Stanley

William Grefe had a knack for turning out low budget yet effective films in the 60s and 70s. STANLEY is one of his more popular releases. The film is very dated (mainly from the guys' clothing), but worth a look. The film is at it's most creepy with scenes of real snakes crawling all over the home of the snake-man. You can imagine what it must have been like to be on the set - Grefe was probably the lone crew man. The film's weakness is in it's running time - more than an hour and forty-five minutes is much too long for this kind of drive-in/exploitation fare. The film would have been more effective if trimmed down to a 90 minute or so running time. Like one character who got bit on the ass, it hurt to sit down that long!

If your looking to be scared, or seriously enjoy a movie, don't watch this. But... if you want to bust a gut laughing, I highly suggest "Stanley". Full of cheesy movie effects, hilarious dialog, and obvious plot holes, it will crack you up! At least, it did me. The acting is bearable and at least it tries to convey a good message, so thats the only reason I gave it 1 star. Though the beginning is actually o.k., boring, but o.k., eventually the cheesiness mounts to be ridiculous, and it is impossible to resist laughing. I have watched this 20 times at least, and we crack up more and more every time! So gather up some friends, get some popcorn, and get ready to laugh your butt off!

I saw this film when it first came out in the early 1970s riding the coat-tails of the highly successful movie, Ben. Filmed in the South Florida Everglades, the film stars two sunshine state film "idols", Chris Robinson and Steve Alaimo. Robinson was best known to die-hard fans for his uncredited role as the "lisp" speaking Melvin in Frank Sinatra's, Lady in Cement. Alaimo known more for his singing career, made a name for himself as the singing drag racer in the Wild Rebels. The two play off each other very well, and for nothing more than a "B" film, it's surprisingly entertaining. Surely not their best acting roles, yet any fans of Robinson or Alaimo, or snakes named Stantley should see this film. Above average entertainment.

The topic itself, a man getting vengeance with the use of his "pets," sounds very familiar to me, especially snakes. I have seen it before but more in the horror style, not psychotronic, as here. Director William Grefe was one of my favourites in the domain of exploitation features, destined to saturday evening audiences. Actually I above spoke of Bernie Kowalski's SSSNAKE, where it was also question of a young man involved with snakes, but the scheme in the way of showing them was not exactly the same though, it was not a matter of revenge. Anyway, I love this kind of indie productions, far from Hollywood industry and those producers who snoop around, seeking every dollar spent, the paper toilet you use each time you go to the men's room. Here, you are sure there is no director's cut, or maybe a very little. We are lucky that there were batches of them during the seventies. And as I said fifteen years ago on Imdb about another Grefe's film: JAWS OF DEATH, the director uses here the same scheme, but snakes instead of sharks. If you prefer, remember Daniel Mann's WILLARD. The lead used rats instead of....

Crap! Another bad killer snake movie. Actually, this movie is pretty much just "Willard" with snakes instead of rats. Chris Robinson plays a Vietnam Vet and a Seminole Indian (neither very convincingly) whose only friends are poisonous snakes. He uses these "friends" to take revenge on greedy developer and snakeskin dealer (Alex Rocco, who appeared in "The Godfather" the same year)who was also conveniently responsible for the death of his father, and on a skanky stripper who bites the heads off of snakes as part of her act (because, of course, THAT'S a real turn-on).

There are several problems with this movie. First, it is somewhat believable that rats might have affection for humans and do their bidding, but it is far less believable that snakes would (and the character here isn't given any special psychic powers over them a la Jennifer Connelly in "Phenomenon"). Second, poisonous snakes aren't very good at attacking people. Even when confronted with a large number of poisonous snakes, all the victims would have to do is run away--it's not like snakes are going to chase you. (The most ridiculous scene has Rocco's character attacked in his swimming pool by dozens of water moccasins). The movie really goes off the rails at the end though when Robinson suddenly falls in love with and kidnaps Rocco's sexy, bare-midriffed blonde daughter. After she spurns him, he tries to get the snakes to bite her, but they refuse, so he reacts in an unintentionally hilarious "Willard"-esque fashion and finally gets his just desserts.

On the plus side this movie was directed by Willam Grefe who would go on to do equally ridiculous but much more entertaining movies like "Impulse" with William Shatner. It's also certainly no worse than many other killer snake movies-"Jennifer, "Rattlers" , "Spasms", "Venom", or more recent CGI crap like "Boa", "Python" and "Anaconda". Maybe filmmakers should just give up on these killer snake movies.