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Prey 2022 tries to be annoying to concervatives
October 14, 2025π 17
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#Prey #Predator #movies #review #film #cinemastodon #DanTrachtenberg
by Blender Dumbass
Aka: J.Y. Amihud. A Jewish by blood, multifaceted artist with experience in film-making, visual effects, programming, game development, music and more. A philosopher at heart. An activist for freedom and privacy. Anti-Paternalist. A user of Libre Software. Speaking at least 3 human languages. The writer and director of the 2023 film "Moria's Race" and the lead developer of it's game sequel "Dani's Race".
From 1 years ago.
Information or opinions might not be up to date.
8 Minute Read
The Predator franchise started its life as a masculine super-macho, mega-violent little B-Movie with Arnold Schwarzenegger. In my review of the first film, I even speculated, for a second, that it might have even been racist. Something that a certain side of political spectrum finds to be a quality of a movie. That certain side of the political spectrum really didn't get when Dan Trachtenberg decided, he is making a feminist, native-American movie in the same franchise.
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The film Prey ( which is a very fun play on words, considering the story the movie is telling ) is set in America before there was USA. The entire movie there is not a singe modern type of American. You have a native-American tribe ( that speaks English only so the audience will understand them ) and you have French colonizers. That's all.
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And more than that, the film's main character is a woman. A woman who is desperately trying to prove men, that she is as capable as they are. The film is asking way too much from the conservatives. Or even, it might be possible, the movie is specifically trying to be annoying to conservatives.
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So here is main issue people saying about it. Remember how Arnold Schwarzenegger with a full squad of Rambos had a hard time killing one Yautja? In this movie the Yautja is killed by one girl. Unrealistic, isn't it? Also what... there is a super-trained girl assassin? What is this, Marry Sue? What is going on? Where is the "realism"? Where is the "logic"?
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Well I guess Trachtenberg counted that conservatives would bring up specifically these issues. And he kind of made the movie in such a way as to almost count on the fact that conservatives would not watch it. So he could later giggle to himself with his friends, every time somebody brings up any of the criticisms I just brought up. Because those criticisms are kind of invalid when it comes to the movie itself.
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I mean, yes. She does defeat the damn Yautja. And yes, she is trying to prove her people that she is as capable as the men. But it is not a simple Marry Sue story.
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Our main character Naru ( Amber Midthunder who may know from Novicaine ) is a teenage-ish girl in a native-American tribe somewhere in the forest. She is a cook and a doctor. But she wants to be a hunter. For that she needs to graduate through a hunting ritual. She needs to hunt something that is hunting her.
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By the way, her casting is fucking amazing. She is just about cute enough and just about angry enough to achieve the "short orgasmic blackout". A thing that happens to me when I see characters just like her. They make my brain very happy for some reason. Maybe I need to see a therapist. Anyway...
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The funny thing is, she is kind of pathetic. She knows how to throw an axe. And she is rather smart. But her battle inexperience makes her rather clumsy in the beginning of the film. Only by the end of the film she becomes a descent fighter, through going through shit. So it isn't a Marry Sue story per se.
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Now, does she become such a great fighter as to defeat a fucking Yautja? No. What we get is a her problem solving skills combined with the little bit of fighting skill she has. Which ultimately defeats the damn ugly motherfucker.
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For example, in the original film, Arny defeats the motherfucker by getting dirty in cold mud, making Arny invisible for the Yautja. Leveling the playing field, so to speak. Since those Predators have an invisibility tech on them. Here in Prey Naru finds out that a drug that she is using to stop people from bleeding ( that makes their blood colder ) makes those people invisible to the Yautja. We do have a mandatory mud sequence. But that is used for a different thing.
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In a way, she uses all the information she observes about the forest and the creature, to trick the creature. To play mind-games with the creature. To ultimately have a chance to defeat the motherfucker. Yes, she needs to use her body here and there to stub him and stuff. But that "fighting" was never a part of the killing plan. She didn't want to stab him to death. She wanted to stab him, to manipulate him into trying to kill her. Which she used to kill him. Kind of using his own weapon against him in a way.
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When she saw ( toward the beginning of the film ) that this motherfucker can kill a bear with his bare hands ( shit... I want to say how I came with this pun intentionally. But unfortunately no pun intended. lol ), she knew that she can't fuck with him. There is no way in hell. She even says this to her brother later in the film. She literally doesn't believe anyone can kill it. But as her brother ( Dakota Beavers, I couldn't come up with a better name, lol ), does a reference to the first film, by telling her "if it bleeds, we can kill it", she starts to think that maybe she can possibly come up with something. Maybe some trap, or sorts. Something that she can do with her mind, rather than her physical strength. And that is exactly what ends up happening in the end of the film.
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I could say that Trachtenberg made a slight directorial mistake. In the final battle, there are moments where Naru does fight the creature here and there, while trying to force him into the trap of hers. And you kind of start thinking about the fact that the creature isn't fighting as well as he used to fight when killing all of the unnamed background characters earlier. It is not illogical per se. She did take her drug, which makes her invisible for him. And therefor he is a bit clumsy when trying to kill her. But Trachtenberg seemingly forgets to show it clearly. There are no shots of the Yautja's POV during the battle, which reminds the audience that he can't see her. We kind of have to remember the fact that she took the drug earlier. And actually flex a little to understand how everything works.
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The film does show the drug in action earlier, before the fight, once. There is a POV shot, where Yautja sees a different character, but not Naru, who just took the drug. Maybe, an argument could be made that refusing the constantly remind people of the fact that he can't see her, is Trachtenberg respecting the audience.
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Or you can theorize a completely different thing. Maybe Trachtenberg refused to remind people of the drug, to catch conservatives.
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Think about it, Trachtenberg specifically makes a movie that annoys the fuck out of the conservatives. The period of time is chosen to annoy them. The main character is chosen to annoy them. The main character's main motivation is chosen to annoy them. And then all of the criticisms that he knew they will have, are addressed, but are addressed in such a way that you actually need to watch the movie and focus on it to notice them. If you simply skim it, to make an angry post about how "unrealistic" or "illogical" it is due to all of the things the movie is going for, well... then... I'm sorry, but the joke is on you.
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Happy Hacking!!!
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Prey 2022 tries to be annoying to concervatives
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/f4/Prey_2022_poster.png/250px-Prey_2022_poster.png)
Blender Dumbass
π 17 π¬ 114
The Predator franchise started its life as a masculine super-macho, mega-violent little B-Movie with Arnold Schwarzenegger. In my review of the first film, I even speculated, for a second, that it might have even been racist. Something that a certain side of political spectrum finds to be a quality of a movie. That certain side of the political spectrum really didn't get when Dan Trachtenberg decided, he is making a feminist, native-American movie in the same franchise.
#Prey #Predator #movies #review #film #cinemastodon #DanTrachtenberg
What is the meaning of "The Lovely Bones" 2009 by Peter Jackson?
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/9e/Lovely_bones_ver2.jpg/250px-Lovely_bones_ver2.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
π 14 π¬ 14
In my review of Transformers 4 I touched upon the uncanny resemblance of it to Peter Jackson's The Lovely Bones. I have not seen the movie when I did that. I knew it existed. I knew what it was about. I've only seen it now, for the first time. And the uncanny resemblance ( as in, the father is played once again by Mark Wahlberg and the villain is played once again by Stanley Tucci and we have Steven Spielberg's involvement ) is rather strange. It begs a rather profound question, what was the point to make the movie?
#TheLovelyBones #PeterJackson #SaoirseRonan #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Star Trek 2009 is when you mix Spielberg with Michael Bay
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/29/Startrekposter.jpg/250px-Startrekposter.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
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I have a soft spot for J. J. Abrams. His masterpiece Super 8 inspired me greatly to develop film-projects when I was a teenager. But his 2009 other masterpiece Star Trek ( together with 2009'th other Sci-Fi masterpiece Avatar by James Cameron ) is what pretty much started my obsession with space movies.
#startrek #jjabrams #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Why Christopher Nolan and why The Odyssey???
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/90/The_Odyssey_%282026_film%29_poster.jpg/250px-The_Odyssey_%282026_film%29_poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
π 18 β€ 3 π 1 π¬ 5
On the surface it seems like The Odyssey is a vanity project. Like if Christopher Nolan after getting an Oscar for Oppenheimer ( which I still didn't review for some stupid reason ), decided that he is big enough, of a filmmaker, to take on a project of epic proportions, or something. Like he can tell Homer himself, how to properly tell a story, or whatever. But then you watch the movie.
#theodyssey #christophernolan #odyssey #odysee #lbry #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Nosferatu (1922) Is Not Scary
![[thumbnail]](/pictures/user_upload/Troler/nosferatu.jpg)
Troler
π 24 π¬ 2
Horror and thrillers seem to be quite ubiquitous in recent times. Nosferatu, a classic from 1920s cinema, has spawned a lot of recreations, making it modern. Yet they fail to see Nosferatu is not horror... at least not in the way the term is usually used.
#GustavvonWangenheim #JohnGottowt #GretaSchroder #horror #Nosferatu #Murnau #film #movies #review #cinemastodon
So Did Avatar 3 Use AI?
![[thumbnail]](/pictures/thumbs/avatar_ai.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
π 44 β€ 3 π 1 π¬ 2
While James Cameron has denied that Avatar 3: Fire and Ash used any generative AI. On January 24, 2026 Joe Letteri ( the visual effect supervisor from Weta Digital ) sat with the Corridor Crew for their weekly show of VFX Artists React where he said that the facial animation for the hero characters for both Avatar 2 and 3 involved a neural network. A neural network? Isn't that a fancy way to say "AI"?
#avatar #jamescameron #fireandash #avatarfireandash #movies #review #film #cinemastodon #ai #art #mastoart #aiart #neualnetwork
The Sudbury Devil is when you mix Nicolas Winding Refn with Wes Anderson
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/40/The_Sudbury_Devil_poster.jpg/250px-The_Sudbury_Devil_poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
π 23 β€ 2 π¬ 1
Andrew Rakich's self-distributed 2023 film The Sudbury Devil is quite a piece of cool horror film-making. Made for a mere $25 thousand, the film is surprisingly good. It is tense and intense. It is rather fucked up. And it is smartly written and directed.
#thesudburydevil #andrewrakich #atunsheifilms #film #review #movies #horror #cinemastodon
Black Hawk Down ( 2001 ) tries hard to beat Saving Private Ryan
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/0/0c/Black_hawk_down_ver1.jpg/250px-Black_hawk_down_ver1.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
π 10 π¬ 2
In 1998 Steven Spielberg shocked the cinematic frontier with his film Saving Private Ryan which had one of the most brutal depictions of warfare, with its opening battle-scene. This caused a small shift in the ways Hollywood was trying to cinematically portray war. And who's better than Ridley Scott, to attempt at beating Spielberg at war footage. Which he tried to do with his 2001 film Black Hawk Down.
#blackhawkdown #ridleyscott #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
How didn't I know about Les Aventures extraordinaires d'Adèle Blanc-Sec?
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/d/da/Adele_Blanc-sec_Louise_Bourgoin_Luc_Besson.jpg/250px-Adele_Blanc-sec_Louise_Bourgoin_Luc_Besson.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
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D'une manière ou d'une autre, je ne connaissais pas le film de Luc Besson 2010 Les Aventures extraordinaires d'Adèle Blanc-Sec. Excusez mon français. I will continue in English now. I just had a pleasure of listening to people speak French for 2 hours straight, because I just learned about the existence of a movie that for some reason passed my radar. As you know I'm a big enough Luc Besson fan that sometimes I take his personal life blunders personally. I knew about his more obscure Arthur films. And I am anticipating his upcoming 2 films, that nobody seem to know nothing about. But somehow only now I heard about the 2010 Luc Besson film The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec.
#adeleblancsec #lucbesson #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Last Night in Soho is not quite horror if you think about it
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/e/ea/Last_Night_in_Soho_%282021%29_poster.jpg/250px-Last_Night_in_Soho_%282021%29_poster.jpg)
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So here comes Edgar Wright, in 2021, and makes a movie that tries to be a real horror film. This must be the real shit right? Wright? Well...
#lastnightinsoho #edgarwright #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
A Sacrifice 2025 is a bit amateurish
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/a8/A_Sacrifice_poster.jpg/250px-A_Sacrifice_poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
π 15 π¬ 3
Ridley Scott has a full family of filmmakers. His brother Tony Scott is a legend. But Ridley also has kids. His son Jake Scott is a bad ass music video director that started already branching out into feature films. Luke Scott directed a cool little 2016 sci-fi horror film Morgan. And was a second unit director on a lot of recent Ridley Scott films. And then there is Jordan Scott, Ridley's daughter that wrote and directed the 2025 thriller A Sacrifice.
#ASacrifice #JordanScott #EricBana #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
The poseur of Last Night in Soho
![[thumbnail]](/pictures/user_upload/Troler/GQ1BNMVU03TH59Q7.jpg)
Troler
π 13 β€ 2 π 1 π¬ 6
Last Night in Soho depict horrifying imagery not so much through gore, the primal horror, more so from the traumatic past. It deals with the less so appealable aspects of the Swinging Sixties. The thriller is used more as a hook, to lure in audience to a film, mostly dissecting and understanding the spirit of the 60s.
#lastnightinsoho #edgarwright #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Gladiator 2000 is Ridley Scott's turn at mimicking Michael Bay
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/fb/Gladiator_%282000_film_poster%29.png/250px-Gladiator_%282000_film_poster%29.png)
Blender Dumbass
π 15 π¬ 1
There are quite some differences between the Scott brothers ( Ridley and Tony ) and the Maximus himself Michael Bay. You can read Troler's observations and then my rant in the comments to see why they aren't quite the same. But specifically Tony Scott films sometimes feels almost like Michael Bay movies. Especially early Tony Scott and early Michael Bay, before both of them knew how similar they are and before they started trying to develop each other into opposite directions. Which happened roughly in time with the 21st century. And yet with all this the Ridley Scott epic Gladiator which was shot at 20st century and released at 21st, bluntly steals one of the shots Michael Bay is known for.
#Gladiator #RidleyScott #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Once Upon a Time... In Hollywood 2019 is Tarantino respecting the audience
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/a6/Once_Upon_a_Time_in_Hollywood_poster.png/250px-Once_Upon_a_Time_in_Hollywood_poster.png)
Blender Dumbass
π 47 π¬ 1
People often complain about dumb movies with too much unnecessary spoon-feeding. We get so much explaining and over-explaining that the brain hurts sometimes. You already know what is going on. You are following the story. You don't need no god damned reminder of what you are watching. And yet the studio heads still think that you are too dumb to understand what's going on in front of you on the screen. Respecting the audience on the other hand is a leap of faith on a part of a film-maker and only the greatest do that well. Quentin Tarantino with his 2019 film Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood takes the hardest such leap of his career.
#OnceUponaTimeinHollywood #QuentinTarantino #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Is Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets better than The Fifth Element?
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/07/Valerian_and_the_City_of_a_Thousand_Planets.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
π 34 β€ 1 π¬ 3
It is funny that I was just watching Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets while drinking Valerian. I was pissed at Luc Besson because I just watched and reviewed The Fifth Element. That review was more of a ramble about my theory surrounding his personal life. Which ties in neatly into the message of the film "Love". But for some reason I completely forgot to talk about it's qualities. Which I suppose this review will fix. I will compare the two grand space-operas from Luc Besson. And hopefully we will learn something in the process.
#Valerian #LucBesson #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
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