Bianyì ju mang

After having suffered through the 2021 Chinese movie "Huge Shark", also from 2021, I must admit that I weren't expecting this movie titled "Mutant Python" to be any better. But since I hadn't already seen it, of course I opted to watch it.

Luckily, I have to admit that writer Zhuang Qin delivered something entertaining here with "Mutant Python". It was a fairly straight forward and enjoyable movie. The kind of movie where you just grab your snack, lean back and watch the screen. The storyline in "Mutant Python" is straight forward and doesn't require the audience to do a whole lot of thinking.

The acting performances in the movie were fair. I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in "Mutant Python", but they put on good enough performances to carry the movie. The only downside to "Mutant Python" was that I had obtained a version dubbed into English. Yeah, dubbing movies in 2021, seriously? And on top of that, it was that kind of horrible dubbing that make the actors and actresses sound like they are soulless drones high on something. A shame really, because it took away a lot of enjoyment from the movie.

Visually then I was impressed with director Er Dong's "Mutant Python" movie, because the CGI was good and the snake looked good and sort of realistic. Well, aside from the fact that the python in the movie had a hood, for some odd reason.

If you enjoy a good old fashioned creature feature, then give "Mutant Python" a chance. I was genuinely entertained here, aside from the dubious dubbing.

My rating of "Mutant Python" lands on a six out of ten stars.

Living in a remote mountain village, an interrupted wedding ceremony prompts the village elders to enact a long-forgotten ritual sacrifice to appease the Snake God responsible for the disaster, forcing one of the residents to get a team together to stop it before his sister becomes the sacrifice.

This was a fairly enjoyable genre effort. One of the brighter spots here comes from the solid and oftentimes striking setup that allows for a highly intriguing storyline throughout here. The connotations involved in the rural village that take place within their own set of customs and traditions involving how to properly prepare for a marriage or other type of ceremony, the involvement of human sacrifice to quell the creature, and the belief that everything works out in this manner offers a strong starting place for what's to come. The fact that the entire plan for catching the snake rests on kidnapping the one outsider of the family and holding them hostage under such strong guard that they're unable to be rescued until the time is right for the sacrifice ceremony makes for a strong motivation to get the hunters involved to stop the snake before that can take place keeps this moving along nicely by allowing for enough of a look into their mindset while also showing the treatment she's subjected to the carry out the ritual for a rather strong starting place. With this establishing everything nicely in the first half, the rest of the film can deal with some solid enough action to make for an exciting time. Getting enough of a taste of everything with the snake appearing during the cleansing ceremony in the tomb and later striking at the sea-side ceremony where it takes the sacrifice and sets off the rampage in the village where it swallows people whole or sends them flying through the air with the size and strength it possesses. Later attacks, including the lake ambush on the sleazy party goer or striking the henchmen trying to grab the sacrifice, are also quite fun at getting the creature more involved with things as the finale offering up the series of encounters it does where they try to capture the snake in the middle of the forest before turning into the massive rampage at the village. This has some exciting moments, several solid stunt pieces trying to get out of the snake's path as it crashes into things, and the effects needed to make everything work come off exceptionally well with a somewhat surprising outcome for quite a lot to like here. There isn't much to hold it back but it does have some minor drawbacks. One of the main issues present is the somewhat illogical means through which the village agrees to participate in the sacrifice ceremony without much reasoning to keep it going. The entire means of their ceremony makes sense in their initial setup yet to the strange insistence on carrying through with the whole thing being continued on when the knowledge about the snake being captured and produced for the congregation turns them into being absolute jerks to continue their ways as being the human villains when it makes no sense to carry on the ceremony. As well, the series of shots here focusing on the obviously goofy-looking and fake snake, which sprouts a hood for some reason despite being called a python which obviously doesn't have one, does come off a bit weird which are overall enough to give some minor drawbacks to this one.

Rated Unrated/R: Violence and Language.