What's Wrong With AvP?

[Spirit of Fire]

It's funny that Two of AVP's biggest complaints: aliens being born too fast and a human teaming up with a predator are becoming the norm with both series.

Ridely Scott himself did the same thing in Alien Covenant and The Predator is about to turn the predators into our co-workers.

AVPR may be an irredeemable pile of shit but AVP was just ahead of it's time.

No it wasn't because most of us hate it in covenant as well, in fact it is bewildering that Ridley would copy a film that he hates.

He said he never even saw it which makes it even more confounding.

Its actually worse that he didnt see it because that means there is a chance he will make the same AVP mistakes which he did!

[bb-15]

It's funny that Two of AVP's biggest complaints: aliens being born too fast and a human teaming up with a predator are becoming the norm with both series.

Ridely Scott himself did the same thing in Alien Covenant ...

There were more complaints as I recall about AVP than this list but I don't want to get into that right now.

* My view about AVP was that the ideas in the script were mostly good.
But Paul W. S. Anderson and his team were at a B movie level and the main problems for the film come down to it being done by second rate talent.
Still it's a fun popcorn movie imo.

- How could AVP have been better? Get a better filmmaker to direct it.
James Cameron knew about the AVP project as it was being developed.
If Cameron had directed the movie, then imo all of its main issues would have been resolved.

Cameron would have put together a better cast, improved the set design, special effects, and action pacing.
As for the story, to me it needed only minor changes to improve it and Cameron as a writer could have easily done that.

[NeoXenoPred]

I didn't see anything wrong in the first AvP movie, and i agree about AvP R are an abomination. I think people complaints about an Alien killed two Predators, who they perceives as killer of an entire commando squad, while Aliens can do the same, but people see them as mere cannon fodder. Aliens deserved more respect, but people backlash when Grid killed Celtic and Chopper. People also complaints about the quick gestating time, which is too quick for an Alien to grow adult. The cardboard characters maybe one of the worst part, and Scar quickly align himself to Lex, who just killed one Alien receives some backlash, although i'm okay with that. For a reminder, this is a versus film, like Freddy vs Jason, where the winner is decided by the Director who is biased to one character, but it is still a good popcorn movie.

[Scorpio]

It's funny that Two of AVP's biggest complaints: aliens being born too fast and a human teaming up with a predator are becoming the norm with both series.

Ridely Scott himself did the same thing in Alien Covenant and The Predator is about to turn the predators into our co-workers.

AVPR may be an irredeemable pile of shit but AVP was just ahead of it's time.

In AVP both things actually made sense, though. 

The gestation period matched with how the pyramid works and the whole ritual.

The teamup was excusable as the predator wasn't there to hunt humans, and the human killed an alien so it made sense for the teamup.

[HuDaFuK]

James Cameron knew about the AVP project as it was being developed.
If Cameron had directed the movie, then imo all of its main issues would have been resolved.

He never would have done it. By all accounts learning that it was being developed was what killed his interest in pursuing the Alien 5 idea he was working on with Ridley.

[happypred]

AvP's team-up made me cringe in the cinema

When Lex looks deep into Scar's puppy eyes, they looked like they were gonna start making out

[Huntsman]

I remember when I was so f**king excited for AvP and then crossing my fingers for an amazing AvP-R

Yep, same here. They dropped the ball with both AvP films to the point they actually impacted upon my appreciation/enjoyment of both species and their solo films. AvP is the better of the two films...and it has a couple okay scenes, but that's not saying much.

[Alienannialator]

Honestly I think avp as being in a different universe from the alien and predator one we know originally , so I forgive the impossibly tall queen , wrestler looking predator , ridiculously quick birth and growth for the xenos , and the bad acting 

[HuDaFuK]

Part of me wishes they'd gone with the original, more radical creature designs for exactly that reason.

[BigDaddyJohn]

I think AVP is a very bad movie. It's cheap, not very well directed (not horribly either), it has okay cinematography, but not much more. Some of the acting is bad (Lex is sometimes...disturbing), it's too politically correct, she can't even say ugly mother f**ker for god's sake ! The predator explaining to Lex with hand signs that his gauntlet will explode was cringeworthy and cheesy to me, the predator suits were bad, too bulky and the faces were too fake. The animatronics aliens were good but served nothing in the movie. The queen was good though. Also, the build-up was a little too long for me, especially leading up to such little intensity afterwards... All that for not much...

[Russ]

A very bad movie? No, I can't agree with that. An OK movie. Maybe even a  really good one for me.

Reading your post, it speaks more about the production company than it does the film maker. Cheap - yes, WS I believe was chosen because he could make six million dollars look great (give the man a warehouse in Prague and he can do wonders on a shoestring). The PC issue - well, I think again the decision was taken to market this to teens (toys and so on), hence the use of not-so-harsh-language. Again - I'm not sure this was the director's choice - I really think he would have preferred a higher rating.

I think with the the suits and all that - well, personal choice. The Predators had to do "the same but different," right? I guess this is just an aesthetic choice and you're either going to like it or hate it.

Personally, I didn't mind the hand signals and the "fut" hand gesture, but that's just me.

On pacing... well, this is precisely how "Aliens" rolled out. Nothing happens for 40 minutes or so, just a lot of chat and build up.

Not that I'm saying these two movies are on a par - clearly not, but I don't think AvP deserves any of the hate it gets (then again, I'm sensing a renaissance of sorts on this forum at least).

[SiL]

On pacing... well, this is precisely how "Aliens" rolled out. Nothing happens for 40 minutes or so, just a lot of chat and build up.

The biggest difference -- besides the quality of the writing -- is that AvP builds for full two thirds of its runtime, then ends half an hour later. It's 55 minutes when Grid and Celtic start their fight and 85 minutes when the closing credits roll. Aliens builds for an hour, but then has another 75 minutes before the close.

Same with Alien; the burster pops about 45 minutes in and the film ends over an hour later.

Slow builds are fine, but AvP spends more time delaying getting to the good stuff than it actually spends on the good stuff, which makes it feel very poorly paced.

[HuDaFuK]

It doesn't help that it doesn't have the script quality or acting talent to carry the slow build.

[Russ]

On pacing... well, this is precisely how "Aliens" rolled out. Nothing happens for 40 minutes or so, just a lot of chat and build up.

The biggest difference -- besides the quality of the writing -- is that AvP builds for full two thirds of its runtime, then ends half an hour later. It's 55 minutes when Grid and Celtic start their fight and 85 minutes when the closing credits roll. Aliens builds for an hour, but then has another 75 minutes before the close.

Same with Alien; the burster pops about 45 minutes in and the film ends over an hour later.

Slow builds are fine, but AvP spends more time delaying getting to the good stuff than it actually spends on the good stuff, which makes it feel very poorly paced.

The director's cut is better in my view (I can't remember the last time I watched the Theatrical come to think of it). But even I'm not going to compare WS's writing with Cameron's! And I'm not saying that AvP is in the same ballpark as Aliens (of course it isn't). But the fingerprints are there. I think it was you or SM who said that it's clear that Anderson wanted to make a film that fitted the mood of the other pieces and all that (and that he failed!) - I don't think any of this stuff was by accident, but I do think that he was rather hamstrung having pitched something a bit different from what we saw. (Or a lot different - we'll never know).

I think that AvP delivers (mostly). It does what it says on the tin, it fulfilled Fox's brief, I think it made money (enough to warrant a sequel) and, as I say, from what I read, it's getting a bit more love these days.

I just think that the tin it was written on wasn't what fans of the franchise wanted - Alien and Aliens were 18s, I think (I can't recall if 3 and Resurrection were - I think they were 15s but can't recall) and by and large, it seems that the people who have been in for the long haul want and expect that.

Even Fox recogised that and allowed AvP: R a hard R movie (didn't work out as we know).

It doesn't help that it doesn't have the script quality or acting talent to carry the slow build.

They probably blew their budget getting Lance. It was done on the relatively cheap, I believe. However, I can't blame it all on that - the buck does stop with Anderson at he end of the day. Look, I'm not saying its a great film, but its not "really shit" or "an abomination" or anything like that.

It's pretty good. Or very good if you're me. But its not a genre defining epoch of a movie like Alien or Aliens. Like Apollo says to Rocky "You fight great, but I'm a great fighter." That sort of sums it up for me really.

[HuDaFuK]

Look, I'm not saying its a great film, but its not "really shit" or "an abomination" or anything like that.

No, I agree, just putting in my two cents.

I used to hate it, but I don't mind it now as a piece of trashy entertainment. It has a few really good elements amongst the bad. One thing I do credit is the fact that Anderson made a very good-looking film (crappy Predator design aside) given his tight budget.