'Crawl' is a Gator-Gore Frightfest

Ever since Steven Spielberg's Jaws, the standard for the genre he essentially invented is almost elusive. But every once in a while, a man vs beast movie diverges from what we've already seen and exceeds our expectations. Few movies on top of my head are 1990's Tremors and 2016's The Shallows. Then there are movies of this kind that are also guilty pleasures. Those that might be ridiculous, but definitely entertaining. See Sharknado, which is already a film series, and the Jennifer Lopez-starred Anaconda. This year, Crawl joins the list and it's definitely up there as one of the most extreme.

Photo Credit: United International Pictures

Kaya Scodelario stars as the aspiring swimmer Haley who tries to rescue her dad from a Category 5 hurricane rampaging Florida. Turns out, it's not only the hurricane she has to deal with as her father's house becomes infested with vicious alligators crawling around their muddy basement.

I've never seen an alligator horror film since Lake Placid and that's years ago. So I'm really excited about this especially that it deviates from the premise of the former. Here, the alligators are not only the villains. I can't even say it's Mother Nature. I could go on and on and blame global warming but it's also not really about it. They also tried to integrate human drama, but no one watches this for that.

It also helps a lot that they are trapped inside the four walls of their house, and there's nowhere else to go. It's like when Blake Lively has to survive a hungry shark on a sea rock where there's no to little wiggle room in The Shallows. The claustrophobic production design is incredible and it maximizes the film's terror value.

Case in point, this is about surviving hostile alligators amidst a torrential downpour, And it's gory, it's action-packed and it maximizes anything terrifying about it. What's different about this is it doesn't shy away from the looming danger. There is no sense that the main characters are safe. As a matter of fact, their encounters with the gators are legit close, and not everyone survived unscathed to the point that their human power seems too invincible to be realistic. But with these movies, the more exaggerated, the higher the excitement.