lake placid movie

Its been in the newspapers today so you might hear quite a lot about lake placid movie in the coming twenty-four hours.



Pros: Unintentionally hilarious. My friend and I had a lot of fun laughing at the ludicrous dialog and bad acting.

Cons: Bad special effects, moronic script, absolutely pathetic acting.

My friend and I have an odd pastime- we rent the worst horror movies we can find and then make fun of them in the tradition of Mystery Science Theater 3000 (for those of you who don't know, Mystery Science Theater, or MST3K, was a show in the 90s in which the cast of characters watched a movie and made fun of it with witty quips.) The MST3K crew found the worst movies ever made to make fun of. Lake Placid 2 would have fit right in with such classics as Santa Claus v. the Martians and Attack of the Giant Mutant Teenagers.

I encountered Lake Placid 2 while surfing around Netflix. As soon as I read the reviews, I knew that I had to get the movie, so I sent away for it immediately. My friend and I expected BAD- and Lake Placid 2 did not disappoint.

When I started up Lake Placid 2, we got our first surprise- this movie was made by 20th Century Fox. We expected some little studio to be responsible for this travesty. I am mystified at how a mainstream studio could have made such a bad B movie. Odd, that.

There really is no way to describe how bad this movie actually is. The plot is pretty typical. Two men are on a lake. One gets knocked overboard by an unseen predator and presumably eaten. The survivor goes to see Sheriff Riley (John Schnieder), who is remarkably unconcerned. He and his cohorts laugh and snicker at the man's tale of losing his friend (and, in fact, the surviving friend seems remarkably unfazed after being left holding his friend's severed hand) After seeing the victim's gnawed remains, Sheriff Riley decides to check things out.

He bumps into his former girlfriend Emily (Sarah Lauffer) and the two go in search of the monster crocodile. One of many inconsistencies- Emily must flee from the room when she sees what is left of the dead man, bemoaning her lack of stomach for blood and gore, but later has no problem tossing a severed head onto the boat after diving for remains in the lake.

Enter some teenagers having a party. The women bare their breasts (of course) and get eaten, in keeping with the grand horror movie tradition that any women who is partially nude must immediately die.

Emily and Riley try to catch the crocodile, people die, and a ludicrously stereotypical hunter and his African sidekick show up to show them how it's done.

I have seen a lot of bad movies, and I can tell you that John Schnieder gives one of the worst if not the worst performance of all time. When his son is threatened by the giant crocodile and is in mortal danger, his barely sweats. He seems to take everything in stride, including watching the crocodiles eat his friends.

Adding to the lackluster cast is Cloris Leachmen playing elderly Sadie Bickerman, an old lady who feeds people to the crocodiles. She was mildly amusing.

But the really amusing things were unintentional. Some of the dialog:

Sheriff Riley comforting Emily, who just watched her friends get killed:

"Sure, they're dead. They got chewed up into little pieces. But they knew what they were doing."

Sheriff Riley on the bright side:

"Well, there are still some good fish in the lake."

Sadie on the giant female crocodile:

"I named her Martha, after Martha Stewart. She was a tough old broad."

(well, maybe that bit was actually intended to be a joke)

I couldn't make this stuff up.

As is usual in bad horror movies, people behave in strange ways- a teenager goes on a nature walk and leaves his topless girlfriend behind on the beach, another teenager laughs and plays in the crocodile nest and virtually traipses into the jaws of the beast, and the aforementioned incident of Emily gleefully tossing a severed head five minutes after being comforted for not being able to stand blood.'

Lake Placid 2 is definitely a one-star movie, but I have to give it two because it was so much fun to laugh at. My friend and I came up with some great one-liners, though there were times we could only stare in amazement and shake our heads.

So we really had a good time.

And we have a new catchphrase. Every time something goes bad, I will just turn to my friend and say "It's ok. There are still some good fish in the lake." Just that made it all worthwhile.

Bottom Line: This is one of the worst movies ever made- but that makes it great to make fun of.

This review also appeared at Epinions. http://www.epinions.com