Monday 16 January 2012

Alligator
(1980)

RATING:80%
FORMAT:DVD



An environmentalist’s wet-dream of a movie: Greedy corporate interests polluting the environment with horror-movie consequences.

For a Jaws’ rip-off, this is an unusually-intelligent movie. It possesses a fine script from John SAYLES that deftly walks the tightrope between socially-concerned polemic and monster-movie thrills.

Director Lewis Teague handles it all with great aplomb and the high quality of the casting and characterization is remarkable. No performer puts a foot wrong in a film that they could easily have decided was to be undertaken just for the money. Moreover, White imperialism, male pattern baldness and the vicissitudes of heterosexual relations are stirred into this enjoyably-entertaining mix.

The special effects are suitably and believably gruesome and the whole affair has a great deal of wit and of not-taking-itself-too-seriously to compensate for the inevitable cliches and credibility lapses so typical (&, perhaps, so enjoyable) of the genre.


Copyright © 2012 Frank TALKER. Permission granted to reproduce and distribute it in any format; provided that mention of the author’s Weblog (http://franktalker5.blogspot.com/) is included: E-mail notification requested. All other rights reserved.
Posted by Frank TALKER™ at 16:30
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Science:



No science is immune to the infection of politics and the corruption of power.



Jacob Bronowski… (1908 - 74), British scientist, author. Encounter (London, July 1971).


Sleep of Reason:



The dream of reason produces monsters. Imagination deserted by reason creates impossible, useless thoughts. United with reason, imagination is the mother of all art and the source of all its beauty.



Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes… (1746-1828), Spanish painter. Caption to Caprichos, number 43, a series of eighty etchings completed in 1798, satirical and grotesque in form.


Humans & Aliens:



I am human and let nothing human be alien to me.



Terence… (circa 190-159 BC), Roman dramatist. Chremes, in The Self-Tormentor [Heauton Timorumenos], act 1, scene 1.


Führerprinzip:



One leader, one people, signifies one master and millions of slaves… There is no organ of conciliation or mediation interposed between the leader and the people, nothing in fact but the apparatus - in other words, the party - which is the emanation of the leader and the tool of his will to oppress. In this way the first and sole principle of this degraded form of mysticism is born, the Führerprinzip, which restores idolatry and a debased deity to the world of nihilism.



Albert Camus… (1913-60), French-Algerian writer & philosopher. The Rebel: An Essay on Man in Revolt: New York: Vintage Books, (1984; page 182.)