Crocodile 2: Death Swamp
release year: 2001
genre: giant monster horror
viewing setting: home streaming 8/22/26 and home DVD 9/9/02
synopsis: Some bank robbers end up hijacking the commercial airliner they're on, but it ends up crashing in a swamp where a gigantic crocodile lives.
impressions: This was fairly entertaining giant crocodile cheese. It took itself seriously enough that I get to rag on it, though; it shared an annoying trait with Cliffhanger: bad guys who are so busy being bad that, as a side effect, they're also monumentally stupid. If the bank robbers had just played it cool, the plane never would have crashed; worse, once things started going wrong, the main bad guy utterly failed to recognize that his plans were being undone simply due to the stupidity of one of his own guys. More, all of these bad guys were not just stupid but completely unlikeable, to the point where it was astonishing that they didn't turn on each other. As for the croc...it did some good eating, and had an aerial moment as well...actually two. It also caused a building to collapse at one point and took down a helicopter at another point. Atta-croc.
acting: Heidi Lenhart did a good job as the stewardess who ended up being the crash survivor with the most sense and will to live. Chuck Walczak was her boyfriend who went to a lot of trouble to find and help her...primarily by hiring Martin Kove, who played a sort of alcoholic Indiana Jones guy willing to fly to the death swamp and search for the crashed plane. Darryl Theirse, as the ruthless leader of the robbers, channeled Wesley Snipes in appearance. Jon Sklaroff was another bank robber, who was clearly unhinged and caused an awful lot of problems. James Parks, son of Michael Parks, was a third robber. Anna Cranage was another stewardess, one who had a lot of trouble coping with stressful situations. As for the giant crocodile, I thought it did a good job portraying the angst and emotion that can only result from spending its entire life in the remote, uncharted death swamp eating small, elusive swamp animals before being exposed to the incredibly easy prey that the humans represented.
final word: Watchable giant croc mayhem with some stupid and/or unlikeable characters.
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