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)
