Arghhh.
Arghhh.
Arghhh.
Arghhh some more.
We did have a good time. I'd recommend it to bad movie buffs,
especially for a couple scenes and the scintillating dialogue. I
will say that I must be getting really tired of the genre because nothing
was remotely scary about the film. There were some scenes designed
to gross you out. There were the usual "fake attack" scenes, the
"shock-startle" scenes, the "I'm being stalked" scenes, and so on but nothing
out of the ordinary. (Which, btw, is why I'm looking forward to seeing
the Blair Witch Project
this coming weekend).
I think the dialogue was what started us laughing.
I think the script was done by the same person who writes for Ally
McBeal. I think this person should stick to his genre as the
dialogue is really campy. There's nothing that I remember in particular,
except what the little old lady (played by Betty White) says and I can't
print those things here because I'd violate some FCC regulations. Here's
a paraphrased example of dialogue in the movie:
Sheriff - "You Fish and Game
guys are all the same. You always have these sarcastic one word answers."
Fish and Game guy - "Gee."
Then there are the various plot holes. For example.
Fonda plays a paleontologist. How does a paleontologist get involved in
a monster hunt? Supposedly, they find a large tooth and they want
someone to identify it because they think it could be a dinosaur tooth.
Huh? That wouldn't have been my first guess (A wild, killer dinosaur
swimming around the lakes of Maine?) and I certainly wouldn't have
called a bunch of paleontologists 3-4 states away to check up on it.
The dialogue and plot undergoes many contortions and almost apologetically
lets her join. It was almost as if the writer was saying "She wasn't
my idea. But now I have to work this person in because she's being
paid a lot of money." So for the first 8 minutes after the character
is introduced, everyone's asking what a paleontologist from New York
is doing out in the backwoods of Maine. Eight minutes, btw, is a
long time for this movie which only runs 83 minutes. Here's another
thing. The crocodile expert is an independently-wealthy, mythology
professor. Huh? The only thing I can figure is that this guy
couldn't hack the biochemistry and genetics courses to get a real zoology degree.
But I was so much more impressed with academics after this movie.
The one thing we did learn is that the Fish and Game people have jurisdiction
of the apprehension and sentencing of wild animals. They're like
FBI in an X-Files flick
or the Secret Service in In
the Line of Fire, and they can also do cool things like "call for backup"
and they have some neat-o rapid response team (although, said team has
never trapped something over 30 feet in length). So if you ever have a
raccoon that's committing a crime, you know who to call.
This movie is really just an Ally McBeal episode set against
the panoramic backdrop of Black Lake, er...Lake Placid, with a crocodile
hunt instead of a court of law, and more fatalities. But it is a
good brain cell killer.
Here are the drive-in totals:
2 dead people (I know. It's a monster flick. This can't
be right. But it is. Low lemming count in this one.)
1.51 human bodies (1 + .51 - you do the math)
1 dead bear
1 dead cow
1 dead croc
.11 dead moose
1 mortified toe
1 mortified script
2 heads
6-7 duffle bags
1 crashing helicopter
1 overturned boat
1 sweet old lady with a big potty mouth.
1 rich, mythology professor with crocodile fetish.
1 ruggedly-handsome Fish and Game Warden (we do regret to say that
this
movie does not do for Fish
and Game people, what Backdraft did
for firefighters.
But he did get the girl. Sorry if I gave too
much away there.)
1 *field* paleontologist on an adrenaline kick. (we do regret
to say that
this movie does not do for
paleontologists what Backdraft did for
firefighters. It does
not even begin to undo the damage that
Ross on NBC's Friends
has done for paleontologists.)
1 stereotypical, backwoods, overweight, bitter sheriff.
Leaping schools of stunt perch (real perch were not harmed in the filming
of this movie. Real
audience members did lose brain cells,
though.)
1 vorpal beaver
1 air cow
kung fu
gun fu
boat fu
trap fu
dialogue fu
cow fu or kung moo (that was JD's idea, not mine)
dart fu
helicopter fu
grenade launcher fu
Good Movie Scale - 3 (no Oscar contenders here)
Bad Movie Scale - 7 (pretty funny but not side splitting funny).
