‘Predators’ Finds Its Humans, Cast Details

Published by Jeff Leins on: October 7th, 2009

20th Century Fox is assembling their line-up of human prey for Predators under the direction of Nimród Antal and producer wing of Robert Rodriguez.  Shooting is scheduled to start in roughly a month at Rodriguez’s Troublemaker Studios in Austin and the wild “jungles” of Hawaii for release on July 2010.

According to the trades, Oscar-winner Adrien Brody leads the pack of human fighters.  He’ll be joined by Walton Goggins (”The Shield”), Alice Braga (I Am Legend), UFC fighter Oleg Taktarov, Louiz Ozawa, and Mahershalalhashbaz Ali (”The 4400″).  Topher Grace (Venom in Spider-Man 3) is still playing hardball in negotiations, reports the Heat Vision blog.  Frequent Rodriguez collaborator Danny Trejo was already announced last week.

There are some definite surprises in the list there.  Brody is the obvious one, since he has an Oscar on the mantle and a filmography consisting of mostly serious character pieces.  But Variety says his representation and he lobbied hard for the role and even signed for multiple Predator installments.  He’s obviously searching for franchise potential along with Grace, who already had a taste of Spider-Man fame.

Goggins is a solid choice and a favorite for fans of “The Shield,” though I have to admit I’ve never seen an episode of “The 4400″ to know what Ali is all about.  The Russian-born Taktarov made the transition from Ultimate Fighting to acting in 2001 and has since played a character named Boris more than once.

This isn’t the only crazy cast Rodriguez has gathered lately.  He put together a helluva wicked group for Machete, an extension of the faux trailer packaged with his 2007 Grindhouse double bill with Tarantino.  De Niro, Lohan, Alba, Trejo, Cheech, Seagal, Don Johnson, and more.

Any way, back to Predators…

Who will they play?
Piecing together what we already know about the script, the humans are kidnapped from Earth and brought to the Predator home planet to be hunted.  They’re hand-selected by the Predators themselves, so they’re the best killers our world has to offer as a challenge to multiple battle-tested aliens, including a Black Super Predator.

Brody is Royce, a bad ass mercenary and the self-appointed leader of the group, playing a gritty soldier not unlike Arnold Schwarzenegger’s action hero in the original.  He’s described as “a hunter of men.”

Goggins is Stans, an inmate with a shaved head from San Quentin armed with a prison-made knife.  The reports indicate he’s the “loose cannon” of the group.

Trejo plays Cuchillo, a Mexican-American enforcer from a drug cartel with “twin Uzis strapped to his back.”

Grace is Edwin/Ethan, an “accountant-type” whose “unassuming facade masks a serial killer.”

Braga will play Isabelle, a tough French woman with a sniper rifle.

Taktarov is Nikolai, a former Russian special ops agent working a rotary machine gun.

Ali is Mombasa, an African member of the Sierra Leone death squad.

Ozawa is Hanzo, a Japanese Yakuza enforcer.

In case you can’t put a face with the name, I’ve included pictures of the cast below:

From left to right: Adrien Brody, Walton Goggins, Alice Braga, Oleg Taktarov

From left to right: Mahershalalhashbaz Ali, Danny Trejo, Predator, Topher Grace