Attack of the Meth Gator

SOMEBODY has to stand up for this wonderful studio, and I'm delighted to accept the assignment. Does no one watch a movie to be ENTERTAINED, with a big goofy grin on their face? If being The Ripoff Kings Of The Cinema is a crime, why was Roger Corman (the former King) handed a career Oscar?? This 89m of trashy dee-light may be a naked ripoff of Cocaine Bear, but that film left me needing MORE of a delicious new "drugged beasties" genre that The Asylum was primed and ready to deliver! You folks who are locked & loaded to give any Asylum film an automatic 2-star rating (without even seeing it, I suspect) have no place in my life. Let the trash cinema congregation say AMEN!!

But with a massive alligator. The dialogue is almost unintelligible from two of the characters, but it's filmed well and if you like Asylum movies you will enjoy it.

As an aside, the Jaws storyline, regarding not putting off the tourists, is pretty moving.

The false ending worked to keep the excitement going, but I stopped understanding what was happening. You may need to watch this one more than once to get all of the subtle elements. I really hope they make a follow up to this one, as there is definitely a lot more that can be done with this storyline.

One note - see if you can spot the actors from Game of Thrones.

Hamlet it is not. Don't look for deep character studies or powerful storylines here. If you like great special effects, such as Terminator 2, Matrix, this is not it. The special effects are of a lumbering alligator that can swim nearly as fast as a speed boat, jump car lengths, and resist bullets to fit the storyline as needed while at other times is hurt by them. There is no consistency to the creature's abilities, strengths or weaknesses. "If it gets more meth, it will become unkillable" The writers did not consult with scientists or toxicologists.

That said, while the actors aren't Hollywood's best, they are engaging and likable. The Mayor (Patrick Labyorteaux) fits his image well, and does a good job as a gentrified Louisianian. LaRonn Marzett as the scientist does as well as can be expected given the thin writing of the thinner script. Ray Acevedo is underused, he is the skilled and experienced trapper/hunter. Unintendedly Barny Fife-like Sheriff Williams ( Bruce Peoples ) likewise has poorly written lines.

The film suffers from anemic directing, third-rate writing, and dismal special effects. Meaning the only thing that can gel it together are the actors who given this mess manage to be an enjoyable bunch albeit all too often becoming gator-food in bad special effects scenes.

So If you want some background mindless entertainment while you're doing something else and not focusing on the film -this can work for you.

After a botched drug deal, a group of Florida police officers find that the contents of the shipment have been accidentally ingested by a local alligator and turned into a ravenous killing machine forcing them to stop the creature before it disrupts a series of upcoming holiday celebrations.

Overall, this was a fun and generally likable cheesy creature feature. Among its better features is a solid series of storylines that manage to provide a great foundation for the type of simplistic creature feature this emerges as. With the opening immediately setting up the idea of the gator taking the drugs from the local drug runners and then explaining how it goes crazy with the unrealistic behavior as a byproduct of the addictive qualities it brings to him as he goes around looking at the various drug labs around town creating a race to infiltrate the remaining labs so that they can save the town. This is a fun setup with the idea of trying to stop the gator bringing about several different tactics to stop it and getting tons of citizens involved in a logical enough manner. As a result, that lets this one go for a slew of immensely fun and cheesy attack scenes bringing the creature into high-energy confrontations. Based on the addiction it has and the desire to consume more, this is then used as a means of allowing the gator to perform unnatural movements like the land stalking going after the different hunters looking to track it down, the attack on the communications tower and destroying it, and the fine attack on the various meth compounds around the backwoods part of the town. It's all generally fun enough leading to a fun and cheesy series of attacks in the finale where the gloriously fake-looking creature is let loose at the final battle involving some cheesy sequences and a fun riot leading to stopping the creature that gives it a lot to like. There are some issues here that bring this one down. One of the biggest drawbacks is a really useless and generally unnecessary cliche of using the corrupt authority figures trying to use their power and influence to keep things under wraps from the citizens to ensure they remain in power. This features a repeat of the storyline where the mayor of the town is perfectly aware of the drug problem in the town and the efforts being made to stop it yet goes along with the idea of keeping it around simply for the money it pays off which forces his hand in keeping the police from going after the group. While he plays it off like trying to prevent a panic on a town holiday, the whole idea is a cliche and ridiculous to even feature and comes off as warranted as expected. As well, the other factor here is a rather lame series of interludes featured that try to paint the town as an eccentric series of friendly locals but instead manage to just eat up the running time with some cringeworthy sequences. The interactions with the local hunters hoping for a chance at the bounty against the creature or the attempts of the crew to get deputized to go fight against it because they're the ones most familiar with the area are used as a means of trying to inject humor into the group but come off as awkward and unnecessary for what's going on. They easily could've been included less weirdly than they are as everything here is a bit weird how it all plays out with the overlong sequences being used to try being funny but it all comes off as cringey merely to stretch out the running time. These are enough to lower this one somewhat.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence and Graphic Language.

I'm a meth addict that has live my whole life in Florida. This is a bad movie in so many ways.

Seriously, I really wanted to like this movie. There were a few lines that made me laugh out loud, but overall the dialogue was flat and the acting is what you would expect from a movie like this. The aerial drone shots are great, as Florida is a beautiful state. But the CGI of a galloping gator is terrible, and the gator looks more like a crocodile (maybe nitpicking, but as a Floridian, one should know the difference).

If you love this type of exploitation film (which I do) give it a watch. But don't have high expectations.