CIRIO H. SANTIAGO

Bil’s rating (out of 5): 0. 

Philippines, 1987 .  Concorde-New Horizons, New Horizons Picture.  Screenplay by Frederick Bailey, C.J. Santiago.  Cinematography by Ricardo Remias.  Produced by Rodman Flender, Leonard Hermes, Matt Leipzig, Cirio H. Santiago.  Music by Ding Achacoso.  Production Design by Joe Mari Avellana.  Costume Design by Elvie Santos.  Film Editing by Gervacio Santos.

A Hawaiian resort is being terrorized by a monster in the lake, so the enterprising director of the place decides to capitalize on his presence: rather than shut the resort down, why not advertise the fact that there’s a killer beast in the lake and see if they can’t get tourists to come in the hopes that they snap a photo of him. The presence of this alligator man has been brought about by some irresponsible dynamiting, and now a concerned sheriff is trying to save lives while having to deal with the director’s greed in her determination not to lose money during her best season. This pale ripoff of Jaws could be forgiven its low production values (laughably low in the case of the creature effects) and ugly cinematography (with the Philippines doing a poor job of subbing for Hawaii) if it weren’t for the fact that nothing happens in it. You yourself might expire waiting for someone to die, it’s incredible how much opportunity there is for shameless indulgence (like all the girls doing bikini photo shoots in the infested waters) that goes completely ignored.