Cheesy effects and great actors. What a combo!

Sweet, mad as a hatter Sean Connery is the only reason I sat down to watch the classic train wreck that is Meteor. Already old enough to feel he needed to wear a toupee, but still exuding that Connery charisma, he holds his own against other stellar actors who got suckered into this thing.

Meteor was plagued by all sorts of problems, mostly due to the folks behind it having grandiose dreams of a blockbuster, but not enough resources or people skills to pull it all together. Sadly for them, this was a flop back in 1979, but for the Queen Of Cheese sitting down to watch it finally in 2009, I loved it.

Meteor has all the elements that make a great B-movie disaster/science fiction flick. We have astronauts all the way out in a spaceship near Jupiter and Saturn. We get to see them converse with space command back on Earth, with absolutely no delay. Spiffy technology since there’s at least a few seconds delay just between Earth’s orbit and the ground! The acting aboard the space craft as a deadly meteor heads their way is awesome, too, especially with the cheesy lighting effects to simulate combustion. We get more questionable science as a comet zips through an asteroid belt and drags some big rocks with it, and one at least five miles wide ends up on a direct course with Earth, along with some baby meteors just big enough to cause lots and lots of damage, including destroying a ski resort, causing a tidal wave, and other general mayhem.

Even more ludicrous is the science behind how the meteor is going to be stopped. The U.S.A. and the U.S.S.R. both have secret, illegal space weapons with nuclear missiles, originally pointed at each other. The plan is to cut through some political b.s., provide some political posturing, but ultimately aim those missiles at the meteor instead, coordinate a launch that will divert the giant mass away from the planet, yet not just break it up into smaller, just as deadly pieces that will hit us anyway.

Really, it’s not the bad science or laughable attempts at a political or military drama that will keep you watching this thing. It’s the heavy, ominous music that sounds every time the meteor is seen rolling slowly, inexorably on it’s path of doom. It’s the long, drawn out sequences as the missiles are readied for launch, again with overbearing, giggle inducing music throbbing away, making sure we know this is a serious moment we should all take pride in as citizens of the Earth. Or something.

The acting of the main cast is definitely more than this film deserved. Sean Connery is the bitter scientist sucked back in to save the day. Karl Malden is his friend and liaison who does his best to stand between him and the paranoid military man played by Martin Landau. Brian Keith plays a very convincing native Russian scientist, delivering his lines in an accent that makes you forget all about that diabetes-inducing show, Family Affair. Natalie Wood is beautiful and smart as his English translator, and Sean Connery’s tepid love interest. Henry Fonda takes a brief turn at being President of the United States, naturally being more noble of character than any real politician would be under those circumstances. The tons of secondary characters are all top notch, adding alternate touches of humor and melodrama. Even some of the silent, just in the background characters are a riot, including a duo of ladies in a caved-in subway scene who are doing their nails with looks of ultimate boredom as they await rescue.

There have been lots of disaster movies before Meteor and tons after, and arguably Meteor is not well done. However, there’s a certain charm to it with it’s over the top music, above average acting, and laughable premise of how the world would be saved from a crisis like this, not to mention the overtly phallic symbolism in all those nuclear rockets (which the movie lingers on for several minutes longer than necessary to simply say it’s ‘dramatic’). It’s got the 70’s hair, the 70’s wardrobe, the 70’s attitude about politics, the military, and science, and an awkward, unrequited romance between a young Russian translator and an ‘old enough to be her grandfather’ American scientist. It all adds up for a popcorn-munching couple of hours. In the end, if the looming meteor rolling towards you doesn’t make you giggle a bit, you’re not watching this for any of the right reasons!

Tags: action flick, b-movie, Brian Keith, disaster flick, disaster movie, giggle factor, Henry Fonda, Karl Malden, Martin Landau, Meteor, Natalie Wood, sci fi, Sean Connery

Where else will you see Matt Houston make a cameo appearance?

I’ve sat through a couple of viewings of Showdown At Area 51 and it’s very okay. It’s not horrible, definitely not great, borderline good, but lacking that special something that would make it live in my heart forever.

Part of the problem is the blatant rip off of all the other ‘dueling aliens come to our planet for a final showdown’ movies. They try to add a twist by throwing in a device that will end the world, where the only thing that can deactivate it is housed in ‘the real’ area 51. This just confuses things at the same time as it adds at least something to keep the plot moving forward. Since this long, hard rod is the only thing that can stop the countdown, and the bad alien wants to make sure the countdown isn’t stopped, and the bad alien also already knows where the device is instead of having to decipher markings on the long, hard rod like the good guys, why doesn’t the bad alien just sit in a prime sniper spot and pick the good guys off as they come to turn the device off? Okay, that would completely defeat the purpose of this being a cheesy movie, but the plot was so weak on this one even I can’t help but say, ‘That’s kind of stupid.’

Be that as it may there’s at least a lot of action between the ugly, naturally evil, alien, and the good alien who looks remarkably humanoid, named Jude, played by Coby Bell. There’s even a scene between the two characters where they stand in a face off ala classic spaghetti westerns, hands twitching at the holsters of their weapons, just waiting for the other to make the first move. You could almost hear that classic whistle from old Clint Eastwood westerns playing in the background. Sadly, they didn’t go for the cheese and actually put that music in.

The other two main characters have the typical back story of being former lovers with a stormy past. They start off helping Jude, then second guess themselves that he might be the bad guy, especially when Lee Horsley makes his cameo as a junk yard owner/former scientist with some of the best lines in the movie. When asked if he has any guns, he replies ‘I may be smart, but I’m still a redneck.’ and proceeds to reveal a small armory in his house.

Jason London finally plays a different character than I’ve seen him do lately, this time a former military man who threw away his career for the love of a woman, and now rides a motorcycle and can actually throw a decent punch. For such a stereotypical role he’s very charming and believable.

Unfortunately I can’t say the same for Gigi Edgley’s character. She’s supposed to be a linguistics expert, which is fine and well, but I think she feels uncomfortable in a role where she’s not painted blue. She couldn’t seem to figure out how much ‘oomph’ to put into her performance now that she’s not acting through the layer of her old Farscape costume. Acting through a mask or heavy makeup is a lot different that going ‘au natural’, and she didn’t look comfortable. Her chemistry with Jason London is forced, and lets lines that should have been a riot (including numerous references to the rod, and having to put it in the right slot) fall flat.

In the realm of B-movies this is definitely a B-minus, losing points for missed opportunities at humor, not giving Lee Horsley more screen time, and not going over the top ridiculous on the plot to make up for it being so lame. I can’t see myself owning a copy of the DVD, but someone else might feel more forgiving of the flaws to give it a home. Besides, it wasn’t all bad. It didn’t take itself anywhere near as seriously as the finally ending new Battlestar Galactica.

Tags: aliens, Battlestar Galactica, Chiana, Coby Bell, Farscape, Gigi Edgley, Jason London, Lee Horsley, Matt Houston, sci fi, Showdown At Area 51, spaghetti western, watchable

Cheese overload!

I’ve seen the 1980’s Flash Gordon so many times I could probably recite all of the dialogue with it on mute. This is another film that made a deeper impression on me during some critical formative years than would be wise to acknowledge without the backdrop of professional psychiatric help.

Based on the classic comic strip character, this rendition starts off with a bored Ming The Merciless sending natural disasters of biblical proportions at Earth, and just for kicks starts the moon on a crash course for the planet. The intent is destruction, of course, but he likes to play with things a bit before annihilation.

On Earth, Flash Gordon and Dale Arden are boarding a small plane. Flash is a football player in this story, which plays nicely into some ridiculous costumes later on. They hit it off just in time for their plane to crash into the lab of crazy scientist, Zarkov, who recognizes that Earth is under attack. He plans to fly up to meet the threat in a homemade rocket, and grabs Flash and Dale to help him fly it.

Of course the rocket gets captured in space and brought to Mongo where they meet Ming, his creepy second in command, Klytus, and Ming’s seductive daughter, Aura. Conveniently all of the tribes of Mongo are there to offer tribute to Ming, so we also get to meet the other two main players, Prince Vultan of the Hawkmen, and Prince Barin of Arboria. Everyone is at war with everyone else, so no one has thought to join their considerable forces to overthrow Ming. I guess it takes a bleach blond football player from America to make that happen!

The world of Flash Gordon is brightly colored, noisy, and violent in a cartoonish sort of way. Blood runs green, blue and red. Daughters of tyrants are manipulative and boy crazy. Some people dissolve into ooze when they die. Hawkmen soar through the air with barely a wing flapping, Arborians dress like Robin Hood’s Merry Men, and everywhere you look someone is firing a really loud laser gun. A lot of detail went into all the worlds of Mongo, and there are a lot of secondary characters which add an extra layer of giggle factor. The whole thing is ludicrous, campy, and intentionally cheesy, basically a cartoon brought to life. There is nothing about this movie that doesn’t make me giggle every time I watch it!

Sam J. Jones and Melody Anderson who played Flash Gordon and Dale Arden never really had their careers take off after this movie. It didn’t do well in the American box office, for one thing, and apparently Sam J. Jones ended up having his dialogue dubbed after the fact by a professional voice actor. Is it sad that I don’t notice the overdub? Probably for Sam J. Jones.

Max Von Sydow is another caliber actor too good for this movie, yet there he is, playing Ming The Merciless with style and flair. Timothy Dalton and Brian Blessed are both solid actors which I’m still shocked to see in a movie like Flash Gordon. Brian Blessed seemed to have a blast. Timothy Dalton is so serious in every role I’ve ever seen him in I can’t tell if he had fun, or not. Either way, his intensity just added more cheesy goodness.

Let’s not forget the soundtrack, which was performed by Queen. Before this movie we were lucky to get maybe a song at the end of the credits, and something orchestral everywhere else. If you don’t get a stupid grin just listening to the opening credits, you’re not meant to watch this movie, because you won’t understand it’s appeal. Queen’s music set the perfect tone to go along with the tongue-in-cheek humor, cornball acting, and all the other ridiculous aspects that make Flash Gordon one of the best cheesy movies of all time.

If you haven’t seen this movie you need to set aside an evening and give it a viewing. Pop a giant bowl of popcorn. Get a box of Milk Duds, Good N’ Plenty, or Junior Mints. Turn off your cell phone so you have no distractions. Make sure your ‘You’ve got to be kidding! That’s just ridiculous!’ receptors have been disabled so your head doesn’t explode. Then sit back and prepare to be entertained by a movie of galactic cheesy proportions!

And now enjoy a video of Queen performing the theme to this awesome movie!

Tags: Brian Blessed, Dale Arden, Flash Gordon, Max VonSydow, Ming The Merciless, Ornella Muti, Prince Barin, Prince Vultan, Princess Aura, Queen, Queen Flash Gordon Soundtrack, Sam Jones, sci fi, Timothy Dalton, Topol, Zarkov

They don't scatter when you turn on the light.

For a giant bug movie, this isn’t too bad. It’s got a ton of CGI-ed prehistoric looking beetles, making me not-so-nostalgic for a crappy apartment I had in Denver years ago featuring Armageddon-resistant cockroaches. These creepy-crawlies move and swarm like the real things, and range from small to gargantuan. They even have little beady red eyes which are so cute on the puppet forms they use to attack the actors with.

The cast features Christopher Atkins of The Blue Lagoon fame, emerging to fight off creditors by starring in Sci Fi ‘not so original’ movies. He plays the father to a family-run tour guide service to the rich. Angela Featherstone (the shallow girlfriend from The Wedding Singer who made Van Halen break up by wearing their t-shirt) is the mother of the clan, who speaks French and wields pump action shotguns like a pro. Chelan Simmons and Stevie Mitchell round out the family as the spoiled daughter and slightly dim, but likable son. One thing I really found amusing in the the movie was how often the daughter got splashed with disgusting bug goo as the mother blew them to pieces. She didn’t look amused after the third hit, but funny thing, I was laughing my copious butt off.

The story starts off with a mining incident in 1948 where only one man survives a prehistoric bug attack. He also manages to emerge from the mine with a map to the location of a huge cache of emeralds. This cache is what the bad guys are after. David Palfey plays your typical greedy bad guy, who is supposedly the grandson of this survivor, and gets the map. We’re not clear of his relation to an old guy with a leg missing that he is shown negotiating with over property at the beginning of the film, but facts aren’t what make a bad movie good, so I can overlook this confusion. The tour guide father gets enlisted to show the way around the mine, much to the irritation of the rest of his family who expected a ‘real’ vacation. The money is good, so they go, and his family has the use of a dead man’s lake house while he earns the fee.

Christian Popa plays a brutal lackey left in charge of the family while the dad guides his crew around an abandoned mine. The daughter and the lackey start flirting with each other, and you wonder why the mother isn’t being a bit more forceful in keeping them apart. You’d also think the parents would be more concerned that their younger son is off wandering a strange countryside, and doesn’t check back in for a few hours. Fortunately there aren’t child protective services available to ask these sorts of questions, so the storyline progresses.

Of course it’s revealed to the naive father that he’s leading a gang of thugs on a treasure hunt rather than a group of thrill seekers wanting to explore a mine. His family is held hostage based on his continued cooperation. The bugs begin attacking, so the story quickly picks up a more energetic pace.

The bad guys have brought along laser rifles, which is handy to have for blasting through rock, and big bugs. The rest of the storyline is pretty far-fetched, too, but it’s still fun. The characters don’t seem quite right, and there are coincidences that even I rolled my eyes. When the mother and daughter are surrounded by beetles, they happen to get the father on the radio in time for a shrill cry of help from the queen beetle to ring out. The attacking beetles hear this on the radio, and rush off to help their queen, saving the mother and daughter. Okaay… Plus you wonder how the bugs have survived so long underground with no source of food? Cannibalism can only get you so far. But you also get groaners of one liners like ‘He said he had a splitting headache…’ when someone gets their face bit in two by a beetle, so things balance out in the end.

There’s a lot of entrails and goo, so I wouldn’t recommend this for dinner and a movie. I would recommend it for a good way to waste a couple of hours of your day so you don’t accidentally do anything productive!

Tags: Angela Featherstone, army of darkness, b-movie, Blue Lagoon, Caved In Prehistoric Terror, Chelan Simmons, Christopher Atkins, Colm Meaney, creature feature, David Palffy, giant beetles, giant bugs, giggle factor, girl in S-Mart, Monica Dean, not so original, sci fi, The Wedding Singer, when bugs attack

There are so many cheesy elements to Planet Raptor, you can’t help but laugh your way through it. It’s pretty clear they weren’t taking it seriously, at least judging by the video game style CGI they lifted from Raptor Island. They even stole an entire scene from Raptor Island, conveniently making sure there’s an underground volcanic nesting area for the giant raptors stalking this odd, deserted planet.

The year is 2066 and we’re all over outer space now. We even speak alien languages and have laser guns, but it’s still not so sophisticated that our soldiers forgo a good old fashioned pump action shotgun. We can go into deep space and respond to distress signals, which is handy, or we wouldn’t have even a superficial basis for a plot. A team is deployed to a remote planet with the vague premise of rescuing survivors, but then a convenient radiation storm prevents them from returning to the ship right away. They make sure a scientist wanders off on his own and becomes a snack, and the rest is B movie magic.

There’s scientists among the soldiers, and they have their own agenda, even though I was never clear what that was. I think it was something about getting alien DNA, but frankly I was just giggling at the puppets and bad CGI, so I didn’t pay close attention. I haven’t seen raptor puppet action like this since Carnosaur 2, and I laughed myself silly through that movie, too.

Ted Raimi makes an appearance as an untrustworthy, rather creepy, doctor willing to inject the team with various concoctions to see how long they’ll last. Mr. Raimi takes a raptor to the head with the best of them, showing that less is more when it comes to making us believe you’re being killed by a puppet.

Peter Jason plays the crusty veteran, ‘Pappy’ with the same zest and humor we see from him in all his other roles (and he has a ton). He’s easily my favorite character out of the whole lot, and is the one the writers kept ‘in character’ the entire time.

Vanessa Angel plays the token female scientist who is naturally drawn to the leader of the squadron. She’s beautiful as ever, so I hate her, and she plays well against Steven Bauer (who happened to be the bad guy in Raptor Island). She’s a scientist, he’s a soldier. She wants to focus on her mission (whatever that is). He couldn’t care less. The writing starts things off in the ‘God, I hate you and all you stand for’ direction, then veers into the ‘Wait, I think this could be something beautiful’ area so quickly I swear I heard gears grinding in protest. Let’s say character development and consistency wasn’t a key focus here.

This is an odd sort of flick that plunders plot points from old Star Trek episodes and other B movies. The acting is often over the top, the special effects are just awful, but somehow I really enjoyed it. I think it was the fact it revels in how bad it is, and actually strives to reach yet unattained heights in making a bad movie. Like an English bulldog is so ugly it’s cute, this movie is so bad, it’s entertaining.

Look at the characters, plot, dialogue and special effects separately, and you’ll wonder why anyone bothered to make this thing. Put the pieces together, and it’s kismet. Planet Raptor is meant to be laughed through. Sit down with a big bowl of popcorn and lowered expectations. I won’t ask you to shave your head to join what I anticipate to be a cult following, but I may ask you to distribute pamphlets to help spread the word about this wonderfully awful bad movie!

Tags: "Not So Original" Movies, action flick, aliens, Carnosaur 2, cheese, creature feature, giggle factor, Peter Jason, Planet Raptor, Raptor Island, sci fi, Steven Bauer, Ted Raimi, Vanessa Angel, watchable

Objects in graphic are smaller than they appear...

This is a little movie with the occasional big graphic that could have been great, but isn’t. It starts off with an older professor searching for Nessie when something happens, and he mysteriously vanishes into the cold waters, never to be found. Flash to an office where a woman, Elizabeth, is convincing her boss that this is something that can be made into a great story for their network, albeit one exploiting a man’s death, and the story is set up. Sort of.

Flash to a desert where the deceased professor’s protege, Case, is working. He gets called in to finish up the research, so he heads to Scotland. Okay, so now the story is set up. Sort of.

Case gets to Scotland in time for the memorial service, to have confrontations with the rest of the team, and to state that he doesn’t believe in the Loch Ness Monster. But he’s going to take charge anyway. Then we go around and around for a bit until we end up with Elizabeth showing up to take over, a few sightings of the big beastie, a sighting of a little beastie, some eggs, some diving footage, and a Scottish native dressing up like Braveheart to take it on.

The plot is all over the place, not even good enough to be B-quality. The characters are at least interesting, if not consistent, and there’s a lot of fun dialogue bandied about. When we finally see Nessie, it’s at least impressive, but those shots are few and far between. At the end, I still couldn’t say what the whole thing was supposed to be about. I think the writers wanted to go for a Discovery Channel type tale, then realized that would be too boring, so they threw in random character conflicts to spice it up. If they hadn’t skimped on the graphics of Nessie so much, this would have been a lot better. Remember kids, never, ever skimp on the monster!

Nevertheless, inconsistent writing and plot aside, this was still entertaining. Little things like the Braveheart makeup and one of the characters (and potential Nessie snacks) walking around in a t-shirt with a bulls eye on it gave me the giggles I need to call this one watchable. I wouldn’t buy the DVD, but if it happens to air again, it’s not one I’ll rush to turn off. That’s as glowing a recommendation as I can plumb up from the depths, so it will have to do.

Tags: "Not So Original" Movies, b-movie, Beneath Loch Ness, creature feature, giggle factor, Loch Ness Monster, monster, sci fi, watchable

It's not out to poop on the hood of your car...

Gryphon (a.k.a. “Attack Of The Gryphon”) is a nice, simple, mostly by the numbers B-movie set in generic medieval times. Two kingdoms which have been at war for centuries after a spat between brothers must now unite to defeat a magical foe, which is the Gryphon. Never mind that the creature is set loose by the wizard serving one of the kingdoms, and that the ruler of that kingdom is dubious about the intent of said wizard, yet gives him his blood for a spell despite that. If we didn’t have a weak-minded, vengeance seeking king willing to do the wrong thing for the wrong reasons, we wouldn’t have a story!

Of course the princess of this kingdom is a warrior in her own right, willful, prone to violence, and willing to set aside her need for revenge for her brother’s death so she can spend the night with the captured prince of the other kingdom. Somewhere along the scattered points of the plot they fall in love, but I couldn’t tell you when that happened. Just rest assured the writers make certain you know it, especially with off hand remarks by the prince and princess’ ‘handlers’. As far as romances go, this was really weak, but tolerable. Amber Benson (who most may recall from Buffy The Vampire Slayer) and Jonathan LaPaglia are engaging in their roles, but the chemistry is forced, and the banter between them not as much fun as it could have been.

What kept me watching was the wizard and his two brides. These ladies look more like Mortal Kombat 2 players than medieval anything, and the special effects on their ‘magic’ is just a riot to watch. Especially when they go up against the prince’s mother (played by Sara Douglas, who was a villain in Superman 2 and Conan The Destroyer, and deserving of a much better role than this), and they all exchange pretty lights that are supposed to be mystical energy. The wizard, played by Larry Drake of L.A. Law, Darkman, Dr. Giggles and a schnike-load of other roles, is over the top with his acting, which is perfect for a movie like this. He seems to be the only actor not out of his element in his role.

The CGI on the Gryphon is just laughable. It’s average, but on the lower end of the spectrum of average, verging on some school project in an intermediate class. You get the idea that the bird is big, has feathers, and a beak, but it moves without the grace and fluidity I would have hoped for. Before you dismiss the CGI as unfit for this flick, remember that this is a B-movie after all, and as such high quality CGI can do more harm than good. Cheesy CGI provides giggle factor, which I got a lot of out from scenes with the almighty Gryphon.

If you need a mostly fun B-movie with some giggle factor evenly dispersed, check out Gryphon with a big bowl of popcorn in your lap, something chocolate waiting to be enjoyed, and expectations realistically lowered. This isn’t an epic story by any means, but it isn’t a complete waste of two hours, either.

Tags: "Not So Original" Movies, Amber Benson, b-movie, creature feature, fantasy, Gryphon, Jonathan LaPaglia, Larry Drake, Sara Douglas, sci fi, warrior woman, watchable

Mega Snake has a lot going for it, especially in the acting talent department. The whole reason I tuned in was for Michael Shanks, but the rest of the cast does an awesome job keeping the lines funny, and the action cheesy. One of my newly discovered favorite ‘minor part’ actors, Todd Jensen, puts in a great performance as ‘Big Bo’, a complete jerk that still makes you feel sorry for him when he gets what’s coming to him. Harry Anichkin and Nick Harvey play a pair of back woods hunters that know how to put together all sorts of snake luring and killing devices.

Ben Cardinal plays a stern, believable man guarding the secret of the giant snake, which hunted his people nearly to extinction. When John T. Woods’ character, ‘Duff Daniels’, comes in to the shop to buy another batch of snakes for his religious sect, naturally this mysterious snake in a glass jar catches his eye. In true stupid, arrogant son of bitch character, he makes sure to not be careful after he steals it, and unleashes the terror on the community.

Duff is the older brother of Shanks’ character, ‘Les’, who watched as their father died by snakebite during a religious ceremony when he was a child. Duff naturally thinks his little brother is a coward for having a healthy respect and fear of things that can kill you, so there’s your family tension for a bit of drama. Les is afraid of a lot of things, including commitment to his girlfriend, Erin, who is played by Siri Barus. Erin starts off very shrewish, and I intensely wanted Les to dump her melodramatic ass for his partner, Fay, who is played with glee by Michal Yannai. When Erin takes up with ‘Big Bo’, we get some well played juvenile games in a bar as everyone tries to make everyone else jealous. Normally I would find this boring, but it fits into the story well, and is a lot of fun to watch.

We get a lot of CGI action of Mega Snake, watching it grow, having hints of it snacking on household pets, and a whole coop full of chickens. Once it gets the appetizers out of the way it just keeps on growing, and keeps on eating. Pretty soon a lot of the ‘local color’ start getting picked off, too, adding to all the tension between our main characters. Livestock is left in steaming, regurgitated piles that ain’t pretty, and Les ends up as a suspect, mostly because Big Bo is an ass.

Of course the truth is discovered and a hunting party heads out to tackle the beast with various unfortunate results. There’s even the requisite ‘You have to cancel the county fair!’, ‘Are you kidding? That’s the biggest attraction of the year! I ain’t canceling it!’, ‘But people are gonna die!’ ‘Well, you’d better get snake hunting, then, shouldn’t ya?’ exchange (not direct quotes). This gives the perfect chance to give a cameo that made the train wreck watcher in me do a double take. We get to see ‘Feedback‘ from Who Wants To Be A Superhero?‘. He gives us valuable safety tips, faces off with Mega Snake for a few seconds, and then herds a bunch of cute kids to safety as he adds ‘Wow, that’s a big snake’ to his acting repertoire. As far as cheesy cameos go, this one was a riot, and definitely not a waste of time.

Overall Mega Snake is a very good creature feature B-movie. There’s a lot of colorful characters to keep the story moving along, lots of humor, and great CGI on the beastie. I’ve watched this one a couple of times, and while I don’t think I’ll ever buy it on DVD, whenever it is on I will hope to have time to watch it again. It’s coming up on rotation on Sci Fi on February 28, 2009 and March 5, 2009, and I encourage you to set up a recording device to catch it. The giggle factor is worth it!

Tags: "Not So Original" Movies, b-movie, Ben Cardinal, cheese, creature feature, Feedback, Harry Anichkin, John T Woods, Mega Snake, Michael Shanks, Michal Yannai, Nick Harvey, sci fi, Siri Barus, snakes, Todd Jensen, Who Wants To Be A Superhero?

Mammoth is a very entertaining B-movie. It starts off right with graphics of a spaceship flying around ala Mars Attacks!, and immediately gives us a closeup of the mammoth it decides to possess. The tone is set properly with the bungling, absent-minded father, played perfectly by Vincent Ventresca from The Invisible Man, the doting, oddball grandfather played by Tom Skerritt, and the long-suffering, surprisingly normal teenage girl played by our favorite robot psychopath from Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Summer Glau. The dad gets so engrossed in his work on the mammoth at the museum that he naturally forgets his daughter’s sixteenth birthday, and that he was going to take her to get her license. Add to that a meteor strike (which gets our poor frozen mammoth zapped) that takes out all electronics in the area, including vehicles, and dad looks like a schmuck, indeed.

We get a brief glimpse at the home life and see that dad is an emotional wreck after losing his wife, and his daughter is tolerating his inept parenting with the typical teenage attitude and angst. The grandpa adds the sense of normalcy, even though he monitors radio frequencies for inevitable alien attacks by people in gorilla suits. (Just watch the movie to see where that comes in. It’s totally worth it.)

Naturally the daughter sneaks out with her little ‘he’s not my boyfriend!’ friend, named, of all things, Squirrelly so they can go to a party out in the woods. Dad discovers she’s gone, freaks out, but is stopped by FBI agents at his door investigating the meteor strike, and who know a lot more than they let on. The fun really starts as the dad agrees to help the agents only if they can do so while they look for his wayward daughter. On his way out the door with the attractive female one, the granddad helpfully shouts, “Try not to get her pregnant on the first date!”

There is a lot of action in Mammoth, and thankfully not too much gore. The movie is written with a lot of tongue in cheek humor, including a scene with a couple making out in a car (naturally slating them for slaughter), and it turns out not to be teenagers, but a couple who snuck out of the old folks home for a tryst. Watching their teeth jiggle around in a glass on the dashboard as the mammoth lumbers towards them made me laugh for all the right (and wrong) reasons.

The CGI on the mammoth is superb, at once looking polished and cheesy. I think someone borrowed Discovery Channel graphics, because the creature moves just like you’d expect a rampaging, alien-possessed mammoth to move. It’s not all that cute, but it I find out there’s a stuffed toy mammoth prop for sale, I’d be tempted to buy it. Apparently the alien in the mammoth must sustain itself by sucking out the life essence of its victims (at least the ones it doesn’t crush), and that’s a nice, non-gory thing to witness.

There’s more to the storyline than just a rampaging, alien-possessed mammoth, which I was shocked to find actually added to the plot rather than making it drag. One scene with a dismembered hand crawling around, and then being subdued by a phone book being dropped on it, is a riot. The little hand has a lot of personality, kind of like Ash’s demon-possessed one in Evil Dead 2.

Once again between the acting and the writing, this is a movie that I will watch over and over again, and am seriously contemplating adding it to my ever-growing Amazon wish list. It is a movie done in the proper, irreverent spirit of B-movies, has a ton of great one-liners, and is well worth spending time on which would otherwise have been productive!

Tags: b-movie, cheese, Cole Williams, creature feature, Leila Arcieri, Mammoth, sci fi, Summer Glau, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, The Invisible Man, Tom Skerritt, Vincent Ventresca

There’s a bit more gore in Super Gator than I like in my movies, but it’s Roger Corman as executive producer, so there’s plenty of humor to make me overlook it. Since I watched it on Sci Fi I was also spared the gratuitous flashes of nudity, but again, it’s Roger Corman, so I can forgive. He’s the reason there’s a t.v. series of The Black Scorpion that I hope to own one day. But I digress.

The film is set in Hawaii, so there’s plenty of pretty young things wandering around in skimpy attire, or making out with their boyfriend at the edge of beautiful waterfall. We don’t have to wait long for the Super Gator to start snacking, and it’s in typical Corman style. Lots of blood, some crunching, lots of screaming, and a flash or two of teeth and eyes before we get a full on view of one nasty reptile. The CGI on the critter is fluid, reflecting either a better budget than the days of Carnosaur, or just more dedicated programmers.

The premise is simple. There’s a geologist observing a volcano, hoping to learn better how to predict an eruption. Meanwhile, a local animal preserve specializing in genetic tinkering have lost track of one of their projects. This is all happening awfully close to a busy resort, so you have tourists wandering around blissfully unaware of their future as an hors d’oeuvre. The volcano begins to rumble, the gator is running around chomping on anyone hapless, drunk, or scantily clad enough to get in its way. We quickly get to even more creature action as the paths of the scientist and geologist cross.

Kelly McGillis plays the role of Kim Taft, the woman in charge of finding the wayward gator. The beauty from Top Gun is showing her age, but she fits the role of a tough, no-nonsense broad very well. I have to place her in the “You Poor Bastard” category since she had a solid career going back to the ’80s and then… Who knows what happened? She’s at least still working, but it seems random, and occasionally desperate. Hopefully things will shape up as she comes back with roles on series like The ‘L’ Word, which I guess is a hit.

John Colton plays the hunter with a grizzled sense of humor. I rooted for his character right up until the end only because he reminded me of my grandpa, albeit with a lot more booze in his system. He plays off Kelly McGillis, and the two of them parlay their lines back and forth like pros. Their scenes together are brief, but a lot of fun.

Brad Johnson, Bianca Lawson, Mary Alexandra Stiefvater, and Josh Kelly all deserve honorable mentions as the main characters. I cringed a little bit at the hinted romance between the older geologist and the younger journalist, but I do that when it happens in any movie. The chemistry wasn’t there, but the hint was mild enough to overlook. The four of them together provided a lot of entertainment, and some more good one-liners.  Even when they split up to go in separate directions, the actors still keep you focused on the movie, and wondering which of them, if any, will survive for a sequel.

The first half of the movie is setup for the last half.  It’s not boring because this is where a lot of the cheesy humor is placed, including a scene with models at a waterfall with a sleazy photographer telling them to flap their arms like birds.  There’s another scene with a trio of idiot friends trying to make up a local cure for a hangover, and naturally having to test it by getting sloppy drunk themselves.  We also have a pair of college girlfriends wandering around the lake bemoaning how boring their trip is, only to encounter…dun, dun, dun, dun! Super Gator!

The second half picks up the pace with some lava, even more Super Gator, and the requisite ‘We’re running out of time!’ plot lines.  Between the volcano and the Super Gator, there’s plenty to keep our characters busy, and the viewer entertained.

Overall Super Gator is prime Roger Corman. He’s still going strong mentoring up and comers in the fine art of b-grade horror and camp. I may prefer less gore and sexual overtones than this dirty old man seems to like, but he’s a legend, so he can put his name to just about anything and I’ll watch it at least once. If you’re a fan of Roger Corman, Super Gator is a must-see. The grand master is still going strong!

Tags: b-movie, Bianca Lawson, Black Scorpion, Brad Johnson, Carnosaur, creature feature, giggle factor, horror, John Colton, Josh Kelly, Kelly McGillis, Mary Alexandra Stiefvater, roger corman, sci fi, super gator, Top Gun, You Poor Bastard