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Thanks to the incredible success Steven Spielberg’s Jaws, from the mid ‘70s to the early ‘80s, audiences were inundated with countless “animal attack/revenge” films, the likes of which not seen since the atomic era films of the ‘50s. These movies ranged from decent, like the surprisingly impressive Orca: The Killer Whale, to the laughably inept – Alligator, to the completely unwatchable -- Slugs (couldn’t you just, oh I don’t know… walk away.) ‘Laughably inept’ is a term that could describe thousands of movies and it is a pretty damned derogatory one. I am happy to say that Sergio Martino’s The Big Alligator River isn’t laughably inept, but it is enjoyably inept.
 The story goes like this. White people decide it would be cool to build hotel Pleasure House in the middle of some foreign land. They even enlist the native black population, the Kuma tribe, to build the hotel for them. How entrepreneurial of them! Well they are almost done, so they hire Daniel (Claudio Cassinelli) to take photos for magazine advertisements and Ringo Starr’s wife to translate the native tongue and to show some gams. After arriving, Daniel’s model ran off with a native boy to have sex on a canoe. You might as well call them Claudia Jennings because soon they’ll be gator bait.
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After the natives get word of this, they know that it must be the alligator god Krooka! This is odd, because as Barbara Bach points out, “alligators don’t live in the orient.” Apparently no one told them that African tribes don’t live in the orient either, but I digress. The tribe warns the foreigners to leave, as does an insane hermit missionary; but capitalistic hotel owner Mel Ferrer naturally isn’t going to hear any of this. He decides he is going to open his hotel THAT day. Meanwhile, Barbara gets kidnapped by the Kumas and tied to a raft as a provocative sacrifice for Krooka! Meanwhile, with the tribe thinking that it is the white people’s fault that Krooka! is back, they decide to kill everyone in sight as a sacrifice. If this movie were re-titled “Kill Whitey” it would have made millions on 42nd street.  Can Daniel save Ali? Can they stop Krooka!? Will the LAPD stop the rioting? Saying yes to all these questions wouldn’t be spoiling a thing (although it would mean lying, because the LAPD aren’t in it at all). The fun here is in the awesome and over-the-top execution. The score is awesome too, and should be released on CD. Seriously, it is like Morricone when he goes goddamned nuts (see his Exorcist II score).
The finale is full of everything that that makes genre cinema worth watching. Poor acting, force-delivered dialog, women in wet clothing, shit blowing the HELL up and horrible effects. Praise be to Krooka! that NoShame has released such a rare and amazing film to the DVD owning world.
 Presentation
The 2.35:1 anamorphic transfer on The Big Alligator River is truly amazing. That is, until the last few seconds before the closing credits when there is a drastic shift in video quality. The rest of the film is pretty awesome though. The darks in the finale are deep and allow the fires to burn nicely against them in the finale. An excellent transfer as a whole, even surpassing the already big expectations one has from a NoShame film. Audio again comes through perfectly clear in both Italian and English tracks. I highly recommend watching this film a second time with the English dub. It is completely amazing and actually adds quite a bit of comic tone to this film. Intended or not, it is hilarious either way. English subtitles are included as usual.
Extras
In the Croc’s nest – (34:49)
This featurette starts with a very frank interview with Sergio Martino where he discusses how the film was one of the last Italian films to get true world-wide distribution. He also mentions the non-difficulties of working with ex-Bond girls (Barbara was apparently afraid of snakes) and other interesting stories. Then we move to Antonello Geleng, the production designer. He discusses in great detail how difficult it was to build, and film on the flowing raft used in the finale. He also talks a great deal of the miniatures used, which are pretty good. Most interesting is his explanation of a film’s release cycle in the ‘A-B-C-grade’ cinemas, and how films like The Big Alligator River would be shown for many weeks. My only real complaint is that there is too much that isn’t related to the film. Still, what is here is fascinating.
Original English Theatrical Trailer – (2:47)
Original Italian Theatrical Trailer – (2:48)
This is essentially the same trailer, with only the credits being in their respective languages, and the distributor tag attached to the Italian one. Both trailers are in various degrees of decay, which only serve to show how amazing the transfer is and how much work went into the restoration.
Poster Gallery – (0:59)
A selection of posters and other press materials used to promote the film, accompanied by the film soundtrack. Neat, but short.
 As always, the booklet never ceases to be informative. This beefy 14-page booklet has an essay on animal revenge, which seems to be too busy categorizing what shouldn’t be considered the genre, instead of concentrating on what makes a good or bad film. It also has pretty good detailed liner notes on the film. Lastly there are bios for Sergio Martino (the same as past releases), Barbara Bach, Mel Ferrer and Claudio Cassinelli.
 Fine
The Big Alligator River is a movie for people who love bad movies, not even just animal revenge films, but really bad films. The film is every bit as enjoyable as House of the Dead or Troll 2. The only really surprising thing is that it came from a director who made three progressively great giallo films, and a slew of other genuinely great genre films. (The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh, Case of the Scorpion’s Tail, and Your Vice) NoShame deserves tons of accolades for their Sergio Martino Collection line of discs. I can only hope there will be more to come and all of them get the quality attention they have so far.
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