Centipede!

I guess it's time all sci-fi/horror/fantasy fans rose up and seized control of the SF Channel. The current directorate is certainly doing such a lousy job that even a committee could do better. I mean, a long line of incredibly foul made-for-TV movies--of which 'Centipede!' is the latest--is NOT the reason I continue to pay 60-some-odd bucks a month for cable. I can hardly wait to see how SFC mangles 'The Wizard of Earthsea'; maybe Ursula K can be our new commissar.

Okay, okay, I should know better by now. In all my years of viewing these kind of flicks (damn near a half-century), I've resigned myself to the fact that most of the genre is not going to be 'Lord of the Rings', 'Star Wars' or 'Clockwork Orange'. But is that any excuse to not at least attempt the production values of moderately well-done mainstream movies? You don't need big bucks, just a measure of talent. None here, I'm afraid...or if there was, it was exceptionally well-hidden.

Take special effects; they had to be kidding. Were those sock puppets? I've seen more believable animation at a Punch and Judy show.

And plot? A bunch of kids celebrate one of their group's pending marriage by going caving in a really deep cavern system, and end up getting eaten by giant centipedes. Oh, yeah; and they got this device that tracks individual transponders ($129.95 at Radio Shack) that each one carries, so that when one of the kids gets noshed, the survivors can--SURPRISE!--actually track the monsters! Hoo-hah! With such clever originality, how could you ask for more?

Might as well forget character development, too. This is one of those rare movies where absolutely NO one is sympathetic. I wanted them all--even the native comic-relief, with his politically-incorrect 'funny Indian' accent--to DIE HORRIBLY. Unfortunately, they didn't--die horribly, that is.

They just died. And so did the flick.

I can say one good thing about 'Centipede!', though; it's over, and I'm not watching it any longer.

A group of irritating young American dudes and babes explore a cavern in India. Our sexy adventurers don't know how to cave, but they sure know how to smirk.

I found none of the characters likable. But worse than that was the deplorable lack of the most basic caving knowledge, exemplified in the dialogue and the visuals. We're told the cave is three miles deep. In reality, the deepest known cave in the world is a little over one mile.

In the "depths" of this movie cave, most of the lighting comes from an unidentified background source, and resembles moon glow. The cavers never seem to notice it. In real caves, even at fairly shallow depths, except for light the cavers themselves bring in, absolute darkness prevails. In the movie, the vertical technique used by the cavers is all wrong. Further, their behavior inside the cave is juvenile and moronic. And I know of no cave wherein the passageways are conducive to ... sprinting.

For me, "Centipede!" did not evoke tension or suspense. There was just too much that was hokey. The inside of the cave looked like an indoor movie set. There was nothing about it that was awe inspiring or foreboding. The large centipede was less menacing than merely clunky. And the film's plot was unoriginal and predictable.

As for the acting, I thought the fake centipede did a better job than the actors. The film's dialogue was dreadful. And the Indian officials coming to the rescue lacked credibility. The one element of this film that did have credibility was the background music.

Overall, "Centipede!" is cheap looking and spurious, mostly as a result of a dreadful cast, a weak script, poor special effects, and an apparent lack of knowledge of caving basics.

The sole purpose for making this film in India must have been the cheap labor because most of the film is shot on fakey cave interiors and the exterior shots are no more exotic than Red Rock Canyon in Nevada. Too bad they didn't make it in Hong Kong at least they could have gotten some of the folks who worked on the Shaw Borthers old 1982 shock and schlocker Centipede Horror to show them how it was done. In that film they actually use real centipedes and it's as gross as Hell. In this film they use old school puppetry and while I'm sick and tired of crappy cartoony CGI monsters this foam latex critter can't even pass the Roger Corman level of New World Pictures monsters. Hell it can't even entertain as much as the no budget ping pong and hotdog monsters from The Horror Of Party Beach. The best thing you can say about it is that some of the actors are trying hard and that it's nowhere as awful as anything I've seen from Asylum pictures who gave us I AM Omega, Beast Of Bray Road,Transmorphers and Snakes On A Train.

Dukey

This is one of those flicks that is just inexcusably bad. There have been less than a handful of really good monster movies ("Alien", "Aracnaphobia" and "Tremors") in the last quarter century, so no one should expect SciFi Channel movies to be theater quality, particularly their "Creature Features". But at least their offerings should rank up there with Maynard G. Krebs' "The Monster That Devoured Cleveland." Unfortunately, "Centipede" is just rank.

One can usually forgive inept acting and low grade special effects. (I particularly liked the truck load of dynamite that caused a boffo fireball -- but didn't blow up the truck.) These things cost money. But how do you forgive scripts that attempt to create tension by having the protagonists do stupid things rather than by having the antagonist do evil things? Through the last half of the movie, these guys are continually chased by a "monster", so instead of running like hell they just as continually hang around until one by one they get caught. These characters are so inept that one wants to cheer for the monster, even if he does look like a latex hand puppet. Oh, it is a latex hand puppet! Personally, I kept hoping the bug would get them all because they all deserve (need) Darwin Awards. Unfortunately, three get away.

I think reviewers have been too harsh with with their "Centipede" reviews. This isn't a great movie, but fans of creature features might enjoy it. This looks like a low budget Sy-Fy channel movie. Most of the monster effects are old-school. I thought it was fun. (not really smart or good) Some of the actors are better than others. And Margaret Cash looks cute in shorts. The centipede effects were OK for Sy-Fy standards. It looks like they used centipede models and props instead of cgi. The cave settings were well done. The story is OK. This is actually better than many of the other Sy-Fy channel movies. (many of them really suck). I found it on a cheap DVD. The quality of the print could have been better. The picture looks just a wee bit soft for a modern movie-I'm guessing no enhancement for 16x9 screens. It is also in standard rather than widescreen ratio. I don't know if it was originally filmed in widescreen or not. Fans of big budget movies should probably avoid this one. This one is for creature feature fans like myself. Thank you.