“If it bleeds, we can kill it”
Without any ado, further or otherwise, here’s the first eleven minutes as a teaser taster:
Against a blank screen a young girl’s voice narrates a portentous “A long time ago, it is said, a monster came here” before we dissolve into a beautiful wide shot of a river valley and a long lingering shot of a moose and high above, a somewhat strange looking cloud pattern. After the rustle of stalks from a barley field we cut to a young lady, face painted but asleep inside a Tepee whilst a fire burns to keep both her and her accompanying Alsatian dog warm. Now awoken, the young lady “Naru” (Amber Midthunder) stumbles into the dawn sunlight of a busy village of American Indians and Comanches, each undertaking individual tasks for the village and community. Naru and her dog wander off to forage for food, flowers and to practice her Tomahawk, axe throwing and hunting techniques when she spots an unusual set of tracks in the dirt. Spotting a moose, she now tracks the animal before a loud crackling sound from the clouds above spooks the moose and a breathless chase scene ensues that culminates in her dog being snared in a beartrap. With the help of some crushed flowers, a homemade balm soon soothes the deep wounds inflicted upon her dog, and with another loud crack of thunder and other unexplainable sounds from above, what seems like a large and bright meteor splits the sky.
Cut to sparse, doom laden opening titles.
We now cut to Naru and her brother “Taabe” (Dakota Beavers) both hunting hawks with bow and arrow against a piercing blue sky, but Naru is restless. She believes she’s already a skilled and accomplished hunter and worries for the “Thunderbird” from the sky that will soon attack their village. A further cut again shows the wide open wilderness of the on screen titled “Great Plains, September 1719” as well as a return to the village of earlier which is now bustling with more life and activity than before. We venture inside a Tepee where brother and sister bicker good naturedly whilst their Mother “Aruka” (Michelle Thrush) busies herself by making potions and balms. Whilst she does so, Naru is busily sharpening arrow heads and hunting weapons, giving rise to an exasperated question from her Mother as to why she’s so determined to be a hunter. “Because you all think I can’t” is Naru’s short and blunt reply.
As we cut away from the village, the “thunderbird” that Naru continually warns everyone about climbs into the sky overhead, leaving a shimmering alien predator in it’s fiery wake.
Before watching Prey I wasn’t aware of it’s connection to the Predator franchise of films, with this being both the fifth in the series as well as an early prequel. I tuned out from this cinema franchise after the first and original 1987 film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and cringed at the mash up with another film franchise I cashed out of long ago, Alien. But that’s not to say I didn’t enjoy this film as a stand alone effort and I didn’t have the chance to pre-judge it or weigh it down with Predator like expectations. In fact, the only small gripe I had for the film as a whole was the clunky and unrealistic CGI effects on the animals that litter the wide open plains of an America long forgotten and brilliantly realised by the cinematography of Jeff Cutter. The mountain vistas, river valleys and streams running through the wilderness are every bit a character in this film and coalesce with the earthy nature and an age of innocence theme that runs through the film. Stephanie Porter deserves enormous credit for the period costumes, so too Kara Lindstrom for her production design and special plaudits are richly deserved and reserved for Sarah Schachner for her somewhat thumping and heart racing Braveheart style musical score.
Directed by Dan Trachtenberg of 10 Cloverfield Lane fame from 2016, I didn’t care for his original cinematic debut 6 years ago but I did here. I’m also pleased I didn’t make any connection pre-film to Predator, the film itself perhaps worked better for it for me, and joins the “Get to the Chopper!” original as the only films, if pushed, I’d watch again from this franchise.
It’s well worth 99 minutes of your time.
Thanks for reading. My film archives are bulging with over 100 articles, some, like this one, are singular reviews but there are many opus editions scattered throughout on the entire cinematic careers of directors such as Quentin Tarantino, Christopher Nolan or Tim Burton to name just three of many more.
Alternatively, I’ve linked my three most recently published film articles below:
“King Richard” (2021)
Will Smith before he gave Chris Rock a forehand smashmedium.com
“Snowpiercer” (2013)
Welcome, to the real worldmedium.com
“The Little Things” (2021)
Denzel Washington masterclass in a film that fades awaymedium.com