eric brochu

manly, manly movie	Deliverance	The Thing	Predator
year	1972	1982	1987
director	John Boorman	John Carpenter	John McTiernan
the all-male group of manly men	suburban outdoorsmen	antarctic researchers and support staff	mercenaries (but, you know: good guy mercenaries)
biome	Appalacia	the antarctic	central american jungle
ultra-macho alpha male	Burt Reynolds	Kurt Russel	Arnold Schwarzenegger
most ludicrously macho action of leader	bow fishing, talking like a survivalist	blows up the entire fucking base, while growing a manly, mountain-man beard	everything. every goddamn thing he does.
far less macho guy who almost dooms them all by cracking under pressure	Ned Beatty	Wilford Brimley	Bill Duke
the initial threat that turns out not be too much of a threat	blister-inducing banjo duels	Norway	vaguely-defined Central American guerrillas
the actual threat	inbred rapists, the incompatibility of macho values with modern society	freaky alien shapeshifters	freaky alien trophy hunter
the internal threat	indiscriminate cathartic murder, bad lying skills	freaky alien shapeshifter	the CIA, in the form of ace spy Carl Weathers. also, insufficient machoness.
good-guy survival rate	75% (but they’ll carry those scars forever…)	0%	Arnold
bad-guy survival rate	50%	0% (maybe)	0% (probably)
innocent people killed by the good guys	1	at least 3	none, but they do accidently kill a pig
female speaking roles	2 (but blink and you’ll miss them)	0	1
future US State Governors in cast	0	0	2
message	stick to the suburbs, city boy, because poor people probably want to tie you up and make you squeal like a pig	there is no problem that can’t be overcome with science, logic and generously-applied explosives	big guns and big muscles are cool. also, don’t trust Carl Weathers.
inane IMDB message board threads inspired by the film	“Ned Beatty kinda deserved to be buggered”	“other woman-free movies?”	“Do Predators lay eggs or bear live young?”
overall manliness levels	moderate	high	extreme

this week’s trifecta of manly, manly films

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