Alligator

My planned post for Jaws would have been perfect to pair with the one for the 47 Meters Down movies. Alas, I already paired it with Midsommar. After watching Crawl I thought of a movie perfect to pair with it but I went with a film I’d already seen so as to quickly get out my advance review.

So what did I think would have been perfect to pair Crawl with? A Jaws ripoff about an alligator!

To be fair, Alligator was one of many ripoffs in the half-decade after the Jaws release. That’s what you’d expect, considering Jaws made $471 million worldwide when no other film had even gotten to $300 million.

Alligator didn’t quite reach those heights, making…$6 million. Still, considering it cost less than 1/3 that, it turned a profit. More importantly, it found a cult following, insofar it received a sequel.

Over a decade later.

That was direct-to-video.

All right, I nonetheless saw commercials for that sequel and at least one for a TV airing of the original around that time. That’s how I’ve even heard of the thing and thought it might be fun to stream this tiny piece of trash film from long ago.

Apparently it’s fallen so far from the limelight that it isn’t even available to to legally stream anywhere! Luckily, a couple of random people have uploaded copies to YouTube.

LOL for such an obscure little thing this has a pretty star-studded cast: Robin Riker, Michael V. Gazzo, and Robert Forster. The beautiful mom from that sitcom Shaky Ground my dad and I liked in the early 90s*, the guy who played Frankie Pentangeli in one of the absolute greatest movies of all time (The Godfather Part II), and a legendary character actor, respectively.

Riker doesn’t really have to do more than look pretty but she rises to the challenge, ha ha. These digital copies were each only 87 minutes long, whereas sources online say the movie’s runtime is 94 minutes. I checked IMDB though; whatever was missing from those extra seven minutes didn’t include Robin Riker’s nipples. She only showed us part of her breasts, period.

Gazzo, from whose career I previously couldn’t have named a single movie other than The Godfather Part II, does fine with his clichéd character of the cop’s hard-nosed boss who says he’s off the case. While I’ve read some people say that this film is meant to skewer clichés from similar horror flicks, it seems like at best it would be what TV Tropes would call a Redundant Parody.** I’m certainly not the only one who feels this way – legendary critic Roger Ebert only saw a silly movie full of recycled tropes.

Forster, however, elevates the film considerably. The future Academy Award nominee*** gives a sincere, compelling performance that proves the point I made here about how great performers acting genuinely scared can lead to an effective horror movie regardless of how dated the effects get.

This movie’s problems go beyond the people in the cheap alligator costume though. The score is so over-the-top it made me facepalm. The story structure is dumb, considering the fact that Riker’s character never even finds out the alligator was the pet she once had. The dialogue is utterly boring, to the point where my mind wandered whenever the alligator wasn’t onscreen. The editing and directing were pedestrian enough that I often got bored even while the alligator was on screen.

The exception was the sewer scenes. Those actually served as another example of combining claustrophobic fear with fear of being eaten – and throw in fear of darkness to boot! Although the main character’s dream about the attack he witnesses in the sewer is too excessive, as the whole screen turns red (Vertigo this ain’t!), the sewer sequences on the whole thrilled me.

I’m not saying that excuses the rest of the film. When you’re checking your watch during an 87-minute movie, it’s not a good sign. However, a free movie on YouTube is a free movie on YouTube. People who like old B-movie horror will get decent scares and some so-bad-it’s-funny laughs.

Bottom line: Can’t believe I’m saying this but I recommend it.

Agree? Disagree? Feel free to comment.

*That gave Jennifer Love Hewitt her first break when she played the daughter on the show!

**That’s two posts in a row I’ve mentioned one of my favorite websites. Perhaps I should finally whitelist them like they keep begging me…

***For a character in Jackie Brown inspired by his character in this movie, according to Quentin Tarantino himself. And no, my praise of Forster is not influenced by the fact that I got to meet him at Paramount this year and he’s a nice man who happily signed my copy of Mulholland Dr.!