Sweet, simple, Alligator mayhem.
The Upside:
Crawl delivers on just about everything you would hope for. Great suspense, body horror, a touch of gore, and a whole bunch of angry Alligators. Great performances by Kaya Scodelario and Barry Pepper propel the story forward, giving a solid background to both leads that makes you root for their survival. Great set pieces help build the suspense to great payoffs, and the special effects Are excellent, making the alligators look truly menacing. Crawl also blends genuine horror with effective jump scares, without relying on them too heavily, as most modern horror movies do.
The Downside:
The story is simplistic, and it does have a bit of campiness to it (but either can be placed in good/bad categories depending on the audience), and some of the CG reflects the modest budget, such as the storms earlier in the film. Crawl doesn’t reinvent the wheel with what it does and does have several cliche’d horror tropes, so there is a bit of predictability to some of the situations. That being said, it does everything it aims for with competency (at worst), so predictability isn’t the worst when the payoffs deliver.
The Verdict:
Crawl delivers a B-Movie premise with A level execution. It works extremely well in just about everything it aims to accomplish, and delivers genuine suspense and horror. A fun creature feature that audiences will surely enjoy.
8/10
The high point: Alligator in the Bathroom/Looters
The low point: CG Storms
FlickFix 