Crawl

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In case you haven’t seen the intro from my entry dated 1/26/19 (it’s in my archives whenever you want to read it), I’m no longer going to review every single movie I see.  I’m going to review one, with the occasional bonus, and just give ratings for the rest from now on (unless I decide to pick it up again in the future).  You can always ask me why I gave the ratings for the films without reviews though (via comments or the e-mail addresses under the ‘About Me’ section).

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Crawl                                                                          G

Hurricanes are frightening on their own.  Imagine alligators in those rising waters.  Such is the premise in this new feature directed by Alexandre Aja (High Tension, The Hills Have Eyes and Piranha remakes) wherein a girl drives into the hurricane zone to check on her father who’s not answering his phone.  An article on social media listed five films to watch---Bait, Cujo, Deep Blue Sea, Rogue, Burning Bright---in preparation for this film.  I could tell where all those influences came in, all good ones too, but I think it has the most in common with Bait and Burning Bright in terms of overall scope.  What makes a concept like this so frightening, as well as those aforementioned films, is its verisimilitude; this could really happen, and I’m sure it has.  The alligators obviously couldn’t be real, at least in regards to human interaction, but they looked real enough.  Since this was still a movie though, some of it was too far-fetched---I don’t care how fast a swimmer you may be, you’re not going to outswim a gator, let alone several (the main character is rarely ever killed in these films though and somehow the creatures always know that); and how does a gator break through a wall and house window so easily, but can’t crack a glass shower door right away?  Some of it was a bit predictable too, or formulaic possibly, like when any extra characters appeared and were inevitably attacked; just a matter of when and how they played out; there is blood too (probably what ultimately garnered the R-rating).  And while part of me feels it was kind of short and ended too abruptly, the other part of me feels it may have been a wise choice to avoid becoming repetitive and overstaying its welcome.  Criticisms aside, it was still an enjoyable natural disaster/natural horror hybrid that I have a feeling might get better with more viewings.  7/15/2019

Other movies and TV show(s) I’ve seen and their ratings (see above):

Fast Color  >>>G

Little  >>>OK

Scream:  Season One  >>>OK

            (VH1/Netflix)

Sexual Chronicles of a French Family  >>>B/EH

What Men Want  >>>EH

---Sean O.
7/18/2019