Mamba

It's a concise, yet mildly exciting close quarters psychological/deadly animal-on-the-loose thriller that puts to good use its short running time. After the humid, nihilistic set-up involving Bill Moseley (snake handler) and a domineering Gregg Henry in seamy, heartless mode collecting/and testing out his newly acquired mamba. There it moves onto young headstrong sculptress Eva (performed with ticker by Trudie Styler) soon to be ex-wife to Gene (Gregg Henry). She wants to break away from his emotional abuse, but he wants to finish things off on his terms... revenge. His plan is to seal off her windowless loft and unknowingly to her release a steroid-injected mamba, as he sits outside in his car getting his rocks off watching the mamba hunt its prey on a tracking device from his lap-top monitor. The lengths this vindictive man would go to can be seen as a power trip showing that his strike is just as lethal, if not deadlier than the snake.

A very elaborate, although not foolproof get-up... I guess cheaper, and less humiliating than a divorce? Styler's character escapes a trapped relationship thinking that it's all behind her, but finds herself literally caught in another enclosed battle. This time survival against a killer she can't see, let alone catch without thinking of the life threatening dangers. In a way it's a waiting game as she spends a good amount of time unaware of the threat, poking and prodding about, leading to set-piece after set-piece of close shave encounters. Plenty of POV shots, low angles, high angles and tracking shots. It's sleekly executed. An outstanding music score seperates itself from the norm giving out an uncanny jungle vibe with the squealing monkey sounds when the snake is on the move. Once she finds out she's not alone in the apartment is when it really clicks into gear. The fear, panic and alertness is amplified, as the snake could be lurking around every shadow and round every corner. One strike and you're done. The space seems to close in even more, claustrophobic suspense arises as she must fight back, not knowing there's a time limit to this madness. All she knows is that she's a target and there's no escaping it.

The idea is frightening, but I don't think the (stretched out) premise fully tapped into the situational suspense and adrenaline boost consistently enough. You just know how it's going to end, poetic justice is oh so sweet.

(This has all the makings of a cheap exploitive thriller.)

"Mamba" ("Fair Game" in the United States) is a decent, albeit somewhat exploitive thriller about Gene (Gregg Henry), a deranged computer game designer who locks his ex-fiancé Eva (Trudie Styler) inside their apartment with a deadly Black Mamba snake.

Directed by Mario Orfini, he keeps a tight pace and strong sense of dread as Eva runs around her apartment trying to avoid certain death at the fangs of a lethal snake, all the while Gene watches the madness from a car parked down on the street. Styler really carries this film on her delicate shoulders, even remaining strong in some of the sillier haunted house/slasher-style moments. It does seem kind of strange that her apartment is devoid of windows (thus setting up the fun-house element for Gene's later entertainment).

One thing that does seem to bother me is how the camera does seem fixated on Styler during a few instances when she has to strip off her clothes. While the camera misses a few of the more explicit shots of her feminine features, you kind of get the idea that Orfini (and the audience) are still getting tantalized.

"Fair Game" gets a fair rating for at least keeping you watching.

4/10

"Fair Game" or "Mamba", which is the less imaginative but apparently official title for this film, actually is the simplified and much more straightforward version of the British early 80's thriller "Venom" starring Oliver Reed and Klaus Kinski. That movie revolves on petty criminals facing the threat of a venomous black mamba snake whilst trying to take hostage the sickly son of a rich family. It's a fun but incredibly far-fetched (the mamba ended up in the house through an "accidental" wrong delivery) film and the script is over-ambitious for its own good, with police forces surrounding the house and virulent intrigues between the kidnappers mutually, whereas basically it should have just been a claustrophobic lethal-snake-on-the-loose suspense movie. Mario Orfini, writer/director of "Fair Game" and of course an Italian, obviously saw "Venom" as well and immediately realized that only the escaped snake formula is more than enough to attract horror audiences. The rudimentary plot of "Fair Game" is reasonably effective just because of its simplicity, and it's merely the details and character drawings that cause major disbelief. Gregg Henry ("Body Double", "Slither") is almost too good as the frustrated and seriously deranged ex-husband who can't process the separation from the joyous artist/play-dough sculptor Eva. What do you expect? If you compare their personalities, they must have formed a terrible mismatch of a couple since day one! So, what's a lunatic video game designer to do? He buys a mamba, kills the seller, injects the animal with hormones to make her even deadlier and finally lets it loose in Eva's hermetically sealed flat without windows. She faces a virulent battle with the slithering dose of venom whilst the psychopath watches everything in his car via a computer-designed game. "Fair Game" naturally is a highly improbable thriller, of course, but the approaching snake sequences are undeniably suspenseful. The score and sound-effects, although inspired by the legendary "Psycho" shower sequence noises, are terrific and the film contains approximately 30 ingenious POV shots, even though admittedly they serve more to provide glorious shots of Trudie Styler's bottom. Speaking of which, Mrs. Sting proves herself to be a very untalented actress but, in all fairness, performing all alone with just a not-so-talkative animal in the room isn't exactly the most grateful role you can get. The script is full of ludicrous little details and the finale is extremely forced and implausible. Interesting little detail for horror fanatics surely is that Bill Moseley forms the entire supportive cast all by himself in his second 'important' role after starring in "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre II".

This is a stunningly bad film, certainly the worst and most inept I've ever had the misfortune to sit through. The acting and direction are not even professional and the script makes no sense at all. It's hard to understand how the video was accepted for mass distribution, there really is no artistic merit at all.

I had the dubious pleasure of attending a pre-screening of this movie at a Los Angeles studio in 1987 or 1988, and I find it really hard to believe that it ever made it out of editing room garbage cans. On the other hand, maybe I should take that back; there are good bad movies, and there are bad bad movies, and I have to admit that I really enjoyed guffawing in disbelief throughout this one. Still, my favorite part of the screening was filling out the evaluation form after seeing this gem: I have never had a more fruitful opportunity to exercise my limited abilities in sardonic wit. If I remember correctly, that document was my masterpiece in the genre. I wish I had a copy. Many thanks to my friend and student at the time, Sergio Canto, who got the passes to the screening.

P.S. I could take a line or two to outline what I remember about the plot of the "film," but that's as much as the writer did, so I guess I won't bother.