SnakeHead Swamp

I honestly could have made a better movie monster in my toilet. and a 2 year old with an I-phone could have filmed a better movie.

In a spooky and voodoo-like Louisiana, mysterious Antonio Fargas (as William Boudreaux) does something weird with a chicken. As his chicken drips blood, a truck full of experimental snakehead fish crashes. The truck contains canisters of the giant – possibly mutated – snakeheads, which escape. They are vicious and blood-thirsty. As you might be expecting, they have a taste for human blood. We meet our co-starring couple at an unrelated wedding. They are not yet a couple, but have obvious potential. Pretty blonde Ayla Kell (as Ashley) invites curly-haired Dave Davis (as Chris Hardin) to a party with some friends, on a small boat belonging to her obnoxious boyfriend Ross Britz (as Ian Davids). This makes the party of five potential bait for the escaped snakeheads...

There is an interesting backstory involving Davis and his family, courtesy of writer Greg Mitchell. Worried ranger Terri Garber (as Carly) is Mr. Davis' mom, and she has a frosty relationship with father Anthony Marble (as Jim). Too bad Davis' brother wasn't tied into the "Blackbrier Curse" scenario in some definite manner. The whole plot involving Mr. Fargas is regrettable. He played streetwise Huggy Bear on the TV series "Starsky and Hutch" in the 1970s, but has lost touch with informants over the years. We are never really sure what made Grandma so angry. Possibly, some of what trudges through "Snakehead Swamp" as nonsense made more sense in development stages. There are a few funny lines – and deaf receptionist Peaches Davis (as Marge) is a highlight.

**** Snakehead Swamp (6/28/14) Don E. FauntLeRoy ~ Dave Davis, Ayla Kell, Terri Garber, Antonio Fargas

If you have been following Syfy films for the last year or so, it seems like they are following the same themes. These films either have a Louisiana bayou theme or they are dealing with sharks. Even though set in Los Angeles, Sharnkado was about sharks basically coming out of waterspouts. Ghost Shark was about a shark that was also a ghost. Snakehead Swamp is quite more of the same.

Back again in the Louisiana bayou, teenagers go out to a party on the water with intentions of having a good time. After a truck is crashed near the water, a snakehead is released and sets off a curse. The curse dates back to olden times and causes more trouble at hand.

For a horror film, this is very so formulaic. Kids going out in the middle of nowhere and you get to know nothing about these characters as they are not developed at all. These kids also don't seem to have a brain because it just seems ludicrous to go swimming in a bayou swamp.

Even more so, this film seems to turn into what Syfy films typically are. We expected this to be very low budget with the limited special effects being a prime example of that. On that, the effects do seem to come off a computer and a very old one at that. The acting is really hit or miss. Maybe the biggest point to make about Snakehead Swap is that it is very old for these Syfy movies to keep returning to the bayou.

Sure, even the good SyFy films are still at most times nothing special. That said, Snakehead Swamp has really nothing here to make it passable. It is just another cliché'd and problematic film from this channel.

Trying to get over his ex, a woman invites her friend on a rafting trip into the nearby bayou only to run across released snakehead fish prowling the area and must find a way to survive the onslaught from the creatures.

There's a lot to like with this one as it generates plenty of positive remarks. One of the best elements at play here is the rather innovative story, which manages to do a lot more than the typical cheesy schlockfest might do, and most of that is centered on the somewhat arduous connection of the creatures' appearance and the culmination of a voodoo curse on the town. Far-fetched in origin, but certainly one that has a rather creepy undertone to what transpires in this, with the voodoo ceremonies taking place, the strange flashes of the local witch who ushered it years ago continuing throughout the entire movie and the strange way the creatures always seem to show up at just the right opportunity to follow-through on the promise of the curse's truth, as if there's a supernatural force motivating them to carry through with their mission of vengeance, and all of these elements make this a lot creepier than just a normal creature feature. As well, the continuous presence of the fish means that there's a large amount of action at play, bringing about some rather fine moments including the initial attack on the boat that strands the friends, the chase through the woods which leads into the assault on the house and finally the charge down the river taking on the swarms of creatures head-on which really sells this nicely as an action-packed offering when combined with the one-shot attacks throughout the bayou. This provides enough gore to really work nicely, even though it does bring about some problems. Even though there's a ton of action in this, the majority of the special effects are handled with the same cheap-looking CGI that usually permeates these films. There's no sense of realism or believability in the special effects here, as the fish themselves look woeful despite a rather cool-looking and imposing design, nearly all the blood and gore is done through CGI which really takes out the effectiveness of their use and the main action scenes are all handled in this manner as well so there's a lot of disappointment here through the special effects. While the central premise of the film is rather cool, from a logic stand-point it really doesn't make a lot of sense so there's some head-scratching moments to come from that as well, and from a believable standpoint it really fails as well. Otherwise, there's a whole lot to like with this one.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence, Language and violence-against-animals.

SnakeHead Swamp is not as bad as it could have been and SyFy have done worse. The opening is cool, the actors though with a fair share of hit and miss moments at least don't take the movie too seriously or try too hard with Peaches Davis particularly fun, there is some decent gore and there is a little bit of novelty comedic value. But like a lot of SyFy outings, SnakeHead Swamp is still not very good, mediocre at best and lame at worst. Some of the photography is enough to induce a migraine, a lot of the movie looks rather drab and the special effects are really laughable with the killer fish looking more ridiculously goofy than menacing. They're not much of a threat either, exuding little personality and you don't learn much about them, SnakeHead Swamp does try to explain the motivation of the killer fish but does so in a muddled manner. The script is riddled with clichés and vomit-inducingly inane dialogue where a few of the worst of them make for unintentional comedy. The story has a decent start but it slows down soon after and never picks up after that, some of it is repetitive with some parts recapping what happened 10 minutes ago and it was really unnecessary, suspense and tension factors are next to zero and it gets infuriatingly ridiculous to the extent that you can't even take it at face value(sure there are movies that do a worse job with this but that's saying very little). A lot of it also is very rushed and under-explained so the story doesn't feel very developed or cohesive, while the attacks are high on gore but also high on predictability and very low in invention and thrills. Despite the efforts of the actors the characters are never interesting or likable, the characters are basically stereotypes with mostly cardboard personalities and a tendency in being annoying(especially Ian, who's also irritatingly acted). The music is not very memorable and either is too obvious in the attacks or it doesn't always fit with the mood. The direction is competent but unremarkable. Overall, not awful but very murky and with too much bad to recommend. 3/10 Bethany Cox