Slither (2006)

---

Click Poster to Purchase

---

Bonus Review #9
Film: Slither (2006) [R] 96 minutes
W.I.P.™: $3.00
When 1st Seen: 31 March 2006
Where Viewed: AMC Theaters Loews Webster 12, Webster, NY
Time: 3:30 p.m.
I believe the first movie of the “giant or mutated creature run rampant killing people everywhere” genre I ever saw was Bert I. Gordon’s Food of the Gods about animals on a remote island that eat some weird food and grow to 50 times their normal size. Since, then I have seen half a dozen or so more mostly on late night television. Which, I am sad to say, really is the best place for this genre of films. The formula is always pretty much the same: some townsperson foreshadows the impending doom, some unexplainable series of technological/environmental mishaps occurs or a meteor / comet / asteroid from space hits the earth or passes close to the earth causing crazy creatures such as giant ants or wasps or rats to be unleashed on the poor, unsuspecting townspeople. In every one I've ever seen, only two or three personss in the whole town will survive the ordeal-- always at least one guy and one girl who then fall in love...and who wouldn't after co-surviving the blood thirsty, homicidal, creatures hell-bent on your assured destruction and that of all human beings everywhere. So, enter 2006 with movie studios claiming the worst year of ticket sales on record, and Universal Studios opts to release, Slither, which I have grave doubts will reverse the downward trend.

I've already given the basic plot outline, just substitute "biology teacher / town beauty queen" for "townsperson" in the paragraph above, add "South Carolinian Deer Hunt-loving" in front of townspeople, substitute “giant ants or wasps or rats” with “giant, voracious, meat-eating, mind-controlling, blood slugs”; and circle "meteorite" and "collides". Actually, the writer / director James Gunn (screen playwriter for the Scooby Doo movies) decided to push the envelope here just a little and toss in a bit of Invasion of the Body Snatchers and some Jabba the Hutt for good measure. The result has to rank up there as one of the most absurd, inane, and unremarkable movies to grace the silver screen in decades. I am not even sure this film would make a Sci-Fi Channel's late night movie slot. One thing is for certain, were it not for my commitment to this project, there is no way I would have risked hard-earned cash to see this film. Hopefully, now you won't have to either no matter how tempting I might make it sound (which, if I do, I would get some one to test your sarcasm detector as it might be on the fritz). In specifics, it will be much easier to list the three things they got right about this film than the 1000s of things that are just so wrong. Here they are: the chief of police Bill Pardy (Nathan ‘Sharon’s boyfriend Johnny on “Two Guys and a Girl” Fillion), the biology teacher Starla Grant (Elizabeth Banks) and, and Mayor MacReady (Gregg Henry) [these three really took their roles seriously and carried them off well despite the rest of the junk—like the plot]; the multiple human being monster made from the biology teacher’s husband (Grant Grant) [it seemed like a cool idea to have the alien villain incorporate the bodies of his victims into one giant, squid-like, creepy organism]; and, finally, there was a complete ending as opposed to one that might have suggested there will a sequel. Hopefully, there will never be a sequel. Here is an interesting idea that just occurred to me. Given that movies are among the USA’s top exportable good these days, and Congress has a long history of paying, for example, some farmers not to grow a crop because a supply that is just too large drives prices way down, maybe Congress could pay a subsidy to prevent movies of this genre from being made in the first place because certainly this drives the value of the industry downward. Honestly, you know that I really do try to find something positive to say about a film, I don't look for all the flaws. With all due respect to the people involved in making this project, there is nothing more I can say. Fortunately, with the plethora of films coming out over the next two weeks and the great films still earning reasonable box office numbers, this film will slither out of theaters as quickly as it slithered its way in.