Killer Crocodile (1989) — Triskaidekafiles

KILLER CROCODILE

WRITERS: Story and Screenplay by David Parker Jr and Larry Ludman

DIRECTOR: Larry Ludman

STARRING: Anthony Crenna as Kevin
Ann Douglas as Jennifer
Thomas Moore as Joe
Wohrman Williams as Foley
Sherrie Rose as Pamela
Julian Hampton as Mark
Van Johnson as Judge

QUICK CUT: A group of kids go off into the swampy jungles of the Dominican Republic to save the trees.

THE MORGUE

Kevin - A young student trying to save the world, and always ready to help his friends.

Mark - Another student who loves taking photographs which…on the one hand, “I am gonna photograph the shit outta this horrific event!” is a bit much…but on the other hand, I’d be doing the same.

Judge - The local dude who passes for any sense of authority in town. He may know more about evens than he lets on, with a few secrets of his own.

As opposed to…what? The hugging crocodiles?

TRISK ANALYSIS: Welcome back, Triskelions! I decided to jump the gun on our regularly scheduled animal attack movie for August, and dive right into the Dominican Republic with...Killer Crocodile! That's really all the setup this movie needs, so climb aboard the Dios Es Amor, grab your cameras and test tubes, because we've got a long ride ahead of us.

The movie starts off with a couple driving around, and finding a nice quiet spot to have a picnic, when the guy breaks out his guitar to serenade her. Lauren takes her top off to go swimming, but don't get your hopes up, the movie doesn't show anything. And it appears she had a very fleshy toned bikini top on anyways.

She tries to get discount Steve Guttenberg to join her, saying the water is warm! "I just peed!"

Fortunately, Killer Croc shows up to take care of her, and she is dragged off to the next scene. Which is a scene of two random fishermen who get attacked. In case you didn't get it already. These murders have nothing to do with the rest of the movie.

We sail through the credits, and totally not Jaws theme music, and meet most of our main canon fodder, as they puttputter down the river looking to find the source of what's polluting the swamp.

Eventually the boat hits a sandbar or something, scattering people and test tubes everywhere. See, THIS is why you don't science on a moving vehicle!

They also brought a dog with them, which seems wildly irresponsible, but I am sure nothing bad will happen to him.

Eventually they find a bunch of canisters floating along the river, one of them gets suited up, and determines the barrels are filled with radioactive material, hence the pollution.

Once Bob is back aboard, they determine they are not ready to handle toxic waste...but hey, let's set up camp right here!

They set up camp, things quiet down, and the only warning they have that anything is wrong, is when Candy starts barking at it.

Unfortunately, the croc had a hankering for some Candy, and has his fill. Conchita goes looking for the dog, and finds a lot more than she bargained for.

Early to bed, early to rise, sleep next to radioactive waste, awake with three eyes.

Everyone wakes up the next day, spend a lot of time calling for their missing member, and the dog, and eventually find nothing, leaving them behind.

They head back to town to report their missing friend and figure out what to do next. They are introduced to the Judge, and he refuses to help because they're understaffed.

He gets angry when they say they went near the swamp he told them not to go towards, and where they found the waste. I'm sure he has good reason though!

The judge heads to a friend of his and warns him to oh gosh, gasp surprise, stop dumping waste, because they're all in on it.

While the boat gets stuck and everyone tries to get it free, one of the girls accidentally stumbles across Conchita's corpse instead, so mystery solved I guess.

Meanwhile, Crocodile Dandee arrives to investigate the death and deal with the wild animal problems.

During the autopsy, Senor Kelly and friends try and blame the kids for murder, until Crocodile Hunter arrives and says nope, y'all got Crocs.

Joe gears up for the hunt, and Mark comes by to have a talk, offering him a cold beer. "Well, I can't say no to a cold beer." "Uh, sure, enjoy some Pabst Blue Ribbon?" "Sonuvabitch."

They start in a conversation about saving the ecology, and hunters, and it might be interesting, but we've got a crocodile attack to deal with!

No! NO! Bad Croc! You spit that out right this instant!!

Some kids are playing on a dock when Killer Croc swims by to have a snack. Mmm, veal.

The villagers band together to save the kid, but Croc will not be denied! He chows down on a guy and goes back for seconds.

All the screaming draws the attention of characters we arguably are supposed to care about, Kevin shoves a broken off piece of the dock into Croc's mouth, and Joe shoots it a bunch of times. The croc knows where it's not wanted, and leaves it's buffet behind.

It's always good to pick your teeth after a nice meal.

Joe gears up and heads home, to find a giant crocodile shaped hole in his house, while the kids have their boat's engine die.

They settle in on the shore for the time being, to work their way back to town when the sun comes up. During the night, a peeping croc spies on them from the water.

Crocky tries dragging their boat away, the guys jump on board to uh...I dunno, yell at it? And get dragged out to the middle of the river.

I reject your reality and substitute my own!!

Killer Croc bursts through the boat and just sits back and waits for it to sink, and he can enjoy a three course meal of college kids.

While it waits, Kevin grabs the rope to swim it back to shore, and they can pull the boat back. Mark keeps an eye out for Doc Croc, but falls in the water. It's not long before he's fish food.

The boys make it back to shore, set up a signal fire, and fortunately Joe isn't far behind to rescue them.

Even if it woulda been funny if he kept right on going down the river with a, "Suck it, kids!"

I guess they go grab the girls, and head to Joe's house to catch their breaths. Joe calls up Senor Kelly, and actually manages to convince him this is serious. Judge tries to convince his accomplice, who is less easily swayed.

Back at the Snake Shack, Kevin and Mark take watch during the night, and chat about losing their friend. I could do with a little less slow movie, but I actually appreciate the character moments.

Meanwhile, the Judge and Foley head out to explode the canisters and destroy the evidence, which uh, seems like a SHOCKINGLY bad idea with radioactive waste, but obviously they don't care...

The judge actually has second thoughts, as he realises what Foley is out here to do, after Foley gets a leech on his arm.

We find out in a bit of throwaway that the Judge is actually an ex con, "But I ain't no killer!" he says as he aims a gun at Foley to make him stop.

Foley knocks the old man in the water, and we ALSO learn he can't swim. As Foley drives off, the croc attacks, and finishes them both off. Bet he wishes the leech was the worst of his problems, now.

The boat explodes, which easily catches Joe's attention, so he and Kevin go to investigate while Mark watches over the girls. Surprise sexism alert, the girls do nothing else in this movie.

Joe starts swatting the water to get the beast's attention, and eventually gets what he's looking for, once he slices open his arm to chum the water. Yeah, great, then pass out from blood loss.

The croc shows up, and Joe goes to town on it, shooting, stabbing, anything he can think of, up to and including hitching a ride!

And amidst the fighting, it appears Joe dies when he goes down with the croc, and blood and bubbles are all that surface.

Kevin takes the boat back, grabs Mark, and the two head out for revenge. Yeah, that's right! That croc killed someone we've known for about three hours!! And yes, once again leaving the women sitting at camp.

The guys spy some eggs on the shore, and woohoo! Crocodile omeletes! We eat tonight!! Kevin shoots at them, to stop a new generation of killer crocs from being born, though.

Momma croc shows up for her own revenge, and Kev blasts away. It's a croc and mouse game as they trade blows, until they decide to get out of there, once the boat takes on damage.

Kevin grabs the outboard motor, is ready to get gone, until a familiar voice calls out from the jungle, and a still alive Joe tosses his hat through the air to the kid.

The hat toss is...ridiculously cool. …Don't judge me.

Joe tells Kevin to use the propeller to make crocodile smoothies, and he does just that! He tosses the motor into the gator's mouth, and it hilariously sprays blood EVERYWHERE as Kevin cheers as he is overtaken by bloodlust.

And even more hilariously, the motor somehow explodes, taking Croccy with it.

So the survivors head back to the cabin, and Joe lets Kevin keep his new lucky hat, and they sail off into the sunset.

But not before we spy one last lost egg that cracks open into the credits.

TRISK ASSESSMENT

Video: Solid enough for an Italian made movie on a budget, although it does not look like a late 80s movie.

Audio: I can’t say for certain, but this LOOKS like the typical Italian practice of redoing all the dialogue afterwards, with no real audio recorded, and it shows. But it sounds fine.

Body Count: Can’t really complain with the numbers this time out.

1- 4:30 minutes in and Lauren gets eaten
2, 3 - It's a fair bet those two fisherman got it.
4 - Conchita gets eaten
5 - Man on the dock gets eaten
6 - Random dude gets sucked through the dock
7 - The croc gets Bob
8 - Foley loses an arm and his life
9 - Judge bites it too
10 - Croc gets Joe...but he lives!
11 - And then the croc herself goes boom.

Best Corpse: Mmm, I am partial to the man on the dock who gets chewed on and carried around like a favourite toy.

Blood Type - B: The effects in this are quite solid! Plenty of blood, decent limb removals, and lots of floating bodies.

Sex Appeal: Nooope.

Drink Up! Every time the boat hits something underwater.

Movie Review: I…actually had a lot of fun with this. It’s got a solid, coherent plot, it has a message it doesn’t harp on TOO much, to the point I wish they gave us a bit more. The acting is tough to judge, but for an Italian flick, it’s more than fine. I like most of the characters, even the baddies. It’s well shot for this level. And I gotta say, that crocodile puppet? You know all they got is the head and paws, but much like Jaws, they make the most of what they got, and really made a fantastic looking crocodile, and it’s the star. Four out of five yapping dogs.

Entertainment Value: Like any good Italian movie, the movie is chock full of silliness. From the dubbing, to the over the top sincerity, and they ham it up nicely. It does suffer a bit from being very slow at points, but they are few and far between. If it tightened up just a little bit, it would be better, but I have no major complaints. Three out of five giant toothpicks.