It isn’t often that Hollywood offers two movies on the same weekend where audiences are encouraged to root for the bad guys.
Both the animated comedy “Despicable Me” and the sci-fi sequel/reboot “Predators” focus on dastardly villains, but only one enlists a trio of adorable children to break the cold-blooded exterior of our technologically-savvy antagonist.
Try to guess which one is which.
In “Despicable Me,” Steve Carell voices Gru, an aging underachiever of a bad guy with a thick Euro-vampiric accent and a legion of adorable minions living in his basement. With his latest heist thwarted by an obnoxious upstart (voiced by Jason Segel), Gru adopts three orphan sisters to help defeat the competition (using their generalized cuteness and seasoned cookie sales experience, of course).
Gru’s house could be the most dangerous home on the planet, with deadly laser guns, medieval weapons and vicious Attack-Chihuahuas around every corner. Carell has a lot of fun “parenting” the kids, criticizing their rudimentary bedtime stories, leaving their food in dog dishes and threatening them with non-existent monsters in the closet. The minions, though, try to engage the kids, but more often than not, it only encourages their own childlike indulgences.
“Despicable Me” gets predictably syrupy in the second half, but the vocal performances keep the material fresh. Like on “The Office” and in “The 40-Year-Old Virgin,” Carell has the rare ability to be simultaneously obnoxious, hilarious and sympathetic.
The film also gets plenty of comic mileage out of the minions. They’re like gremlins only cuter, nicer and (slightly) less destructive.
If only the monsters in “Predators” could be as interesting. The science-fiction sequel from director Nimrod Antal (“Armored”) and producer Robert Rodriguez (“Sin City”) is structurally similar to the 1987 actioner starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. The second half of the film, unfortunately, plays like every standard sci-fi slasher on the block.
The new film opens strong with hardened mercenary Royce (Oscar-winner Adrien Brody!) freefalling out of a spaceship and landing on an unknown jungle planet. He meets up with other hardened human warriors (including the always-relatable rapists and death-row inmates) and soon learns they are on a game preserve where alien Predators enjoy hacking-and-slashing humans for sport.
After a familiar-but-competent opening half with the obligatory “What’s that behind the trees?” scenarios, “Predators” goes all out in the mayhem and gore department, with very little of it mustering any tension or thrills.
The cast is fine, although Brody brings nothing to the role besides a newly toned six-pack looking only slightly less awkward than Taylor Lautner’s “Twilight” abs. Laurence Fishburne also appears halfway through the film as a longtime inhabitant of the planet. He’s a major highlight, but his role is similar to and no bigger than that of Tim Robbins in the recent “War of the Worlds” remake.
Worst of all, the Predators themselves show no personality. Hunt. Kill. Repeat. There’s some nonsense about Classic Predators battling with what IMDB calls “Berzerker” Predators, and it all makes as much sense as it sounds.
Hopefully the next “Predator” film will explore the alien race’s backstory, or show the Predator domestic life or what they do for leisure. Maybe they adopt human children and snicker through our primitive bedtime stories. They could call it “Despicable Predators,” and it would make gobs of money.
Grades:
Despicable Me: B+
Predators: C