Predators in film act unrealistically aggressive. It’s exciting, tension building, and in some cases totally necessary to drive the plot. But usually, it’s also unfortunately insanely stupid. The big offender that got me thinking about this was Jurassic Park. In the case of the xenomorphs in Alien, I simply don’t know if they’re driven by hunger or by aggression against the humans, I just don’t know so I can’t make a conclusion. But the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park are totally 100% animals. They have no ulterior motive. They hunt because they need to feed, so logically once fed, they should simply leave.
But in Jurassic Park the second a carnivorous dinosaur spots a human, it’s a fight to the death. The dino will stop at nothing to kill every human. Will they even eat them? Not as far as we see. The T-Rex would just as soon rip someone in half as eat them. And the raptors just seem intent on tormenting. If a lion was chasing you, and you got into a car: fight over. You’ve won. The lion will sniff the car, claw at it, maybe climb on top of it. Maybe he waits you out for awhile, but most likely it’d just walk away. It’s only hungry, and you’re slow and clumsy.
I neeed you!
What wouldn’t happen is the predator risk life and limb to kill something. In Jurassic Park: The Lost World there’s a scene, maybe for comedic effect, but Ian Malcom is running in and out of a fuel depot’s office, and the same raptor leaps through every pane of glass. Animals can certainly cause self harm in the pursuit of prey, but they’re not oblivious to self preservation. That’s what’s driving them to hunt in the first place!
Sharks, bears, lions, tigers, dinosaurs, zombies are all shown with a supernatural drive for murder, when all they should really want is to feed on sight. But once evaded, the hunt is over, and they should simply walk away.
