Crawl is a horror movie about a Florida hurricane that I think was just intended to serve as propaganda for other people not to come to this already overpopulated state. It’s basically like what every other state thinks Florida’s hurricane seasons are always like. Right down to the gators happily devouring anybody that comes into their path. Hurricane seasons are like buffets for gators.
WARNING: A HURRICANE OF SPOILERS in this review!!
Director: Alexander Aja
Starring: Kaya Scodelario, Barry Pepper
Co-written with Tony and Michelle.
The movie follows a woman, Haley, who has been competitive swimming her whole life who just can’t seem to quite win when it counts. She talks to her sister as this category 5 hurricane is barreling toward the state, and they can’t get in touch with their father. The movie throws in some exposition about how the family has been split up for years, because we won’t have time to delve into the rich complex drama of this family once the gator stuff starts up. And they add in a few jabs so we know they all still hate each other. Ah, family.
So Haley, possessing that classic Floridian insanity, decides to drive down I-75 to find her father, despite the sky looking like it actively wants to murder everyone – which, in Florida, is understandable. She sneaks into town against the cops’ warnings, and finds her dad in a weird crawlspace beneath his house, presumably built because this is the kind of hick nutjob character who is paranoid we’re going to have a nuclear war any day because of the liberal darkness in the country – but the movie doesn’t expound on this. Just me theorizing here.
Unfortunately for this poor sap, a bunch of gators have snuck in – the scamps! One of them bites Haley on the leg but she seems fine after, still able to run and swim perfectly fine. Must have been one of those gators with cotton balls for teeth. The dad has also already been maimed. I kept expecting him to die, but I guess he’s just too tough to do that when he has all that online dating and selling his house to move into a shitty condo like the movie shows us. He has so much to live for!
The movie unfolds into a pretty thrilling, fun ride as they try to avoid both the gators and the flooding from this monster storm. It’s a well constructed thriller. A lot of tense moments. Even if I’m skeptical of how many times they survive being bitten by gators. Shit, man. I guess gator bites aren’t so bad after all.
Several plot points in this thing revolve around Haley having to use her swimming talents, which her dad helped train into her from a young age. Every time this happens, her dad whispers something under his breath like “you go, honey!” Did he train her to swim specifically so he could feel good about himself? I hope he enjoyed the bragging rights from mercilessly beating a competitive sport into his own child. I’m also glad they chose a discipline that could help for the EXACT CIRCUMSTANCES of this movie’s plot. What kind of luck is that?
Also, they get in a few lines about their family drama in. The dad even takes time to talk about how life was so hard with his ex wife/Haley’s mom. It’s like yeah, but we’re still trapped in a flooding crawlspace with gators. I don’t think your ex wife can compare with this, buddy. It is nice that the gators are respectful and polite, letting them converse without interrupting. Gators truly are some of nature’s most considerate creatures.
There’s a lot of stuff that happens – mostly more gator attacks, including a thrilling scene where they try and brave a flooded area full of gators to get to a boat. Then the boat ships them back to the house they’d just come from. Whoops! It’s like you can never truly escape from where you came. Powerful stuff. Metaphoric, even.
Oh and there’s a scene where she shoots a gun like five times in a gator’s mouth. I thought that was cool.
Eventually they make it to the roof just in time for a helicopter, surveying the ruins with a sense of awe no doubt, to pick them up, flying them to safety so they can no doubt continue their familial arguing like earlier! Hooray for dysfunction!
But no, seriously. I wanted this to go even further. I wish they hadn’t been saved right away. I wanted to see where this post-apocalyptic wasteland could go. Maybe have the gators form some kind of union and gain human intelligence over time. Then, as the rule of law fades to distant memory and the post-hurricane humans have to co-exist with the gators, the humans could try and negotiate with the gators in order to survive and possibly escape back to civilization. That would be cool. I long for the day when a film will go this far!
Until then, this is a pretty fucking solid monster movie. It’s better than some others I’ve seen in the genre – I mean if you have a choice between this and, say, a Jaws sequel, then the choice should be clear enough. It’s well made and entertaining.
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