Predators (2010)

Predators  – (Action, Adventure, Sci Fi,  2010) (18) D: Nimrod Antal W: Alex Litvak, Michael Finch,  C: Adrien Brody, Laurence Fishburne, Topher Grace. 1h 47m. USA.

It had been quite a while since the release of Predator 2 (1990) which took the alien from the hot jungle into the equally hot city and after the failure of Alien vs Predator (2004) and it’s predecessor AVP requiem (2007) we were finally treated to a third installment of the Predator trilogy, And luckily it went old school and gave us some of the thrills that the original movie created and then in perfect homage to the original movie it mimics the original soundtrack but unfortunately fell short on bravado and instead opted for a slightly different less military, tough hombre approach.

Starting a movie in free fall  is slightly unusual but this is how Royce (Brody) is introduced into Predators, along with a few other tough guys and gal, from various war zones around the world and a strange doctor they find themselves being dropped into the jungle and are supposed to be the lucky ones as their shoots managed to work… They discover the corpses of the unlucky souls who had crashed straight into the jungle floor and some unknown cargo cases that held something which was obviously not human or pleasant, and possibly very hungry. After lots of tense suspicion and fights for the alpha male role the group eventually they band together to try and find a way out.Unfortunately for them, even their finely tuned skill and expert guerrilla, homicidal and military experience they could never be quite prepared what they have to face here on an alien game preserve.