Prey
Jessica-Ann living with her girlfriend Josephine, when suffering nightmares she sleeps alone in the guest room, awoken late at night by a terrifying sound and lights descending from the sky; running to Jo, her fears are dismissed as a dream but the next day the radio news confirms others saw the phenomenon, while another report, apparently unconnected, is concerned for the whereabouts of a young couple who have been reported missing.
The relationship between Jessica and Jo deep but sometimes difficult, Jo is both protective and possessive, finding all she needs in Jessica and unwilling to share her, while Jessica needs more; her friend Simon having left without explanation or goodbye, the arrival of an awkward stranger offers diversion, although Jo is immediately hostile to “the male.”
Directed by Norman J Warren from a script by Max Cuff, Prey was shot in only ten days for a minuscule budget, originally released in 1977, the year after his notorious Satan’s Slave, and starring Glory Annen and Sally Faulkner as Jessica and Josephine, with Barry Stokes as “Anders Anderson,” his offputting behaviour ignored and bed and board offered even though he is far from charming or personable but because the film requires it in order to proceed.
Any sense of mystery deflated by the opening scene where the flesh-hungry alien “Krator” radios his command ship and receives instructions to “proceed with the mission” before stealing the body he uses to pass as human, unaccustomed to manners, struggling with salad and never having experienced water but speaking perfect English, Prey works better as a drama of the disruption to Jo’s controlling relationship with Jessica, the science fiction and horror aspects shallow and poorly handled.
Jessica the peacemaker who wishes more freedom, that apparently extends to accepting that Jo may have murdered Simon, though with no manhunt following the slaughter of the two police officers investigating the original missing persons report, perhaps that is simply how things are done in the countryside, Jo’s jealous rages culminating in a chick fight then digging a grave in the woods which she swiftly forgets about, falling into it shortly after.
Playing games of hunter and hunted with foxes and hide and seek in the house, Krator is woefully unprepared in every way for his mission, the purpose of which remains oblique until the final line of the film even though the title gives it away, and also known as Alien Prey the new edition is supported by a commentary by Nathaniel Thompson and Troy Howarth, a discussion of the film by Stephen Thrower, the theatrical trailer and a gallery.
Prey is available on Blu-ray and DVD from 88 Films
