| Director | Paul W. S. Anderson |
|---|---|
| Genre | action film, adventure film, crossover fiction, horror film, monster film, science fiction action film, science fiction film, science fiction horror film, suspense film, thriller film |
| Runtime | 100 min |
| Country | Canada, Czech Republic, Germany, United Kingdom, United States |
| Budget | $60 million |
| Box office | $177 million |
A satellite detects a heat bloom beneath Bouvet Island, an island about off the coast of Antarctica. Wealthy industrialist Charles Bishop Weyland discovers through thermal imaging that there is a pyramid buried beneath the ice. He assembles a team of experts to investigate, including archaeologists, linguists, mercenaries, and mountaineering guide Lex Woods. Terminally ill, Weyland desires to claim the discovery in his name. Meanwhile, a Predator ship arrives at Earth and uses a heating device to melt a hole in the ice.
When the team arrives at the abandoned whaling station, they find a newly made tunnel running directly from the ice's surface toward the pyramid beneath. The team descends the tunnel and begins to explore the pyramid, soon finding evidence of an ancient civilization and what appears to be a sacrificial chamber filled with human skeletons that all have ruptured rib cages.
Meanwhile, three Predators — Scar, Celtic, and Chopper — arrive and kill the remaining team members on the surface. They make their way down to the pyramid and arrive just as the team unwittingly activates the structure and is trapped within it. A captured Xenomorph Queen is awakened from cryogenic stasis and begins to produce eggs. When the eggs hatch, several facehuggers attach themselves to several of the team members trapped in the sacrificial chamber. Chestbursters emerge from the humans and quickly grow into adult Xenomorphs. The humans take possession of the Predators' Plasmacasters, and conflict erupts between the Predators, Xenomorphs, and humans. Chopper is killed by a Xenomorph named Grid, and after an intense battle, Celtic is killed too. Weyland buys Lex and Italian archaeologist Sebastian De Rosa enough time to escape from Scar, who initially spares him due to his illness. After attempting to challenge Scar by using a flare and his oxygen breather as a makeshift flamethrower, Weyland is killed. The two witness Scar kill a facehugger and a Xenomorph before unmasking and marking both his mask and forehead with the acidic blood of the facehugger. After Lex and Sebastian leave, another facehugger attacks Scar.
Through translation of the pyramid's hieroglyphs, Lex and Sebastian learn that the Predators have been visiting Earth for millennia. They taught the early human civilization how to build pyramids and were worshipped as gods. Once a century, they visit Earth to take part in a rite of passage by which several humans sacrifice themselves as hosts for the Xenomorphs, creating the "ultimate prey" for the Predators to hunt. As a fail-safe, if overwhelmed, the Predators would activate a self-destruct device to eliminate the Xenomorphs. They deduce that the Predators lured them into the pyramid to use as a sacrifice.
Lex and Sebastian decide that the Predators must be allowed to succeed so that the Xenomorphs do not escape to the surface. Sebastian is captured by Grid, and Lex gives Scar a Plasmacaster. They are attacked by a Xenomorph, and Lex manages to kill it. Impressed, Scar uses parts of the alien's corpse to fashion a sword and shield for Lex, and the two strike up an alliance. Lex finds Sebastian, who has become the host of a Xenomorph. She mercy kills him with a pistol, but the Xenomorph Queen is freed from her restraints and, along with the other Xenomorphs, begin to pursue Lex and Scar. Scar detaches and uses the bomb in his Wrist Gauntlet to destroy the pyramid and the remaining Xenomorphs and their eggs. Lex and Scar reach the surface, and Scar uses acidic Xenomorph blood to mark Lex with the Xenomorph hunter symbol. The Xenomorph Queen reappears and attacks them, but they defeat the Queen by hooking her chains to a water tank and pushing her over a cliff to sink to the ocean floor under the tank's weight; Scar is mortally wounded in the battle when the Queen impales him through the back with her tail.
A Predator spaceship appears, and its crew retrieves its fallen comrade. An elder Predator sees the hunter scar on Lex's face and gives her his spear as a gift as the spaceship departs; Lex walks over to a snowcat and leaves the area. On the Predator spaceship, Scar's body is placed at rest in front of a window by his comrades when a Predalien chestburster erupts from his chest.