Deadly Species (2001) from Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski) and Tuna

Two thumbs WAY down.

A college professor requests a grant to search for a lost tribe of Native Americans in the Everglades. A mysterious philanthropist agrees to fund the expedition, but insists on going along. Well, it turns out that the sponsor is not just a guy interested in science. He has reason to believe that the Fountain of Youth has been found, and he fully intends to use its waters to become a trillionaire. His major obstacle is that the fountain is guarded by some flesh-devouring Sasquatch creatures with long, poisonous claws that can kill humans almost instantly.

Do you need to know any more? Needless to say, while they are deep in the Everglades, they find everything that has ever been lost in Florida, and some things which were lost elsewhere but moved to Florida to retire: the fountain of youth, Ponce de Leon, Mercury Morris, the missing Indian tribe, Sasquatch, the Yeti, Amelia Earhart, Dr Livingstone, several other scientists from earlier expeditions, a Honus Wagner baseball card, Glenn Miller, Judge Crater, the keys to a 1955 Studebaker convertible, some golf balls that Chi-Chi Rodriguez lost when he was playing the Blue Monster at Doral, all your missing socks, and Bobby Bonilla's home run swing.

NUDITY REPORT

Haans Siver and Samara Ibanez show their breasts. Heather Patrone is stark naked. There is a very brief glimpse of her crotch area, but it was covered with a white patch.

At one point, one of the Sasquatch dudes attacks the scientist but does not kill him. This works the same as a non-fatal vampire/werewolf attack, and the scientist starts to turn into a Sasquatch. Luckily, the Fountain of Youth is also the Fountain of Sasquatch Venom Antidote, and a quick glass of its restorative waters, mixed with some Schweppes Bitter Lemon, leaves the professor both fully human and curiously refreshed.

Now here's something crazy about the lost Indian tribe:

1. They have not been seen since 1850, so they've had 150 years to multiply.

2. They have found the Fountain of Youth, and a 300 year old Spanish explorer is living with them, so we know that they live pretty much forever.

3. Among them, there is a mother with a newborn baby, so we know they are not sterile.

4. Despite all the above, the tribe only consists of about ten people.

Look how many people are on the planet now, even though we die and have only about 25 years in the reproduction cycle of our lifespan! If we stayed forever young and biologically capable of reproducing, like these Indians, there would be at least twice as many people. Obviously we need to go back to this tribe and find their ancient secret of population control.

DVD info from Amazon

  • no widescreen

  • minimal features: trailer, photo gallery

Speaking of Bobby Bonilla, the cast of this film also comes out of left field:

  • The star, Pete Penuel, was last credited by IMDb in 1996, in the challenging role of "man in parade". You think DeNiro had to prepare to do Jake LaMotta? That was nothing compared to learning how to hang on to the Underdog float while staying in step with a Sousa tune. This guy had to practice his marching for ... well, who knows how long? Now that I think about it, I guess his parading couldn't really have been that good if it took him seven years to get another job. Maybe he was out of step.
  • A cast member named Britt George has appeared in minor roles in several similar "B" projects in the past three years. He's run the full gamut of characterizations, playing everything from "Cop #1" in The Falkland Man to "Policeman #2" in Quigley. He's also played "party husband", "marine", and "delivery guy".
  • Those two guys are the only members of the cast with any other IMDB credits.

TUNA's THOUGHTS

Deadly Species (2002) -- When I read Scoop's review of this new masterpiece of filmmaking, I had to see it for myself. He covered nearly all of the plot points, and I agree with his assessment, with one major exception. He says, " ... most of the cast members were inexperienced amateurs ..." Indeed, performances were absolutely dismal. They were so bad, in fact, that lack of talent and inexperience could not produce this level of acting. It is my personal theory that the two leads are consummate actors adding to the bad movie appeal of the film by portraying terrible acting to such a degree that the performances become ludicrous.

This film follows all of the genre rules, so it presents a good opportunity for a review of these unpublished laws:

1) Kill someone and show nipples in the first 5 minutes. This way, audience minimum expectations are met early.

2) Don't show the monster until near the end. Anything the audience imagines is far more frightening than anything your special effects/make-up people can design.

3) When two people have sex, the man goes out alone first shortly after, and is killed.

4) The girlfriend is always killed second. This lets the director get two great screams from her.

5) Anyone who hides behind a tree is going to die ... soon.

6) Running characters will trip if they are faster than the monster.

7) One of the good guys must be injured but survive.

8) All but one of the bad guys will be killed. You have to leave an antagonist for the sequel.

The Critics Vote

  • Somehow, Roger Ebert missed this one, as did all other critics.

The People Vote ...

The meaning of the IMDb score: 7.5 usually indicates a level of excellence equivalent to about three and a half stars from the critics. 6.0 usually indicates lukewarm watchability, comparable to approximately two and a half stars from the critics. The fives are generally not worthwhile unless they are really your kind of material, equivalent to about a two star rating from the critics. Films rated below five are generally awful even if you like that kind of film - this score is roughly equivalent to one and a half stars from the critics or even less, depending on just how far below five the rating is.

My own guideline: A means the movie is so good it will appeal to you even if you hate the genre. B means the movie is not good enough to win you over if you hate the genre, but is good enough to do so if you have an open mind about this type of film. C means it will only appeal to genre addicts, and has no crossover appeal. (C+ means it has no crossover appeal, but will be considered excellent by genre fans, while C- indicates that it we found it to be a poor movie although genre addicts find it watchable). D means you'll hate it even if you like the genre. E means that you'll hate it even if you love the genre. F means that the film is not only unappealing across-the-board, but technically inept as well.

Any film rated C- or better is recommended for fans of that type of film. Any film rated B- or better is recommended for just about anyone. We don't score films below C- that often, because we like movies and we think that most of them have at least a solid niche audience. Now that you know that, you should have serious reservations about any movie below C-.

Based on this description, Scoop says, "This film is a D. It doesn't look too bad, and the monsters are not altogether silly, but the premise is far-fetched and completely uneconomical, the dialogue is probably half improvised, most of the cast members were inexperienced amateurs, and some characters serve no purpose at all other than to get naked. Not that there's anything wrong with that." Tuna says, "This film is a D, but might make a good group watch, if lots of chemicals or grain beverages are included at the party."

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