Movie Potluck | Creature-Features
Reviewing earthly apex predators and horrors from beyond, oh my
Creatures, Creatures Everywhere
In the not-so-long-distant past, my brother, friends and I embarked on a now time-honored crusade: the Movie Potluck, wherein one of our number would invoke a theme, and each of us would choose a movie we felt fulfilled its requirements. It started innocently enough in October 2023 with the appropriate theme of Horror. However, in the days, months, near-year since, we’ve accrued a rather varied run of selections, including:
Colorful
- Blade Runner 2049
- Birdcage
- Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
- Eraser
America Screws It Up
- Grave of the Fireflies
- The Host
- Captain America: The Winter Soldier
- Terminator 2: Judgment Day
Food Mishaps
- Drop Dead Gorgeous
- Alien
- Parasite
- The Menu
Introductions
- Nightmare Before Christmas
- Man of Tai Chi
- Anything for Jeremy
- The Living Daylights
Etc., etc.
It’s always exciting to see who picks what, and even more so’s the chance I’ll come away having seen something new. Since our inaugural watch, I’ve had my viewing habits and tastes occasionally challenged, walking away with some new favorites under my belt that I might not have ever considered otherwise. This, our most recent, was no exception.
Without further to-do, I present: Creature-Features!
Crawl (2019)
Synopsis: A daughter and her estranged father find themselves trapped and fighting for their lives against nature as a deadly hurricane — and hungry alligators — traps them in the crawl space of their flooding house.
Flooded With Disbelief
Disclaimer: I’m a huge fan of reptiles. For 14 years one of my best buddies was my green iguana, Smegal. Lizards have always interested me and I’m still waiting for Hollywood to give them their hero spotlight. As such, you’ll have to excuse my reptile-centered bias and the impact it had on my viewing of the film.
I initially avoided Crawl because I didn’t really want to see alligators (even CGI ones) get murdered; call it an allegiance to our scaly overlords, I don’t know. However, my interest in seeing something new as opposed to tried-and-trues nudged me to elect it as my pick. I figured it would be dumb, over-the-top fun… and I was mostly right.
Mostly.
Usually in animal-attack films, the filmmakers select the most vicious qualities of their chosen creature and dial them up to 11 for the kind of dramatic entertainment that’ll make you the enemy of every knowledgeable expert around. Crawl, however, seemingly dialed down the capabilities of their apex predators in ways so confounding that we actually had to look up who could swim faster, a human or alligator? Like our main characters’ ability to withstand things like blood loss, shock and common sense, the alligator v. human statistics were so hilariously suspended from any sense of reality that it ultimately jeopardized the movie’s dramatic potential.
However, that’s not to say the movie was bereft of entertainment: There was plenty of cannon fodder characters on-hand for the alligators (and filmmakers) to run amok with some gleefully splashy R-rated carnage. It’s a good-looking movie too, its sets satisfyingly drenched in mood and atmosphere, and some generally decent tension precipitating gator attacks while still managing efficient pacing. Lead Kaya Scodelario also puts in a solid, genre-proper performance, providing the right amount of bravado and fear, and showcasing how under different circumstances she could have done well as Claire Redfield in Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City.
Trollhunter (2010)
Synopsis: A college filmmaking crew joins up with an enigmatic hunter to document the truth: Trolls are alive and well in Norway!
A Good Time Worth Hunting For
This is my second time seeing Trollhunter, and it’s every bit as enjoyable as before. It’s in Norwegian so I can’t say with 100% certainty that the acting is good from a delivery standpoint, but to my uninitiated ears the small cast of unknowns (to me, a silly American) do a fantastic job. The writing is snappy, darkly comedic, and hardly wasteful, moving the team from one discovery to another and making smart use of the found-footage approach in stitching together their journey — also, it avoids the ‘motion-sickness’ issues prevalent in some of its contemporaries; an added bonus. The attention to detail in creating a believable background/lore for the trolls and how they are monitored and hunted is surprisingly in-depth, and its satirical elements land in properly amusing ways. For an independent 14-year-old movie, the special effects also hold up well, highlighting the filmmakers’ knack for visuals and how to wield them.
If you haven’t seen Trollhunter (and aren’t diametrically opposed to the found-footage genre), it’s highly recommendable, standing tall as a highlight amongst its ilk.
Orca: The Killer Whale (1977)
Synopsis: When a greedy fisherman accidentally murders a killer whale and its unborn baby, he incurs the wrath of its vengeful mate.
Blackfish Rising
Have you ever wondered what would happen if someone wrote the plot for a modern Liam Neeson actioner, but replaced him with a whale? Well, look no further than the 70s gem known as Orca: The Killer Whale. I’d heard about this movie in gleeful second-hand from my brother, who blessedly chose it for his pick. I’ve seen a score of ‘killer fish’ movies in my time, including Jaws, but never have I witnessed one as traumatizing, philosophically-possessed, mythological, ridiculous, and ultimately cathartic as this. A feverish inversion of Moby Dick with explosions, Orca: The Killer Whale sees prolific producer Dino De Laurentis working his unhinged magic to help conjure a surprisingly sympathetic, if delirious, take on a genre that arguably had just truly become sea-worthy a few years prior. Steven Spielberg may have elevated the genre (and created the modern blockbuster) in 1975, but it would only take 2 years for director Michael Anderson and Co. to evolve it with this madcap ride of guilt, vengeance, and the unspeakably casual cruelty humanity commits against nature’s creatures.
I laughed. I cried. I cheered. I loved this movie.
The Blob (1988)
Synopsis: A small Californian town is pitched into chaos when it’s besieged by a ravenous, gelatinous entity from beyond.
A Classic of Its Own (Re)Making
An 80s movie if ever I’ve seen one, The Blob nonetheless impressed with absolutely dynamite special effects, inventive (and often horrifying) death sequences, and a story that kept finding surprising ways to subvert my expectations of what should have been a standard-fare horror ride. Perhaps most shocking, however, was how tight the characterizations were — archetypal as all get-out, maybe, but executed so flawlessly as to complement, and even elevate, the impact and efficiency of the narrative. The Blob is a creature on par with John Carpenter’s 1982 iteration of The Thing for conjuring pure visual terror and dread, something I honestly wasn’t ever expecting. It’s suitably, undeniably disturbing as an antagonist, and paired with the inventive writing and razor-sharp pace, it practically forces you into a hostage situation of feelings — occasionally rooting for some to meet their horrible ends, yet more often fearing for the well-being of everyone else.
A masterpiece of its era, and quite easily beyond.
Deep Rising (1998)
Synopsis: A mercenary team targets a millionaire’s cruise ship for a high-seas heist but find themselves trapped in a fight for their lives against nightmarish creatures from below.
A Tentakiller Time
A bonus pick, since we’d completed our gauntlet in record time, and one I’m incredibly happy to have experienced. There’s nothing quite like the charm (and often cheese) of the late 90s-early-00s when it comes to action-horror; a time where CGI had not quite won the effects wars over practical, where actors might still trounce and pounce their way through practical sets replete with squibs, sparks, explosions, and all other manner of real-deal kineticism that can feel woefully absent at times in modern genre cinema. With makeup effects work handled by legend Rob Bottin (of Robocop and The Thing fame) and special effects titans Industrial Light & Magic involved, the film maintains a remarkably solid visual presence, alongside other effects-laden movies like 1997’s Event Horizon, The Mummy (1999, also directed by Stephen Sommers) and Resident Evil (2002).
Also like those aforementioned films, Deep Rising conjures up a willing and charismatic cast who breathes life into largely one-dimensional characters through the sheer might of their enthusiasm for the material. Add in a classic horror setup with unnecessarily over-the-top futuristic firearms (rotating-barrel assault rifles, why not) and a deceptively tight, efficient story, and this unheard-of-until-now gem found itself surfacing quickly to the top of my enjoyment list.
Flashy, furious, and fun, Deep Rising is everything I want from a late 90’s creature-feature.
This may mark our 18th movie potluck collaboration since that fateful October nearly a year ago, but it’s my first time writing about it here on Medium. I can only hope you enjoyed the read. But, what about you? Let me know in the comments what your Creature-Feature picks would be — or better yet, tag me in a piece so I can see and share!
