Julia Barrett's World

Or why the movie, Predators, watches like a romance novel reads.

As viewers, we are quite literally dropped into the middle of the action. And I do mean dropped. A good romance does the same thing - the story begins in the middle of our hero’s or our heroine’s life, often in the midst of a difficult, dangerous, unpleasant, life altering situation. We generally aren’t given the entire back story in the beginning - i.e. from birth to present day. The back story unfolds as the plot progresses, often via dialogue, sometimes with nothing more than a nod of the head or a look.

In Predators, the closest we come to back story in the beginning is when our unlikely and nameless hero asks our somewhat more likely and equally nameless heroine if she’s IDF. I know what IDF is…look it up if you’re not sure, I don’t want to spoil too much of the movie. That simple question gives us significant glimpses into the back stories of both - we now know what she is and what she does to some extent and what her history might be, and we know that he’s familiar enough with the IDF to use nothing more than the initials, IDF, without hesitation. That fact alone hints strongly at his background.

Every character in Predators is an archetype, and none fits the typical hero archetype, far from it. Yet each character, like the archetypal hero in Joseph Campbell’s book, The Hero With a Thousand Faces, must follow a classic heroes’ journey - descend into the depths of hell, face his or her inner demons, and either conquer them or die trying. We use archetypes in romance all the time.

Adrien Brody’s character, we don’t learn his name until the very last scene, is amoral. (Names aren’t important here, archetypes are.) He’s competent, courageous, single-minded, decisive and discerning - everything we love in our Alpha Males, but through most of the film, his only concern is his own survival. For him, there is no moral high ground. He is not compassionate, self-sacrificing or sympathetic, yet he’s honest, straightforward, matter of fact, clear-thinking and therefore, compelling and appealing in the exact same way the hero of a romance novel is. The question is, in the end I think, can he show some empathy, not kindness mind you - this man is not kind - but empathy. Adrien Brody’s interpretation of the role brings to mind the words Faye Dunaway uses to describe Robert Redford’s character in the movie, Three Days of the Condor. She says, paraphrasing here, “Your eyes…they aren’t kind, but they don’t miss anything.” Robert Redford is the hero in that movie. Like Adrien Brody in Predators, he isn’t kind, but neither is he deliberately cruel. He does whatever he deems necessary to survive…sometimes he’s not so nice, but yes, he too does the right thing in the end.

I have to admit, I like my bad boys. Since this post is getting long, tomorrow - my favorite bad boys and if there’s time, a few of the beta heroes I adore.

Some of my favorite romance heroes cannot by any stretch of the imagination be considered nice guys.

(notice I say my favorites so you won’t think I’m dissing yours)

Arrogant? Yes.

Hot stuff? Absolutely.

Testosterone laden? Positively oozing from every pore.

Protective and possessive of those they care about? Without question.

Nice guys? Probably not.

This is on my mind for two reasons - reason one: the hero of the book I just finished (oops! Finished Reading!) is a nice guy. He’s a flat out nice guy and he’s sensitive. When I describe him as sensitive, I mean sometimes, well pretty much all the time, he acts, talks and thinks (vis-a-vis internal dialogue) like a woman. In other words, I read him as a female character. From my perspective, at best he’d be a really good guy friend or a brother. Except he’s less protective than a brother because this character is so sensitive. He spends an inordinate amount of time nursing hurt feelings and he keeps giving the heroine space whereas a not so nice guy would think to himself, she doesn’t need space, she needs me. ME. ME. ME. Depending upon the quality of the writing, I’d probably agree. I liked the character, but I sure as hell wouldn’t fantasize about him because that would be exactly like fantasizing about my brother…if I had brother…ewww.

Hey…there is nothing wrong with fantasizing. I don’t only fantasize about romance, I fantasize about hero stories and mythology and scifi - have since I was a little kid. Don’t knock internal fantasy. I think it is the mother/father of creativity, the crucible in which our stories are mixed and melded.

Reason two: I just watched Predators last night - the updated Predator. I really liked it. Nobody is a nice guy. Yet there is a hero, an alpha male who stands head and shoulders above the rest. He’s competent. He’s a survivor. He’s arrogant and has little use for human frailty. He does not suffer pangs of conscience, but neither is he sadistic or cruel. In the end, he does what every romance hero/alpha male does - the right thing, the good thing. At first I thought Adrien Brody was miscast as an unlikeable, not nice, alpha male hero, because I can’t help but remember him in his genius role as Wladyslaw Szpilman in the movie, The Pianist. But he filled some big alpha shoes, and he did it convincingly.

Tomorrow - Why Predators provides a perfect vehicle for the archetype of an Alpha Male, and a few other not-so-nice Alpha Males in romance literature.