Tuesday, July 19, 2011

THE GREAT ALLIGATOR (1979)

As far as JAWS ripoffs goes this ones pretty shitty, but shitty in just the right places to make it a fun film to watch...especially with friends.

Somewhere way off on the banks of a South America river, a land developer has spent $3 million on a secluded tourist resort called "Paradise Hotel". He's hired a photographer to take a bunch of pictures of the guests enjoying themselves. Things are going good until this huge alligator shows up and starts eating people. At first, it's just a few people and just like Chief Brody warning the mayor in JAWS the photographer warns the owner, but he's so financially invested that he refuses to believe this crazy story. The buildup is a little slow, but once things got started I was very entertained and laughed a lot at the low-budget special effects, the kickass bone-crunching sound effects, the surprising plot twist concerning the local tribes plan to make the alligator go away and the funky music score.

Overall, it wasn't a anything special, but I was thoroughly entertained. It would have been nice if there'd been some hot female guests that decided to get naked. Also some really good gore shots of the alligator chomping down on people would have been awesome.

Fans of JAWS-ripoffs should definitely check it out.