The cast of Prey went through boot camp to prepare for filming, but it wasn’t enough. The upcoming horror thriller will be a prequel to the long-running franchise, which first began in 1987 with the action movie Predator. The original film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Carl Weathers, Jesse Ventura and Bill Duke received mixed criticism at the time of release. Nevertheless, it proved popular with the public and quickly became a cult classic. Over the course of 35 years, the franchise has spawned five sequels and two crossover films, Alien. Prey aims to tell the story of a Predator that takes place 300 years before the events of the original film.
The events of Prey unfold in 1719. The focus is on Naru (Amber Midtander), a young commanche hunter who takes part in a testing ritual, but is interrupted by an invisible ruthless alien. With nothing but a hunting bow, homemade weapons and her skill, Naru takes on the task of tracking down and killing the Predator before he kills her. The cast is rounded out by Michelle Thrush, Stormy Kipp, Julian Black Antelope, Dakota Beevers and 6-foot-9-inch former professional basketball player Dane Dilegro in the role of Predator.
ComicBook.com recently contacted Midthunder, who reports that the actors had to go through a four-week special training program to prepare them for the shooting of Prey. When asked about the training camp and how she prepared for her scenes with the Predator, the actor explains that “you’re not ready” — no one can really prepare for something like this. Read what Midthunder says below:
You can not. It’s so impossible. We had a four-week training camp. Dakota, me and all the other boys before filming started. But the truth is, there’s no way to prepare for coming to work every day for a week and being thrown into a mud pit or a river, or, you know, at some point I ran off a cliff or something like that. You can’t prepare for this.
Since the film tells about a tribe of Native Americans who lived on the Great Plains in the early 18th century, it is expected that the actors will simulate the life of that time. Although Midthunder didn’t go into the details of the actors’ training regimen, her description of the scenes implies that the boot camp most likely consisted of rigorous outdoor exercises to simulate the film’s combat scenes. Such a program helped the actors immerse themselves in the setting, while physically training their bodies for combat scenes, as well as strengthening the camaraderie between them to help create realistic performances and captivate viewers with the next chapter of the Predator saga.
Training camps are not uncommon for action movies in which actors must convincingly play a role. Director Steven Spielberg conducted a complex training program for his actors to prepare them for the role of soldiers in an action movie about World War II Save Private Ryan. Tom Cruise, director Joseph Kosinski and producer Jerry Bruckheimer subjected the entire main cast of Top Gun: Maverick to flight training, and also spent time on real F/A-18 Superhornet to prepare them for shooting on real fighters. Whether Midthunder and the rest of the cast training paid off will be determined when Prey premieres on Hulu on August 5.
