SuperSatellite ||

What follows is a movie review I had previously posted on SuperSatellite back in May of 2004.  What made me think to pull it back out of the trenches I have no clue.  But hey, I do think you’ll find it marginally entertaining.  I have updated a couple parts and fixed some spelling errors though.  No, I won’t tell you where.

Every once in a while, something comes along that is just so bad, it’s almost fun.  The Cube is a case in point.  It was so horrid that it’s almost worth watching for the sake of the campiness.  You laugh, you giggle, you make fun of it, and in the end you still feel somwhat fulfilled.  I am sure you know a few movies like that.  Curse of the Komodo, however, is NOT one of them.  In fact, I’d say if it vanished from the earth, the absence of its Vortex of Suck could be displaced only by President Bush.  Or Monica Lewinsky.  Zing!

Pardon if I spoil anything, but the basic premise is this:  people are dumb, dumbness spills over into science experiment gone awry, military tries to cover up, dumbness ensues, people die.  End of story.  Reminds me a lot of a movie called Carnosaur…*shudder*  It is complimented with such gripping dialog as:

Rebecca
What happened?  What was that?

Hanson
Ask your father.

Because, obviously, he would put his daughter in imminent peril without telling her what was going on for some reason.  All good fathers do that these days, right?  That, and leave her with two green around the gills guys that are…well, they’re just there I guess.  Decoration. "Me man, me protect wo-man."  They can fire guns, yes, and they appear to have little ability beyond that.  Such as aiming.  Well, they can make googly eyes at the girl, who is some sort of 14 year old trapped in a 27 year old porn star’s body.  Do we feel dirty about that?  Yes…yes we do.  She was blessed with a bad scriptwriter AND a bad hairstylist it seems (the bad career is totally her own fault):

She never stood a chance…But, let’s move on.  There are more people, because you gotta throw in some stranded criminals to make it spicy (Lost anyone?).  It’s great because they are robbing a casino in Hawaii when we meet them.  They make off with three, maybe four million dollars.  How did they get it?  That’s the great part.  They robbed the one, seventy plus year old, inept guard in the security office, because we all know how undefended those silly casinos are.  You’d think they’d learn to be more careful in today’s day and age.  They could have at least tried something creative, like creating a double of the armored truck and taking off that way.  In Hollywood there’s this crazy little work habit called effort.  Even the worst movies at least try in some regard.  This felt like Saturday morning sitcom planning.  The kind with monkeys at typewriters.

And what’s up with the color?  Last time I checked, that shade of purple wasn’t particularly considered a healthy skintone.  They never heard of filters I guess:

In the case of a water landing, Rebecca’s (Glori-Anne Gilbert) chest can be used as a flotation device FOR THE ENTIRE FUCKING PLANE.  Between her and Tiffany (Melissa Brasselle), two-thirds on the female cast could have floated off the island to safety if needed.  Or just swung their upper torsos back and forth wildly as the lizard approached, effectively pummeling it to death (work with that mental image for a couple minutes).  Plus, you can imagine the music going with the "swimming" scene which was, of course, essential to the movie (and yes, she is taking her top off).  I think an equally fitting title for this movie would have been Attack of the Killer Breast Implants.  Oh, and last time I checked, nipples aren’t supposed to be that low.  Here’s a bit of advice from me to you, never use the coupon at the bargain basement breast implant emporium:

Next, I will present for you "the Compound."  I use quotation marks because, you see, it’s not really so much what you would consider a compound, as you would a house.  You know, the kind you live in.  Keep in mind this is on an island 300 miles from Hawaii.  I’d love to see it after a hurricane.  Plus they keep nice flood lights all around the place, even though they clearly stated the Komodo is "light sensitive."  "Be vewwy, vewwy quiet….I’m huntin’ fo’ a dwagon.  Hehehehehe."  Obviously wrapping the windows in black plastic must be enough though, because they leave all the floods on.  That’s what I’d do too, if I was, you know, suicidal.

All things considered, the CGI wasn’t what I’d call terrible.  It wasn’t the worst I’ve seen, though it wasn’t Hollywood.  In fact, this movie would be right at home (and I think it has been) on the Sci-Fi network.  The work was done by a company called Pyros.  Their website isn’t much to look at, and they haven’t done much that you’ve probably heard of besides some work on Quake III.

I was glad Rebecca never had to handle more than about 5 words in a line.  Personally, I think the hair bleaching was starting to get to her in a big way.  She liked saying everything twice a lot too.  And screaming, she screamed and cried a lot (which is funny, something from her filmography tells me she might have a knack for that).  Truth be told, if you’re a fan of Seven Degrees of Kevin Bacon or whatever tha game is, try this one:  Glori-Anne Gilbert to Brittany Andrews.  I know, it’s SO easy.  Gilberts was in Night Vamps (1998) with…ANDREWS.  The only reason I bring it up was because I noticed Andrews has a…long running…uhh…film…career?

And what monster type movie would be complete without…you guessed it!  ZOMBIES!  Apparently the "bio-infection" you can get from the Komodo doesn’t just kill you, but gives you an insatiable hunger for the human flesh.  This sorta came out of absolutely nowhere too.  Shocking!  And it didn’t go anywhere afterwards.  It was just…sort of…there.  At least it died when they shot it.  That’s more than the Komodo.  In fact, I’d go as far as to say these people had no idea how to kill anything.  After the first 500 rounds I’d catch on that the bullets weren’t hurting it.  AT LEAST TRY TO AIM FOR A FRICKIN EYE OR SOMETHING!  Jesus.

Let me see if I covered everything…bad dialogue, gratuitous breasts, terrible acting, stupid hole filled plot, oh, and it was left open for a sequel.  Yeah, I think that’s everything.  2 out of 10.  I have seen worse, but not much, and I can tolerate quite a bit.  18 foot long Komodo dragons doesn’t seem to be one of them.  Wynorski should stick to what he’s good at, which is making…oh, bad films.  Damn.  The last thing I could say (which I don’t think is a compliment, but I guess maybe is) is a quote from their website: 

"Yet another cinema classic from one of our favorite directors, Jim Wynorski, or as Jim likes to call himself in this film, for no apparent reason, Jay Andrews.  Now that I think of it, there is a reason. In fact, what better reason could there be than to hide the fact that he’s Jim Wynorski? This film is rated 3.6 at IMDb, which sounds pretty weak until you realize that such a dismal score actually places it in the top third of Wynorski’s rated films."

Do yourself a favor, go rent Cube 2: Hypercube.  However wasted you feel after watching that, just realize that it could be worse.  Much, much worse.

[As of this reposting, the IMDB score has dropped to 3.0, no longer in the top third of his films, but rather the bottom quarter.]