Spasms

For years I heard reports about how utterly bad this movie was, so when I finally got a chance to see it, I wasn't expecting much - especially knowing the movie was also shelved for two years before getting a release.

As it turns out, I didn't find it completely bad. For starters, the production values were above average for a Canadian movie of the time (except for when we see the snake at the end - it does indeed look like it was made out of paper mache.) There are a few impressive gore effects (though not as much as you might think), and the sorority house attack sequence is pretty amusing. It was slow at times, but seldom could you find it boring.

But I won't deny that the movie is filled with problems. The editing is quite bad at times, with scenes cut short and some information seemingly missing. The whole "snake cult" subplot turns out to be for NOTHING - the movie would need very little additional rewriting if it was completely cut out. The scenes are mixed together with clumsiness - after Peter Fonda's character is introduced, it takes about half an hour before he returns! Ultimately the movie completely falls apart around the last 20 minutes or so, leading to an awful climax and ending. Not just awful, but abrupt - it's pretty clear the ending was considerably tinkered around with in the editing room for some reason. Could it originally have been even more awful than this? Quite possibly.

The same year as starring in killer snake movie Venom, Oliver Reed also appeared in killer snake move Spasms (although this film would be released two years later, in 1983). I'm not saying that the actor was in a rut (okay, that IS what I am saying), but surely he was making these movies for beer money. Peter Fonda, whose career was hardly on the up either, co-starred, but the real draw was surely the massive reptile itself: what a shame, then, that the snake remains hidden for most of the film (the animal's attacks employing blue-tinted snake POV shots), and is quite laughable when it is finally revealed.

Directed by William Fruet, the man behind such mediocre thrillers and chillers as Death Weekend, Killer Party and Blue Monkey, this scary snake flick stars Ollie as Jason Kincaid, who has been cursed with nightmares ever since he was bitten by a supposedly supernatural snake that appears once every seven years in deepest Micronesia (the same part of the world where the strange plant in Blue Monkey originated). Wanting to put an end to his terrifying dreams, Kincaid has the creature captured and shipped to the States, and enlists help from expert in psychic phenomena Dr. Tom Brasilian (fnarr, fnarr!), played by Fonda. Unfortunately, an evil snake cult are keen to acquire the deadly serpent, and accidentally release it during a bungled raid on Brasilian's laboratory.

The ensuing chaos includes Brasilian and Kincaid's niece Suzanne (Kerrie Keane) coming face-to-fang with the escaped snake in a greenhouse (a scene that provides a 'parrot scare', a variation on the classic 'cat scare'), the snake going crazy in a sorority house (the reptile launching the body of one victim through a shower screen where another girl is washing herself), and the snake's hilarious slither through a crowded park, which allows Fruet to include a shot of a well endowed woman on roller skates (camera levelled at her chest) and a buxom blonde in a tiny pink bikini playing frisbee.

Hot woman in one-size-too-small swimwear aside, the film's most memorable moments come courtesy of make-up effects legend Dick Smith, who uses some terrific bladder effects to show the result of the snake's bite: as the victims go into shock, their veins bulge and their flesh swells until the pressure causes the skin to burst. I only wish there had been more of Smith's work, 'cos it's really good.

Fruet wraps things up leaving several plot threads unresolved: an incestuous relationship between Kincaid and his niece is hinted at and then totally ignored, while the snake cult conveniently vanishes. The rushed finale sees Kincaid using his psychic connection with the snake to track it down and try to kill it, Reed wandering around his house, having psychic flashbacks to the snake's previous victims (thereby padding out the runtime a tad), before meeting his scaly nemesis. Having only seen glimpses of the creature thus far, we finally understand why: it's rubbish. The Ollie vs Snake showdown is very disappointing: Kincaid is killed all too quickly, Brasilian arriving on the scene moments later to shoot the (now stationary) reptile in the head with his machine gun. It all sssseeems a little too eassssy for my liking (sssorry, I couldn't resssisssst).

Nothing qualifies such bad reviews of a movie called "Spasms". It's about a giant snake and Oliver Reed shares telepathic powers with it. What more is there to expect? Not likely another early 80s director with a diminished Canadian budget could have done better. There's lovely gore effects, some effective shocks, and Oliver Reed emotional and tormented by his predicament. Unfortunately, there is also Peter Fonda and his terrible female costar. But at least one man undergoes such massive spasms he first tranforms into Robert Z'Dar, then pops. Not much more I can ask for than that. For all its sloppy editing and a plot which contains too much unresolved material, the movie delivers its share of drive-in quality thrills. Plus, the Tangerine Dream end credits piece rocks.

Underrated thriller about a serpent that is shipped off to a college for a rich trophey hunter (Oliver Reed), but the serpent escapes and begins murdering people. Reed also has a psychic link to the serpent and witnesses the murders through the eyes of the serpent. Scary, exciting thriller with a good cast and some good shock effects. Rated R; Graphic Violence, Nudity, and Profanity.

The story in a nut-shell. Oliver Reed has a psychic link to a satanic super snake which emerges from hell every seven years and kills people on a tropical island. He can see through the snakes eyes when it kills! Obviously the best thing to do in a situation like this is to bring the snake to the US (Actually Canada filling in for California) Naturally the snake gets loose and continues doing what giant venomous satanic super snakes do best. BITING PEOPLE!!! Good stuff.

The FX are done on the cheap. Lots O POV shots, inter-cut with VERY quick shots of a GIANT balloon-y snake head on a too thin looking body, inter-cut with screaming bloody people tossed around. The whole thing was done on the cheap for the most part. There is one well done super venomous bite that makes a guy break out a little. They probably spent half the budget on that one shot. You'll know the scene when you see it. If you like bad horror flicks from the 80's. You'll probably dig this movie. If the snake doesn't scare you, Oliver Reeds mustache will.