‘AVP’ better as a game than movie

Lance could’ve told them. He knew. He’s been down this mine shaft into the scary, scary dark before.

Lance Henriksen was in “Aliens.” He’s seen what the toothy, slimy, phallic face-grabbers and chest-busters can do to a human. Even though he didn’t play one in “Aliens.” (He was an android).

Somebody needed to warn us. Sigourney Weaver, Gov. Arnold, ex-Gov. Jesse and Danny Glover and Winona Ryder and the rest of the folks in the know about Aliens and Predators were, um, unavailable for “Alien vs. Predator” (“AVP”), the heartless and sometimes hilarious finale — we hope — to the “Alien” and “Predator” franchises.

Henriksen plays a billionaire who finances a research trip to a pyramid hidden thousands of feet beneath the Antarctic ice. Sanaa Lathan (“Love & Basketball”) is the ice-climbing expert who tries to keep her charges safe. And Ewen Bremner (“Trainspotting”) and others are the potential victims when humans come between the slimy Alien phalluses and the dreadlocked, helmeted super-hunters from Predator.

The pyramid, it turns out, is an elaborate gamescape, a maze set up for the predators to hunt the aliens. The game here is to see which, if any, of the humans will get out alive.

Director Paul W.S. Anderson (“Resident Evil,” “Event Horizon,” “Mortal Kombat”) has a thing for gamelike killing sprees. What he doesn’t have is talent. The heartless way he dispatches most of his cast before we’ve even gotten to know them is ineptitude of the first order. He’s got great sets and cool lighting, and the best two monsters the recent cinema has produced, and this is all he could think of to do with them?

But the unintentional laughs almost save “AVP.” Hearing the silly Italian archeologist (Raoul Bova) blurt out “Theees eees starting to make seeeense,” just when it isn’t making any sense, is irony incarnate.

The scary action beats were borrowed from “Jurassic Park” (a T-Rex sized alien gives chase) and “Pitch Black.” Plainly, this makes a better video game than movie. No wonder the game came first.

But the finale is a stitch, plainly the thing that got this idea turned into a film after a decade of trying.