That's right - PREDATOR! You may be asking yourselves, "how in the hell can a film produced by Silver and directed by action-man McTiernan be a cult film?" It's simple - out of the horrific "hard bodies" cinema of the eighties (Hard Bodies film - Reagon era action films starring Stallone, Schwarzenegger, Norris, etc. - films featuring strong white Americans blowing the shit out of "Third World" Countries while delivering one liners), Predator is the one film that has survived that era and is spoken about with reverence. It's safe to say if you're chatting with a group about this pitiful era of American cinema, some jackass will go into a soliloquy about Predator.

Predator is indeed a bizarre little flick - it's half Hard Body action film, half sci-fi stalker film. If the first few minutes of the film didn't show a spacecraft heading towards earth, you'd almost forget that there was a damn space monster in the flick! The first half an hour is your basic bullshit American crew wipes out a group of terrorist guerrillas nonsense. We follow the crew into helicopters where they show their witty personalities in typical 80's fashion. You have the Native American commando applying war paint, a commando telling dirty jokes, the great Bill Duke silent and menacing and Jesse "The Body" Ventura spouting out one of the classic lines in "hard body" history. Ventura takes out a wad of chewing tobacco and offers the pouch to his comrades. When nobody bites, Ventura tells them in a tough, southern drawl - "Bunch of slack jawed faggots 'round here ... this stuff will make you a god damn sexual ty-ra-no-saurus." I don't know, it always makes me laugh.

The commando unit is led by Dutch (Schwarzenegger) and is joined by Carl - Action Jackson - Weathers. They have a typical 80's tough guy reunion where they arm wrestle revealing abnormally large biceps. Once in the woods they promptly slaughter all the dark skinned bad guys with Schwarzenegger delivering a shitload of corny one liners. We get "stick around" after he throws a four foot knife threw a dudes chest, and of course the always reliable, "knock knock" as he enters a room and butchers startled guerrillas.

After a successful mission they must find their way to a clearing for a rendezvous with an Army coptor. But alas! Something has been watching the action with a psychedelic, thermal vision. We can see the heat of the live bodies and hear a strange clicking-like noise from the voyeur (the crew has also been stumbling upon skinned bodies and piles of guts which are blamed on the damn guerrilla fighters!).

Soon the crew starts getting picked off by this tree swinging, chameleon creature (who blends into the surroundings but has a slight, crystal outline), and the real fun begins. After Ventura gets his chest blasted, Duke picks up his Gattling Gun(!) and with his mates proceed to destroy about 20% of the rainforest! They hit the creature causing green - glowing blood to splatter about and cause a painful leg injury to the now really pissed off Predator.

After the Predator blows up Duke's head and shoots off Weathers arm he takes care of the Native American who in a typical 80's version of the "noble savage" throws his gun down and fights the creature with a fucking knife! Yeah - Good Luck. Soon only Dutch is left and it's a great, taught, fight to the finish!

This last half hour is pure cinema - it's simply as good as it gets in the genre. Dutch escapes the Predator by falling about 5000 feet into a river only to plunge down a shitload of waterfalls. As Dutch regains his senses on the riverbank there is a huge splash behind him - it's the fucking Predator! AHHH! Slopping his way on land Dutch becomes covered in mud thus making him invisible to the Predators sight range. The Predator retreats to his tree to pull the spines and skulls out of his prey for polishing while Schwarzenegger starts building booby traps and bow and arrows - right on! Then comes the scene that will have any action fan shitting his pants, Schwarzenegger, covered in mud, holds up a twenty foot torch and gives out a war cry! That's right he calls the Predator out! You know you love it don't lie!