Predator and the Horror Criss-Cross

People often complain that Hollywood flicks need movies to be in a certain ‘box’ or category.  Film experts, film makers and film ‘sophisticates’ often complain that  a movie has to fit a certain mould, like ‘action’ or ‘romantic comedy’ or it won’t get made.  But, what people seem not to realize, or are ‘willfully blind’ about, is that in the world of horror, especially recently, this kind of blending of genres happens quite a bit.  It is yet another area in which horror movies show far more creativity than many people realize, or perhaps in artistically prejudicing horror movies, want to realize. 

Predators, starring Adrian Brody is opening this week, and it brings to mind just this phenomenon.   What is the Predator series?  Is it horror?  Action?  Sci-Fi?  Actually, it’s an awesome (some installments notwithstanding!) blend of all three.  Such a good blend, in fact, that no one noticed that it was a blend at all.  We all just sat back and enjoyed!  But the truth is, that beneath its fun exterior,  is a bold cross over between a straight up kick ass action flick and a sci-fi horror movie.  Hunting and being hunted in the jungle brings to mind movies like Rambo, but the freaky alien gives it a whole new spin, and makes the action thrilling – because the enemy is an alien, we don’t know the limits of its capabilities and its ultimate defeat is all the more impressive – who among us wasn’t thrilled, relieved and hopeful when Arnold said those famous words:  “If it bleeds, we can kill it…”.  Not since Churchill’s ‘we will fight them on the beaches speech’ have people been given such hope!  But part of why this line is in fact so effective, is the deadliness of the alien enemy, which being an alien, is given tremendous weight.

Predator is not the only flim to cross genres so effectively.  Aliens was also a great blend of the same genres and was so successful, no one even realized it.   The later Nightmare on Elm Street movies, as well as the Raimi-Bruce Campell collaborations, and more recently the Buffy series and its spin-offs, blend horror and comedy with great effect.  We may, in fact, see far more of the horror and comedy genre blending together down the road, with  Joss Whedon having broken real ground with his style of juxtaposing horror elements with every day colloquial styles.  

And hey, I don’t think I was the only one that loved Pandorum (starring Dennis Quaid and Ben Foster) combining of martial arts with horror and sci-fi genres.  That movie saw, without giving away anything, some great fights between strange human-like creatures and a great cast of unlikely and well played heroes.  Even the creatures got into the action, with a great climactic fight between a martial arts–knowing good guy and a creature with his own fighting weapons.  Now, maybe I’m just a gee-shucks film fan, but I thought it really worked and found no strain on my suspension of disbelief at all.

Perhaps, some day soon, we will see horror spreading its wings into genres other than action and comedy, but really, horror has spread its wings large and wide.  Perhaps then, what we should hope for one day soon, is that other genres, and the film critical community, takes note of horror movies’ artistic daring and creativity, and recognize this creativity for the true artistic accomplishment that it is.  Until then, I’ll keep loving it anyway!

Lorne Gross

© Showflicks 2010

0 Comments