Review: Predator World

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2018
Images from the Internet

Predator World (aka Aliens vs. Titanic)

Directed by Jeff Leroy
Girls and Corpses / Tom Cat Films / Sterling Entertainment /
Wild Eye Releasing / MVD Entertainment
85 minutes, 2017 / 2018
www.girlsandcorpses.com
www.wildeyereleasing.com
www.mvdb2b.com

By looking at the poster or case for this film, one would hardly know this was a futuristic Love Boat-ish broad comedy filled with sex and drugs, and lots and lots of CGI, including nearly everything except the hills outside Los Angeles and some of the alien rubber suits. Actually, this part of a sci-fi sub-genre that includes such titles as Spaced Out (1979; aka Outer Touch) and Zeta One (1969; aka The Love Factor).



Survivors?: Brenton Jones, Jin N. Tonic,
Kelly Erin Decker, William Gabriel Grier  

The initial flight of the party space boat this time is called Titan-1C (aka Titanic, hence the original title). After a CGI meteor shower of rocks containing CGI scorpion like creatures take over and destroy the ship, a group of six survivors wind up on said planet, unintentionally taking the alien creatures with them.

Between the sex and the drugs (pills that seem to be a cross betwixt ecstasy and Viagra) is a story of survival on a hostile planet, with these scorpionish thingies crawling in and out of people’s various holes and turning them into rubber suited, full size aliens and back to human-looking form.

Now, if the viewer of this film is going in expecting a high-end Predator kind of thing, well, that’s a problem. This is as cheesy as they come, with cheap special effects, over the top acting, and taking the easy way out as often as possible (most likely due to budget constraints). But the sets and the rubberized creatures are no worse that the first season of the original Star Trek or Lost in Space, the latter of which was also cheesy fun when it came to costumes, sets and storylines.
 

Tasha Tacosa

The problem, though, is while the cover doesn’t necessarily looks like a mega-budget blockbuster, it also falls short of its promise with the likes of wannabes, such as Richard Thomas’s Battle Beyond the Stars (1980). Personally, I do not hold it against the viewer who was annoyed by the film as it stands. At least under its original name, there’s some indication of spoof; its present moniker is nothing short of confusing.

Anyway, getting back to the meat of the film, there is a lot of cartoon violence, nudity and sex, especially in the beginning with Victoria De Mare and Bree Olsen giving a cameo nude quickie before being infested by space bugs that makes them and the captain (Leroy’s go-to-guy, Robert Rhine, who was also a producer) look like bug-eyed Snapchat photo apps.

The crash survivors include two couples, some other guy, and possibly the only smart person among them from the crew, Lana (Tasha Tacosa). Of course, no one pays attention to her when she says, “We need to stick together,” and before you can say losing your virginity, there’s drug-fueled sex, metamorphoses, and alien infestation of various shapes and sizes.
 

Decker and Grier

Honestly, of the six, the women fare better than the men. Tacosa mostly does a fine job though she seems to use a bit too much face squinting to show emotion. I have to say I am quickly becoming a fan of nerdy cute Kelly Erin Decker as hesitant lover Terri, who I’ve seen play very different roles in a couple of other films now (Devil’s Domain in 2016, and she was especially effective in Halloween Pussy Trap Kill! Kill! in 2017). Pink wigged Diamond, played by Jin N. Tonic (aka Jin Miller), is an empath who can feel the emotions of others. The guys are Terri’s boyfriend Kenny (William Gabriel Grier), Diamond’s lover Dirk (Brenton Jones), and Zak (Harlan Post). The latter three play to the lowest common denominator; Grier seems to act here more with this eyebrows. But I have to say, they all look like they are having fun, and that is kind of cathartic for the viewer, as well.



Bree Olsen and Robert Rhine

Of course, references abound, such as the Alien franchise (of course), Night of the Living Dead (1968), Snakes on a Plane (2006), The Thing (1982), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (various), and even South Park. Also, the smaller CGI alien creatures (which we see much more than the rubber suited ones) have a lot of humanistic mannerisms, such as high-fives and rubbing their own head when confused, in one case for example.

The only extras are a wack of Wild Eye Releasing trailers, including this one (though it contains way too many spoilers, if you ask me).

While this film will certainly never win any prestigious awards, it serves its true purpose to be mindless (and I mean mind-less) fun. The six survivors are attractive, and don’t really have to put in much work to make the film happen, because it is what it is, once you know what it is – and it’s pretty obvious within the first minute of viewing, if one is paying attention, whether it’s a disappointment of a promise of higher quality or not. And it’s certainly no worse than the likes of Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama (1988) or Sexsquatch: The Legend of Blood Stool Creek (2013). Sometimes one is in the mood for a sloppy joe rather than steak.