The Big Alligator River is that rare dialectic, synthesizing opposing stereotypes into a remarkably inane ending. (More on the ending later.)
Perhaps realizing its potentially offensive content, the film explicitly (if artificially) disavows both stereotypes. Ferrer expounds his respect for the environment, and dissuades a paying tourist from shooting monkeys. Meanwhile, Bach offers running commentary throughout the film, lecturing Cassinelli about her respect for the natives.
Bach's character would know. She's an anthropologist working as a hotel guide. It was the only way she could afford to come study the local natives. Cassinelli is the hunky photographer in khaki, hired to take publicity shots for the hotel opening. We know he's eco-sensitive because he chides a gamekeeper who is feeding live animals to crocodiles (as though crocs, uncorrupted by Man, are veggies at heart). Naturally, one suspects Cassinelli would rather do serious photojournalism.
And just as naturally, Cassinelli and Bach become "an item," as they were before in Screamers. (How it is that beautiful lead women are always unattached in these films? I know it's to make them available to the newcomer heroes, but still...)
Director Martino makes admirably creative use of his limited resources. The low-budget alligator only rarely looks like a stiffly floating prop, because (1) Martino's camera constantly pans across the alligator, (2) which is shot largely in closeups, and (3) edited into brief shots. Thus, we rarely see the alligator prop as a whole, but rather only see brief closeups moving across the screen. When we do see its entire body (usually from underwater, so even then it's partly obscured) it's apparent that its legs are still, despite its being propelled across screen.
When the alligator munches upon tourists, its stiff jaws are shot descending on screaming actors, intercut with bloody water. But we don't see flesh pierced. The body count is high, but the gore is almost suggested, as in Psycho (where you saw blood, but no cutting). The Big Alligator River is a poor man's gore film.
For that matter, even the natives are a poor man's savage tribe. I'd seen The Big Alligator River several times before I realized that I never really knew the story's location. In the opening shots, the jungle and river resemble the Amazon basin, yet the natives look African, not South American. One of them even refers to "your black woman." But the grass-covered boats and props — more than anything else, they look Polynesian. So are we in the South Pacific? Come to think of it, the "Africans" look a bit like Australian aborigines, albeit tallish aborigines.
Article comments
1 - Joanie
I keep waiting for your review of To The Devil A Daughter.
2 - Thomas M. Sipos
It's been a while since I saw To the Devil, a Daughter. I remember being disappointed with it.