Silent Venom

First, there was "Snakes on a Plane". Next, we were given "Snakes on a Train" by poverty-row studio The Asylum. Now, with "Silent Venom", we are given (thanks to notorious director Fred Olen Ray) snakes on a submarine! In fairness to Ray, this movie looks a lot better than a lot of his past cheapies. They actually got a decent-looking submarine set, for one thing, and it's acceptably photographed. But those looking for low budget horror thrills will be very disappointed. The movie is pretty dull in its tone, the movie moves very slowly, and there's very little blood. (Also, the CGI snakes look REALLY bad and are not the least bit scary.) The movie has a lot of stuff happen offscreen or is never explains (Just what is that mysterious substance that's found on a pipe at one point?) Perry looks aged, and Berenger fans will be disappointed because he's hardly in the movie. To sum up, it's incomprehensible that a major Hollywood studio would handle this direct-to-DVD release.

This movie has been re-titled "Sea Snakes." Maybe it had a name change to dodge a bad reputation. Anyways, it's a movie about snakes on a submarine. " Aha," you say. "The crew will simply isolate compartments, wear breathing equipment, and turn the compartment oxygen off." Well, we all know that would make for a 15 minute movie ... So pretend that it's not a real submarine, a real submarine crew, or real snakes. Oh yeah, the scientists aren't real either. I guess this is my beef with this flick, no suspension of disbelief. Most of the stuff looks fake, and it's hard to care or get engaged. There's a lot of technical errors and they are annoying. One teeny example: in one scene the ship's corpsman (the medic) puts some anti-venom next to a bunch of glass containers, all sitting on top of a cabinet. That's OK if the cabinet is affixed to a building in a non-seismic zone. All those glass jars would have fallen off the cabinet and shattered once the sub went to sea. If you want to see bigger technical errors or learn lessons in careless movie making, watch the flick. Just don't expect to be entertained.

"Snakes on a Sub" (or "Recoil" or "Silent Venom") was on my list of films to see, simply because I had to know why some (once mighty) actors would want to appear in a Fred Olen Ray (or whatever name he's going by this week) movie... The answer is (obviously) money.

The film wastes no time in letting the audience in on what to expect. Really (and I mean really, painfully) bad CGI snakes, that the average 12 year old kid could do a better job with on his home PC. It makes you wonder if they even tried? Yes, they look like cartoons of the worse kind. That being said, the story is not all that bad... Once the premise switches over to the what (and why) a submarine is involved, it actually pulls you in, and you begin to forget about the stupid snake storyline. There is an underlying war-themed adventure about an out of commission sub (and crew) that accidentally wanders into enemy waters. Very well acted by both Berenger and Perry, this part of the film really worked for me, and I became engrossed in the story. The dialog appears to follow proper Navel protocol, and you begin to feel for the characters. Unfortunately, we are soon reminded that this is "Snakes on a Sub" and the B-Movie resurfaces. I think it could have made a decent war drama on it's own, however not many people would likely rent (buy) it for that.

"Horror Sells!!!"

Thus, we are left with good acting and really, painfully, horribly, cheesy FX and an hour and a half of our lives gone forever...

Enter at own risk.

This movie was sooooooo crappy. The only thing that was interesting in it was that they combined a "submarine war movie (there aren't that many of those) with a "creature feature movie" ..... but it was hardly a successful endeavour.

Yes it's true, the CGI rendering of the giant snakes was a total joke! Oh and I must comment on Krista Allen (the only woman in the film): Her acting is TERRIBLE! Seriously, its as if she was on Botox the whole movie because the expression on her face hardly changed and therefore she seemed like she had no reaction to the current situation! Don't get me wrong, she is gorgeous, but she would be much better suited to be a model or a porn actress where she won't need any acting skills.

Bottom line, go watch one of the "Anaconda" movies if you want a creature feature with big bad CGI snakes ........ they are a lot more entertaining than this piece of bunk.

O. K., now atomic mutant, vicious, and sneaky, half pit viper, half diamondback. So, you can imagine if that was Krista Allen, what the snakes are like.

On Manku Island The east of the China Sea. A hybrid snake strain was created supposedly by a covert Chinese bomb nuclear test. As with all hybrid snake strains, they eventually get loose.

Before the credits are over Kimo Keoke gets eaten by a big mother in one gulp. Eventually, there can be an electrifying climax.

In any event, the story might be lame, but the props are realistic, and the dialog is o.k. For this type of movie. You can add it to your disaster collection.

Of course, being on a sub, we could not have the standard flame thrower.