Tim's Pick: Alligator 2: The Mutation

It may be a little known fact that I enjoy indulging in a bad movie from time to time.  Not only do I enjoy it, I sometimes go out of my way for it, and not always for the kind of movie that is the typical B-Movie, which is fun to laugh at because of horrid acting and other such failures, but for movies that would just make me mad while watching them.  I can give you a few examples, if you don’t believe me.  I inflicted on myself movies like Killing Season and Bucky Larson: Born to be a Star for no reason other than the fact that I would most likely begin boiling and overflowing in negative emotions and start dwelling on all that is bad and tormenting in this world.  I put myself through all of this, because I, Scott Martin, am a media masochist.

Many years ago as a young teenager, while beginning to understand these complex inner workings, I found myself seeking out such things without even knowing about the concept of a B-movie.  One time in particular, it was watching a movie on television called Alligator 2: The Mutation, a movie which must have been a follow up to successful film, I had reasoned.  Heck, it was a sequel which must have meant the first was good enough to warrant such a thing (years later I saw the original, and it was indeed not good enough to warrant such a thing).  Later, as a young adult, friends of mine and I got into cheesy movies, and Alligator 2 was a movie that I threw into the mix and would become the basis for which we would then rate other films on.  We developed a seven clap rating system and tracked various films as we weekly got together, watched bad movies, and sometimes ate horrible snacks.

Revisiting a movie with memories of old is always a tricky thing, as the mind is not a consistent keeper of the facts (I once caught a fish this big), and the understanding of what we witnessed and held in our hearts can veer far off course from reality.  This can lead to major disappointments as it is almost impossible for movies to stand up to the nostalgia that we create for them.  When it was requested of me to review this movie from a friend who was one of the founders of the seven clap ratings system, I braced myself to have my loving memories of this monster movie schlock fest overturned by the reality of a very boring film.

The opening sequence of the movie caught my attention right away as I quickly recalled the blatant thievery it did as it mimicked in intro of Jaws 3 in many ways.  With the film underway, I started to realize that perhaps it was going to be able to live up to the memories as it flaunted its substandard dialogue and well-intended acting attempts.

The movie is about a police officer, David Hodges (Joseph Bologna) who is revered by everyone in the community from transients who he knows on a first name basis to thugs in the local gang, who affectionately call him ‘Solo Lobo.’  For someone whose family complains a great deal about never seeing him because he works the night shift, he does a whole heck of a lot of working during the day.  Hodges is a streetwise cop who plays by his own rules and is teamed up in a unlikely combination with the force’s rookie who enjoys sexually harassing the mayor’s daughter.  Well, actually it is the sexual harassment that wins the heart of the beautiful mayor’s daughter as she is storming away from the conversation, and I would have to believe that the script was written by a male.  Hodges is blessed with an adoring with whom surprises him with a birthday cake by pretending to be an intruder in their home, with Solo Lobo coming face to face with his cake with pistol drawn.

While he is working the beat, Hodges has to deal with the deaths of local citizens who have perished via fatal chomping of a mutant alligator that is roaming the sewers and a local lake.  The alligator is sometimes of terrible and imposing size, and at other times seems the size of a normal gator.  He is big enough to use Otis the transient as a toothpick, and, as Wino Henry (yep, that’s how he is credited) says, ‘he didn’t deserve to be a toothpick.’  It is a touching story at its heart, it really is. 

Causing the mutation of the alligator is the illegal dumping of toxic chemicals by the rich and evil landowner, who is also attempting to purchase all of the houses in the area for a very lucrative venture.  With the land developer (who is in bed with the mayor) in play, nothing is subtle about this movie as it ups the stakes.  Foreign investors promise on Friday to put one million dollars into the development, but only provided that nothing bad happens between now and Monday… a very subtle way for the director to insert into the minds of the viewers that there may indeed be something bad happening within the next three days.

Bless this movie, it really does try hard.  But my cat tries hard to gain my affection, and that does not mean he cleans up his own feces.  Trying hard is one thing, succeeding is another, and this film fails at pretty much everything it attempts.  It has a very unrealistic view on how every aspect of the world works, and seems more to reflect the imaginations of the writer.  An example is that in this movie, for some odd reason, professional wrestling is a black tie affair that is for the rich and the event is one of opulence where the social elite and the cultured attend, taking place at country clubs with valet parking.

The movie has a skeptical police chief, Chief Speed, who refuses at first to listen to the evidence provided by Hodges (as well as that provided by the science of forensics) and pulls an Amity Island mayor by not shutting down the weekend festival because there is too much financially at stake.  The festival is being put on the rich, evil developer who is also using the soothing effects of a Ferris wheel to lull the locals into selling him their land.  The party also provides a great place for a giant (well, sometimes giant, the size changes from scene to scene) alligator and amazing predator to slowly saunter in a not-so-climactic murderous rampage at the end where it does a whole lot of not killing, and an absurd amount of not-even-seriously-hurting people at the very crowded fair.

Even though it sounds perhaps like not much of event actually happens, we get some fun gator hunters from the south lead by the fearless Hawk Hawkins who has a personal score to settle with the cold blooded beast.  It is a movie that really seemed to try and take itself seriously, but was unable to effectively pull the trigger in any arena of film making.  The result is a movie that is not as outlandish as some B-movies that emerge in the upper echelon of the cinesphere, but it does resort to clinging onto so many clichés of its time and can be a joy to watch for those who can spot its failures and give this mutated sequel a chance.

Rating – 6 out of 7 claps (or, if you will, a 3.5 out of 4 stars on the cheesy movie scale)