Who doesn’t like a shitty Jaws ripoff? Honestly, plenty of people. But enough do like it that giant animal flicks have become a robust subgenre of b-horror the last couple of decades, thanks to the work of outfits such as The Asylum, and the availability of affordable CGI. Jaws ripoffs aren’t the sole province of the 21st century, though. The Italians, whose cinema has always had a mere passing relationship with copyright law, produced plenty of their own…homages…to Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster.
Bruno Mattei, Dino De Laurentiis, Sergio Martino, Enzo G. Castellari, Ovidio G. Assonitis, Raffaele Donato, Lamberto Bava, Luigi Cozzi, Dardano Sacchetti, Joe D’Amato, and more — all names familiar to fans of Italian genre films, all of whom participated in Jaws ripoffs. Add to the list Fabrizio De Angelis, who produced, directed, and wrote, with the aforementioned Dardano Sacchetti, 1989’s Killer Crocodile.
Killer Crocodile follows a small group of conservationists who are investigating contamination in a rural swamp. It’s never said what country they are in, but the movie was filmed in the Dominican Republic.
The group, led by Kevin (Richard Anthony Crenna), discovers that the source of the contamination are radioactive barrels dumped in the swamp by some unknown evil corporation. The radiation from the barrels has, of course, mutated a local crocodile, causing it to grow to unprecedented proportions. After one of their party is chewed up by the croc, they try to enlist the help of the local magistrate, known only as the Judge (Van Johnson), to do something about the bloodthirsty animal. The Judge has been taking bribes from sleazy business guy Foley (Bill Wohrman) to allow the dumping, so no help is coming from that quarter. However, no swamp is complete without a swamp hermit, and that hermit is Joe (Ennio Girolami), a hunter who has lived deep in the swamp for the last 30 years, and is familiar with all its perils. Joe is to Killer Crocodile as Quint is to Jaws. That is, he’s the only competent person in the whole damn movie.
The film plays out just as one would expect. There’s the discovery of the threat. A denial of the threat followed by a bunch of deaths. And then denouement, where the threat is dealt with. Like so many other similar films, it ends with a singular moment of destruction.
What makes this film stand out from the crowd is the crocodile. There’s no CGI in this flick. The crocodile is 100% practical effects, and it shows. It’s a charming effort, though. Giannetto De Rossi is credited with creating the crocodile, and his creation is a wonderful combination of cheese and scale. The croc has a head about the size of a Fiat 500, with rubbery teeth and a red gullet. It has all the mechanical grace of a bucket excavator, and looks as if it shares some of the same components. For this type of production, I don’t think De Angelis could have asked for more.
By the end of the film, I was rooting for the croc to eat the bad guys, and for the good guys to kill the croc. Guess what? That’s exactly what happens. Then, as a final treat, the croc is done away with in hilariously spectacular fashion, making the ending of Jaws look restrained. It’s a high moment of excess in a flick that, otherwise, had pedestrian amounts of blood and gore for Italian horror. It also makes the entire movie worth sitting through.
There are no deep themes or symbolism in this movie. Or, if De Angelis and company intended there to be, they have been swallowed up by the film’s derivative nature. It’s a cash grab that was meant to do that most shallow of things: be entertaining. It does so. Killer Crocodile enters the Watchability Index at #158, displacing Squirm.