"Sea Snakes" is a pretty decent killer-snake film with a few minor flaws.
**SPOILERS**
Arriving at a naval base, Commander James O'Neill, (Luke Perry) is informed a scandalous incident in his past will be dropped if he brings along a decommissioned submarine to Taiwan. Accompanied by crew Houston Davies, (John L. Curtis) Eddie Boudreau, (Anthony Tyler Quinn) Lozano, (Travis Dixon) Cab, (Oliver Rayon) Rhodes, (Haran Jackson) Kovacek, (Sam Scarber) and Kelso, (David Andriole) they set sail but are soon ordered to escort Andrea Chapman, (Krista Allen) and Jake Goldin, (Louis Mandylor) off an island to save them from an enemy attack. Getting them off in time, the crew suddenly starts dying off due to an unknown virus and they reveal they've been studying venomous snakes and brought them on-board only to have them get loose within the ship. As their presence draws enemy attention, they must find a way of dealing with the deadly snakes without giving up their position to be attacked.
The Good News: This one had a lot of good parts that really helped it nicely. There's some nice snake-action in here, including the opening wrangling in the jungle, where it bites the local from inside the cage and slithers away before the jungle confrontation, set off quite nicely with the suspenseful rattling in distance continually getting closer before it appears from the watering hole in a nice shock. Their escape scene is handled quite nicely as well, with the dropped equipment and subsequent damaging, followed with a quick bite-attack and then shown slithering away, starts this with some nice suspenseful bits. That's carried out even further with shots of the snakes in the sub, mainly with continuous shots of them crawling on the floor or over submarine equipment, under doorways or the feet of unsuspecting crew-members. By choosing these types of scenes continuously, it makes it quite chilling as to when their attack will be launched. The number of quick attacks, from the strike while the crew-member is fixing the intercom to the engine room, is all good stuff, mixing the suspense with the action nicely. The follow-up attack in the kitchen is really good, with them surrounding food and slithering around before attacking. How they're dealt with works nicely, and the aftermath sets up future events as well. The search for the snakes throughout the ship contributes more suspense, due to the claustrophobic setting of the sub as well as finding the snake-skin, which leads to a nice attack. Since the tactic used, drawing them to a heated place, is both original and quite entertaining, this segment is really good. The action returns to the film in several big scenes, including an attack in the torpedo room, where the surrounded-victim begins clanging on the pipes with a wrench, drawing attention before encountering the giant snake and the ensuing attack, which is really good. The scenes of them retrieving the stolen anti-venom is just golden, where they fight off the giant snake only to find an army of snakes on the floor between them, and the attempt to acquire it results in being swarmed. As they're blocked by snakes in the escape hallway, the rescue later on finds them willingly becoming a Buddha statue of snakes, and the removal and eventual gunfire escape is great. The battle with the snakes in the com room is full-on chaos, and the later encounter with the giant one is purely-awesome all around. Aside from that, the encounters which make it feel like a true submarine-movie are really good, with believable battle tactics, several different attacks from others, and their continuous presence makes for a realistic scenario, and it mixes some nice action as well. The torpedo launch is especially good, and the different battles employed are a lot of fun. The last good part is the use of real snakes for the swarming scenes, which is quite nice and appreciated, since those snakes have a mass to them during these moments missing elsewhere. These are the film's good parts.
The Bad News: There wasn't a whole lot here that didn't work. One of the main issues here is the fact that there's the ever-present cliché of the greedy associate on the project. The individual chosen to portray that character is just painfully obvious from the get-go, the motive is the same thing done every time this is presented, and from the initial stand-point, the amount of cluelessness that must be present to ignore the danger is just astronomical to think that anything like this couldn't happen, which just makes the film that much harder to get into when dealing with so many of the different clichés in the genre. Another big flaw here is the fact that the snakes are a complete after-thought in the finale, handled just once and then forgotten about quickly, dealing with the other areas instead and just making them seem like a joke to have been handled so easily and then dismissed despite being the centerpiece for the majority of the time. It's quite disheartening to see that done, and it really takes a lot of fear out of the creatures. The lack of kills in here is something else to get over, since the original plot line dictates few chances for any blood or gore here, as their method of attack doesn't leave a lot of opportunities for that, and the body count is surprisingly-low for a film of this type. The last flaw is the ever-present CGI for the snakes, which is painful and again quite common, so it is a necessary evil here. These are the film's problems.
The Final Verdict: While not completely flawless, this killer-snake film has enough going for it that it manages to become somewhat better-than-expected and wholly enjoyable. Recommended mainly to fans of these kinds of films, Sci-Fi Channel creature-feature enthusiasts or fans of the cast, while others should heed caution.
Rated R: Violence and Language
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