Komodo vs. Cobra

Komodo vs. Cobra is not going to set the world on fire. It's not a hallmark of cinema history. What it is is a group of underfunded filmmakers trying to make another movie, make another paycheck, and continue to support themselves and their families. As such I give these efforts a lot of slack. I mean, come on, it has to be hard to be a Russian special effects technician. Not a lot of big budget films getting made there. BUT-- they are a dedicated bunch and more than willing to throw their all into whatever lame American monster flick needs affordable SFX. And I get a kick out of looking for the same locations appear time and again in these flicks. If for some reason you find yourself watching this again, look at the sequence where Pare and company are walking through a "jungle." Look at their feet and you'll see paved walkways. And if you happen to still have a copy of "AI Assault" (shown a week or two earlier also on SciFi), you'll see the folks in there tramping through the same ersatz jungle. Come to think of it, I think the helicopters land in the same clearing in both flicks. I can admire the thriftiness of these films. Every dollar really does show up on the screen! Too bad there just aren't enough dollars......

"When a top secret island research facility goes dark, a crack team of commandos is sent to investigate. Once there, they are shocked to find that giant Komodos and Cobras live on this island and they're really hungry. Now with the deck stacked against them, and nearly no hope for survival, the team is locked in a battle of survival with two of nature's most formidable predators." Also on the island - big-breasted women and Michael Pare! Komodo vs. Cobra is the highly anticipated movie smackdown that will answer the age old question: who would win in an apocalyptic battle between a giant Komodo dragon and a giant cobra? Oh, yes, and there are big-breasted women and Michael Pare running around trying not to get caught in the crossfire.

Enormous reptiles? Big breasted women? Michael Pare? This has got to be a Jim Wynorski film. Hold on. Let me check IMDb just to make sure. Let's see...

IT IS!!! Oh, who am I kidding? I already knew KvC was a Jim Wynorski film, although I wasn't aware that the movie co-starred rising scream queen Michelle Borth and reality show banshee Jerri Manthey.

And as hard as it might be to believe this, it isn't meant to be a sequel to his recent giant Komodo dragon flick Curse of the Komodo, although I'm sure it was the inspiration as well as an ominous measuring stick of KvC's potential quality.

Another laughably lame and senseless low-budget sci-fi TV presentation… but actually its kind of amusing… kind of… in a passably undemanding way. Am I being soft? I don't know why they come up with these titles. Yes there's a komodo. And yes there's a cobra. However what's the deal with 'versus' in between? Sure they do come to blows… in only two sequences (one recapping an incident and the other being the dodgy climax) and quite boring exchanges I might add. The get-up is the same old routine of a scientific experiment getting out of hand on a secluded island (no dinosaurs about), and some innocent bystanders (environmentalists hoping to expose animal testing) getting caught up in it. This sees a komodo dragon and cobra becoming massive in statue with the government soon wanting to destroy any sort of the evidence (including witnesses) of its existence by blowing up the island. So this leaves the survivors racing against time to find a way off. The prominent staples existed of awful video game CGI, hack script, few dingy sets (although the tropical island setting was easy on the eyes), throwaway characters (but I found the performances faired up), lifelessly tacky thrills (which for some reason kept using the same repetitive shot of the victim just standing there in terror… which implied I'm waiting, please eat me now, I'm not going anywhere and eventually they were swallowed whole… well almost as it seemed to always take a second gulp to finish them off or just save the hassle by stupidly squashing them) and a very hysterical edge with some sort of wretch message amongst the acts of survival. Director Jim Wynorski seems to be on cruise control throughout. Michael Paré has fun with his gruff dialogues and Michelle Borth added much needed sparks. Renee Talbert is there to pout a lot, quite successfully too.

I can admit right away that this is one of the worst movies i have seen in my life. And that is not saying a little, because i consider myself to be somewhat of an aficionado when it comes to crappy film. But this is beyond bad. This movie is so awful that there is no fun left in it, it's just bad.

Reviewing this is almost impossible. There are no strong points and nothing positive to say. I'll just ramble about a few of the points that sucked. First off, the CGI has to be one of the worst i've seen. I can't believe this movie was made in 2005, the CGI reminds me of something i might have seen in Babylon 5 way back when CGI was new and fresh. It's poor beyond belief. Second, the actors all seem like they belong in the worst kind of daytime soaps. And looking at their resumes i see that i'm correct... Thirdly, being able to breed enormous reptiles is no match to the other technology they invented in this movie: the recoilless pistol with infinite ammo! Seriously, Michael Paré fires 100-200 times without reloading in every other scene... As if that was not enough there are also shape-shifting planes! At first they are regular F-16 fighters, in the next scene they are something else completely, and in the third scene they are F-16 again! If you're buying stock footage, please don't mix it like this!

Honestly, there is loads more to say, but i think i'll stop. You all understand what i'm saying. Honestly i didn't think this kind of movie was made any more. It's like something Ed Wood would do. Completely ignorant of quality, not caring how anything looks... It's almost amazing in all it's awfulness. If i could give it 0/10 i would, but 1/10 is the lowest grade. So that's it.

When moviegoers hear two popular villains/characters will be fighting, they flock to the theaters to see how the battle will end. There's Freddy vs. Jason, in which two very popular horror icons try to kill each other. And, more similarly to this, there's Godzilla vs. (Insert Name Here). But the very generic Komodo vs. Python is just a horrible title, and an even worse premise. Obviously, the movie's a D-list picture, but, at least come up with a more compelling name, maybe something that can trick the unsuspecting viewer into watching it. With a name like this, you know what you're getting in to.

A group of military men/women, including a 20-something year old sexy scientist woman are left for dead by the military on an island inhabited by a giant komodo dragon. As long as they can make it off the island and to the boat, they'll be fine, but...no...there's a giant python guarding the ocean and the way off. Let's hope all these guys can make it off the island, and that the python and komodo don't verse each other in some sort of horrible special effect battle.

Really, this movie is bad in almost every way. The acting is pretty bad, or maybe it's that the special effects are so cheesy, that the acting is unbelievable because no one believes that these people are in any danger with creatures that look like they were made on an early 90s computer. Nonetheless, this movie is actually pretty funny. The creatures are so clunky looking, and the actors really give it their all pretending like they're in danger.

I'd like to say that this movie is a steaming pile of sh*squawk!*...but I can't. This PG-13 rated film actually bleeps itself out. Every time a curse word comes, a parrot noise beeps out the word. Even words that can be said on network television. How *squawk*ing cheap that they bleep out words, and with a parrot no less. Eventually these parrot noises got to me and I couldn't help but laugh at the incompetence.

This movie is bad, from the silly beginning to the ridiculous Night of the Living Dead style ending, but it's also kind of funny. As a horror movie it fails miserably, as an action movie, it fails slightly less, but still pretty bad, and as a comedy it shines.

My rating: * out of ****. 95 mins. PG-13 for some violence and Squawked out cursing.