Alien vs Predator

Rating ***/*****, or 6/10

After almost 15 years of having two of the greatest movie monsters duke it out in various other media (most notably games and comics), the pair finally square off on the big screen, with mixed results. The action scenes are quite solid and the overall look is great, especially where the creatures are concerned, but the story of a team of human cannon fodder discovering an ancient pyramid on Antarctica, which soon turns out to be ground zero for extra-terrestrial sparring matches, leaves much to be desired. There's little surprise as to who's gonna die when, plus the fact the film is rated PG-13, whereas the other entries in both franchises had hard R ratings, makes for little appropriate gore, much to the chagrin of the legions of fans. Plus, considering the Predators are running the whole show, the outcome of the battle is fairly predictable.

Starring: Sanaa Lathan, Raoul Bova, Lance Henriksen

Directed by Paul W.S. Anderson

USA: 20^th Century Fox, 2004

Aliens

Rating *****/*****, or 10/10

Superb sequel utilizes a completely different style from its dark and brooding predecessor, exchanging the slow suspense for high action, to great results. Could very well be considered superior to Alien. After spending 57 years drifting through space in hypersleep, Ripley (Sigourney Weaver again) returns to Earth, where she soon finds herself asked to join a team of overly bold and raunchy space marines to LV-426 to check out whether there's any connection between her wild stories of monsters and the loss of contact with a group of colonists on that planet. Naturally, the settlement is overrun by the xenomorphs who soon turn the marines into a bunch of wimps, at which point Ripley has to take charge to get the team out alive, along with the lone survivor of the colony, a little girl nicknamed Newt, for which Ripley soon develops maternal feelings. A carefully crafted exciting sequence of action scenes culminates in the film's brilliant climax, Ripley battling a huge Queen Alien (another triumph of special creature effects work) with a power loader suit. Also featured is a surprisingly trustworthy android called Bishop (the impeccable Lance Henriksen), Bill Paxton as an hilariously loud mouth marine who wets his pants at the first sign of any real trouble and Jenette Goldstein as a very manly latina private. James Cameron, fresh off The Terminator, established himself as one of Hollywood's leading specialists in the field of sci-fi action blockbusters with this movie, which still remains the best in his oeuvre.

Starring: Sigourney Weaver, Michael Biehn, Lance Henriksen

Directed by James Cameron

USA: 20^th Century Fox, 1986