LAKE PLACID A film review by Steve Rhodes Copyright 1999 Steve Rhodes RATING (0 TO ****): ** 1/2
Yes, it's true. The right cast can save what would otherwise be an awful movie. Steve Miner's LAKE PLACID is living proof.
Think about it. A horror movie about a killer crocodile who mysteriously shows up in a lake in Maine and starts noshing on the locals. Does that or does that not sound like an instant candidate for your list of the worst movies of the year? Well, it isn't.
A horror movie that's proud to be a parody, LAKE PLACID doesn't have a pretentious bone in its body. The talented cast never makes the mistake of taking the movie seriously, and David E. Kelley's biting script is filled with deliciously sarcastic humor. LAKE PLACID is the type of movie that the supercilious THE HAUNTING should have been.
When we first see the lake in Maine that would have been called Lake Placid (that name was already taken), Sheriff Hank Keogh (Brendan Gleeson) is busy listening to music in his boat as a scuba diver works below. Something attacks the diver, but he can't get the sheriff's attention. By the time the sheriff pulls him in, he finds that something has completely eaten off the bottom half of the diver.
Since there is a crocodile tooth left in the deceased, someone calls the big museum in New York. Of course, they send a paleontologist, Kelly Scott, to investigate. Crocodiles are closely related to the dinosaurs, you see.
(We just got back from Australia, where we stayed at a cabin near a lagoon where until recently a large crocodile lived, so the movie had a certain resonance. We also learned some crocodile facts, like the way they never kill large game by eating them. Instead, they always drag the victim into the water and drown it first. Also, they can't run very far on land, but they can out swim any human in the water. The movie ignores all of these facts, but in such a broad comedy it is trivially easy to suspend disbelief.)
As the big city woman Kelly Scott, Bridget Fonda is great as a woman who thinks camping out means the Ramada Inn. She's always worried about the availability of toilets and the cleanliness of the glasses. She also can put people in their place faster than the crocodile can snap its jaws shut. "Could you be a little more condescending," she tells the head of the small investigative mission, Game Warden Jack Wells (Bill Pullman), when he thinks it's too dangerous for her. "I don't deal well with subtlety."
The other delightful highlights of the cast include a rich crocodile-worshiping mythology professor Hector Cyr (Oliver Platt) and a foul-mouthed farmer, Mrs. Bickerman (Betty White), who raises cows for reptilian food.
When they come across a maggot-infested human toe, Hector picks it up. "Is this the man who was killed?" he asks the sheriff, who despises Hector. "Seemed taller," the sheriff replies in his typically laconic fashion.
Although the movie has a lot of dead spots, there are several large laughs in it. My personal favorite occurs when the crocodile attacks the helicopter. Perhaps the wisest part of the movie is that it has the good sense to be very short.
LAKE PLACID runs 1:22. It is rated R for violent creature attacks and related gore and for language and would be fine for teenagers.
Email: Steve.Rhodes@InternetReviews.com Web: http://www.InternetReviews.com
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