AVP: Requiem (DVD)

On DVD this week is the perhaps too harshly judged Alien Vs. Predator: Requiem, which bowed on Christmas Day of 2007 and died before the pine needles on most folks' tinseled firs were dry. Most critics hated it, and the fan-boys were up in arms about the liberties taken with their beloved slimy villains. But, the filmmakers explain on the featurettes, they're not liberties so much as evolutions (for instance the gestation from burrowing to bursting in the Alien is much quicker, and there is also a super-nasty hybrid critter as the result of the two sworn enemies mating [hm, which one is the Montague and which one's the Capulet?] )

When the Aliens are chest-bursting out of 11-year-old kids (that is, when they're not eviscerating pregnant women), and the Predators are ripping every living thing in sight from limb-to-limb, you really can't go wrong. Set it in a small town, throw in a few stupid teens and even dumber law-enforcement officers, and you're got yourself a microwave popcorn party in front of the old boob tube.

The characters are flimsy flotsam and the action lacks suspense, but still in all Alien Vs. Predator: Requiem is worth a look for the prompt pace and gory slayings — while not as much cheddar-factory fun as the first Alien Vs. Predator movie (directed by Paul W.S. Anderson, the mayor of Cheeseville), Requiem still holds its own as a guilty monster-movie pleasure. Read Horror.com's [yep, harshly judged... but it's different paying box offices prices than renting a DVD] review of the theatrical release here

The DVD offers up a multitude of additional release material choices. Some might find it interesting to utilize the pop-up option to show them how the theatrical R-rated version differs from the uncut (I didn't, but if memory serves me there is indeed more gore now). There's also an informative look at the Predator Homeworld, which is something never before seen in any of the previous franchise offerings.

Since the movie was helmed by visual-effects designers and music video veterans The Strause Brothers, you can bet there is a lot of back story on the CGI and special makeup and creature costuming. The process was obviously quite painstaking and while nobody's going to say the Strause Brothers' filmmaking ability is on the same level as some of their predecessors (Ridley Scott, John McTiernan, James Cameron — at least, not yet — you can see that they took a lot of care with their monsters and that they are genuine fans of their film's forerunners.

Disc One:

• Full-length audio commentary by directors Colin and Greg Strause and producer John Davis;
• Full-length audio commentary by creature effects designers/creators Alec Gillis and Tom Woodruff, Jr.;
• Added footage marker; Prepare for war: the Making of AVP-R Featurette;
• Fight to the Finish: the making of AVP-R featurette;
• AVP-R: the nightmare returns - creating the aliens featurette;
• Crossbreed: the PredAlien featurette;
• Building the Predator Homeworld featurette;
• Design photo galleries;
• On-set photo galleries;
• Theatrical trailers

Disc Two:

• Digital copy of AVP-R for portabel media players

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Reviewed by Staci Layne Wilson