Wednesday, October 01, 2008

Mammoth


(2006) **


It’s not hard to imagine the pitch session for this campy made-for-tv horror flick: “It’s Tremors mixed with Men in Black!” Unfortunately, it’s not nearly as good as either of those. Some space-goo gets released from an asteroid and brings a wooly mammoth to life. The goo then causes the mammoth to go on a killing rampage in what looks like the SoCal suburbs, but is really apparently Louisiana. Gotta love on-location budgets for B-movies.

This is mostly a pretty lame attempt at Tremors like tongue-in-cheek fun, but most of the camp falls flat. Tom Skerritt is the lone bright spot, as a kooky granddad who helps his son and granddaughter kill the thing. Summer Glau of Serenity/Firefly fame plays the granddaughter, but it’s a lame part and a mailed in performance, like most of the flick. There’s one scene early on when the asteroid flies over, and Glau, Skerritt and others are gazing quizzically at the horizon, during which Glau gets a case of the giggles mid-scene. Rather than do a retake, the director just decided to leave it in. That sums up the level of care in the whole thing.


Camp is probably a pretty difficult thing to pull off, as the actors and script have to be good enough to play like they're not in on the joke the whole time, even when the audience knows they are. Skerritt's the only one who pulls it off here.

5 comments:

miko564 said...

Yeah, I think the slew of crappy "comedy" movies that make fun of recent films prove that campy is hard to do well. (This hasn't apparently slowed them down any.)

The line between campy and just plain unwatchable is razor-thin. It's like they have to be aware it is all in fun, but still take the process seriously...good job on two so far LS.

DKC said...

I heart Tom Skerritt.

What opened the door to the whole funny/scary thing? Was Scream the first to do it successfully?

Octopunk said...

Evil Dead 2.

Nice choice, Sharky! I love me a big stupid monster movie.

JPX said...

What is it about space-goo coming from asteroids causing all sorts of havoc? There was some asteroid space-goo in Creepshow, and wasn't is also in The Stuff? No? Are you sure? Excellent choice, though. I'm a big fan of made-for-TV horror from the 70s - ever see Dark Night of the Scarecrow?

Catfreeek said...

If all else fails you can always fill the hole in the plot with space goo.

Malevolent

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