Prey

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Mukunda Michael Dewil directs. Miriam Arndt cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in English, Spanish.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

• 186 minutes exactly — the "classic feature" runtime most directors aim for.
• 2Released 2 years ago.
• 3Dialogue crosses 2 languages: English, Spanish.
• 4Editor Miriam Arndt shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
• 5Ryan Phillippe and Emile Hirsch and Mena Suvari carry the top of the cast.
• 6Marketing tagline: "Let the hunt begin.".
• 7IMDB entry: tt27682129 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

The technical file

Editing

Miriam Arndt

Production design

Damian Lund

Stunt coordinator

Eric Spudic

Runtime

86 min · 1h 26m

Aspect ratio (typical)

1.37:1 (Academy)

Status

Released

Original language

EN

IMDB

Prey (2024) ↗

Also by

Mukunda Michael Dewil

• 
  The Patient

  2025 · ★ 6.1
• 
  Vehicle 19

  2013 · ★ 5.4
• 
  The Immaculate Room

  2022 · ★ 5.2
• 
  Collide

  2022 · ★ 4.8

Stills · wallpapers

Selected frames

Full-resolution frames — open one to save it as a wallpaper.

Wallpaper Wallpaper Wallpaper Wallpaper

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

• 

  ▶
  Lion Attack

  Clip · Official
• 

  ▶
  Stay Awake

  Clip · Official
• 

  ▶
  The Crash

  Clip · Official
• 

  ▶
  Official Trailer

  Trailer · Official

Community reviews

What people are saying

• Wuchak2024-06-23
  ★ 6/10

  Survival in the Kalahari Desert, physical and spiritual A missionary couple in Africa (Ryan Phillippe and Mena Suvari) are forced to take a flight with a questionable bush pilot (Emile Hirsch). Unfortunately, they & several others end up stuck in the barren areas of Southwest Africa with plenty of lions and hyenas roaming about. "Prey" (2024) was originally called “Kalahari,” but changed to the hackneyed “Prey.” The movie poster isn’t that far removed from the 2007 movie “Prey.” At heart, this is a modern take on “Sands of the Kalahari” and “Flight of the Pheonix” with a key element of “Conan the Barbarian” (1982) thrown in. While this is the least of ’em due to its low-budget, it works well enough for a slow-burn survival adventure wherein the gore is more implied than shoved in your face. I prefer it to the 2007 version of “Prey.” There's a factual error (the medical treatment of a particular wound), as well as a couple of seeming plot holes, but one of them can be easily explained on the grounds that a stray bullet struck the radiator of the jeep. A better explanation is that the jeep wasn't even there since one of the Namibians said something about waiting for the jeep to come back, possibly with another vehicle to transport the prisoners. The other potential plot hole can also be explained with a little imagination. The writer/director isn’t obligated to spell everything out and respects the intelligence of viewers to put the pieces together. This was the first time I’ve seen Hirsch play a bad boy and he’s convincing. I also liked the lowkey ideological struggle between good and evil, morality vs immorality, faith and atheism (or, at least, agnosticism), Christianity vs secular humanism. Speaking of which, it’s laughable that some people criticize the flick on the grounds of it being “Christian propaganda.” Two of the main characters are occupational missionaries, so it’s understood that God and faith will come up in a few of the dialogues. But, again, this is so light it’s hard to believe anyone would complain. The same came up in “The Grey,” but no one complained there. As for a weather-related incident that occurs at the end, it doesn’t have to be attributed to a metaphysical source since freak things happen in the weather all the time. The film leaves you thinking about life’s heavy issues, like what’s your purpose? Is there a Creator? Is life a meaningless accident? Is there good and evil -- ethical and unethical -- or is everything relative? Is redemption possible for the morally compromised? Is there such a thing as self-sacrificial love (aka, agape)? The movie runs 1 hour, 26 minutes, and was shot in the arid areas of the high country north of Los Angeles, such as SilverStrand Ranch, Castaic; Agua Dulce Movie Ranch; The Quarry in Semi Valley (for the sand sequence); MH Aviation in Lancaster; and Vasquez Rocks; as well as studio stuff done at Blackstone Entertainment, Azusa. A second unit filmed additional scenery and animals in South Africa, along with the use of stock footage. GRADE: B-

  Read full review ↓
• CinemaSerf2024-08-21
  ★ 5/10

  Could this really be the same Ryan Philippe who was in "Cruel Intentions"? Are things really that bad? Well now he's "Andrew" who runs a Christian missionary deep in the Kalahari. Forced to flee, they engage the rather untrustworthy services of pilot "Grun" (Emile Hirsch) and next thing they are amidst some wreckage in the middle of a wild game reserve with loads of hungry lions, hyenas, scorpions and a few heavily armed freedom fighters. Can they survive? There are some beautiful animals featured in this film and the Californian Vasquez Rocks National Park serves well enough as a location double, but the rest of this is all really quite poorly written and executed before a denouement that I could have done with half an hour earlier. There's nothing about the characters for us to care about, one being determined to smuggle artefacts out of the country whilst an other wants to indoctrinate the locals with a lifetime supply of bibles. Maybe he thought it was called "Pray" instead? It's not exactly predicable, it's not that structured - it sort of meanders along desperate to generate some sense of menace from it's arid and hostile environment, but all to underwhelming avail. Nope, nothing at all to recommend this to anyone, sorry.

  Read full review ↓

Production companies

Who made it

• TH

  The Barnum Picture Company

  US

• GR

  Green Light Pictures

  US

• 

  Lucky 13 Productions

  US

Key crew

• Second Assistant DirectorXibei Hu
• Stunt CoordinatorEric Spudic
• CinematographyFarhad Ahmed Dehlvi
• EditorMiriam Arndt
• CastingNeely Eisenstein
• Second Second Assistant DirectorForrest Snyder
• Production DesignDamian Lund
• Associate ProducerSammi Farber
• Executive ProducerPeter Jarowey
• Executive ProducerJonathan Deckter
• ProducerLucas Jarach
• ProducerChristian Ackerman
• Executive ProducerKristin Harris
• ProducerRobert Ogden Barnum
• Executive ProducerRichard Goldberg
• Executive ProducerAndrew Davies Gans
• Executive ProducerLuke Daniels
• Executive ProducerNicolas Chartier

Themes & keywords

What it's about, really

• missionary
• lion
• kalahari
• plane crash

Release history · US

When it landed

• Theatrical (limited)2024-03-15
• Digital2024-03-15

Also known as

International titles

• KalahariUS
• طعمهIR
• טרףIL
• Prey!GB
• ДобычаRU