Lockjaw: Rise of the Kulev Serpent (2008)

Directed by Amir Valinia [Other horror films: Dream Home (2006), Mutants (2008), Alligator X (2010)]

Well, this movie is pretty terrible. On the upside, it’s not a long movie, but on the other hand, it’s still at least an hour and ten minutes, and it’s certainly not one of the better giant snake movies I’ve seen in my time.

Apparently, Lockjaw: Rise of the Kulev Serpent (which is, I guess, at least a memorable title) was later re-released under the rather generic name Carnivorous, but no matter which title you see it under, it’s not a particularly worthwhile film, and unless you really like DMX, it’s not something I’d say is worth is.

I do have at least one story that’s almost amusing about Lockjaw, though. I first saw this film a long-ass time ago off Syfy (and it very possibly might have still been called Sci-Fi when I watched it), and I noticed on my DVR, the recording was only an hour and a half. I’m guessing that most people know when you record a movie off Syfy, most of them are two hours (what with commercials and all), and so I thought that the recording messed up, and I was missing the rest of the movie.

Well, that wasn’t the case. The finale to this film is was just so damn sudden, and doesn’t really feel like the finale. It’s not like it comes out of nowhere, but it also doesn’t seem satisfactory whatsoever. I’m happy I didn’t need to try and find this elsewhere back then to finish it, but whenever I think of this movie, I remember that it’s only around 72 minutes, with something like nine minutes of credits.

As for the story, it’s sort of like Pumpkinhead. A bunch of kids accidentally kill this guy’s wife, and he gets revenge on them via a voodoo alligator/snake hybrid, and only with the help of rapper DMX can these kids survive. As I bet you can imagine, Pumpkinhead is a decidedly better movie.

I didn’t really like any of the performances. I guess that both Lauren Fain and Wes Brown have their moments, but neither character is great. Louis Herthum (Be Afraid) felt somewhat weak, DMX felt somewhat generic, and Caleb Michaelson has no character traits outside of being an asshole.

Honestly, I don’t think the opening is too bad, being a scene where two kids (Brendan Aguillard and Abby Rao) break into the house of a voodoo guy and steal the Kulev box from him. I think it’s a decent scene, if only because the two kids work pretty well with each other (and their adult counterparts just don’t have that same chemistry). It’s a small thing to praise, but never say I’m not merciful.

With some horrible CGI (which can’t be a surprise) and lackluster kills (one of the least satisfactory decapitations I’ve seen in my life), not to mention an incredibly awful finale, Lockjaw: Rise of the Kulev Serpent just isn’t a movie that’s really worth it, and I can’t think of a good reason to seek this out at all.

3/10