User reviews

Although this is billed as a Jaws rip-off, the whole theme park threatened by a huge lizard sounds a lot like Jurassic Park too me, more than ten years before Michael Crichton published that book.

In some country, somewhere, photographer Claudio Cassinelli has been employed to take publicity shots for new resort owner Mel Ferrer. This new resort is seems to be smack bang in the middle of a jungle surrounded by hostile country and natives who help the newcomers, but also seem pretty superstitious and twitchy. Claudio, like in Island of The Fishmen, loves to do a bit of snooping, and finds that Mel isn't beneath some dodgy antics to get the tourists in, like having sidekick Romano Puppo feed musk rats to the local crocodile population.

Also like in Island of the Fishmen, Claudio sets his eyes on Barbara Bach, Ferrer's assistant who can talk with the natives (basically the same role she had in Island of the Fishmen then!). Whereas everything seems to be going okay for everyone, there are rumblings from the natives that all these newcomers have angered the God of the river, and that he's come back as an Alligator (not a crocodile - they do have a discussion about this). So, is monster Alligator real, and more importantly, how many people is it going to eat?

This is a film of two halves, really. There constant bickering of the characters and the lack of gore is a complete letdown, and yet the elevated cheese factor completely saves the film in the end. While it takes ages to get to any action, it's worth waiting until the film gets to Richard Johnson's appearance as a crazy priest. His demented performance as a man driven insane by the alligator is hilarious. Director Martino also saves most of the action until the end, and although we never do get a gore-fest, the alligator does get to go radgy and attack every person in the resort, at exactly the same time every person in the resort is trying to escape from the angry natives!

Although made in 1979, just check out that eighties vibe with the dancing tourists. I was already to hate this one but then Martino pulls it out of the bag in the last thirty minutes. Well done m'man! Martino's next four films are comedies, so I'm giving them a miss.

Filmed in beautiful Sri Lanka, The Great Alligator otherwise known as Alligators otherwise known as Big Alligator River has featured in several worst movies ever made lists. Honestly I think the people who included it need to watch more films, as this wouldn't likely make my bottom 500 despite still being bad.

It tells the story of a group of tourists who anger the locals and before you know it there is one angry giant alligator after them and the native people aren't very friendly either.

I can't come up with a reason folks would consider this one of the worst ever, sure it's bad but not to that degree.

It looks dated sure and the plot and pacing are really quite dire but all in all I've seen this very same thing done considerably worse.

I would certainly not recommend this to anyone, but it's not THAT bad.

The Good:

Some great nature shots

SFX aren't that bad

The Bad:

Very slow burner

Plot is a bit of a mess and gets worse the further in you go

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

I don't approve of swine swindling

Adam (As in Adam & Eve) was an idiot

This movie has generally been critically lambasted over the years, and quite unfairly. It's generally been regarded as a "Jaws" rip-off even though the only thing it really has in common with "Jaws" is a fake-looking beastie and a guy (Mel Ferrer) who doesn't want to scare off the tourists from the luxury hotel he is operating in an undisclosed Third World jungle location. The giant caiman (incredibly, this movie has even been taken to task by some people over its inaccurate English-language title)may not be just a normal overgrown monster, but may actually be the god of a nearby group of indigenous people (do you remember that from "Jaws"?--I sure don't), who turn out to be even more dangerous to the hapless tourists than the caiman. There is also a mad missionary (Donald O'Brian)living in a cave who might be the Robert Shaw figure, but might just as well have been "ripped-off" from the novel "Heart of Darkness" as from "Jaws".

The hero (Claudio Cassanelli) is a photographer(i.e. not a sheriff)who comes to the resort for a fashion shoot. But then his model gets together with a native to make the beast with two backs out on a river island, after which they're both promptly eaten by the giant beast with one back, so it is up to the photographer and the PR spokeswoman for the hotel (Barbara Bach)to stop the rampage of this enraged "god" before he chows down on more tourists. And they also have the murderous and sacrifice-happy native tribe to deal with. This movie has a real social and environmental message about the developed world exploiting the developing world and despoiling nature. It's pretty muddled (not much more convincing than the ones found in most Italian cannibal films) but it's also very un-"Jaws"like.

This movie has also been unfavorably compared to director Martino's previous cannibal outing "Mountain of the Cannibal God". This movie doesn't feature a naked Bond girl like Ursula Andress (and clothed latter-day Bond girl Barbara Bach is admittedly a poor substitute), but it also doesn't contain tasteless animal atrocity footage (watching people get eaten by a patently fake caiman is a lot more fun than watching a real monkey get slowly eaten by a real snake). It also gives the underrated Claudio Cassanelli a chance to shine, away from the shadows of big international and American stars like Andress or Stacy Keach (there's certainly no danger of Bach upstaging him). Sure the caiman's pretty fake, but this is still infinitely preferable to Tobe Hooper's "Crocodile" or other recent CGI garbage. Watch it and judge for yourself.

This film starts with a photographer being flown by helicopter to a hotel/resort in the middle of the jungle, because he has been hired to take some publicity photos for the owner. Once there he is introduced to everyone of any interest (to the viewer anyway) and is given a guided tour of the place (once again more for the viewers benefit than his, a quick and lazy way to set the story up). After this opening ten or so minutes its on with the story, this photographer falls for the owners assistant and tries to chat her up when she is alone, outside. At the same time two locals sail to a nearby island and make love. On their way back they are attacked and killed by a giant alligator, of course the photographer and his soon to be lover hear their screams. The next morning one of the two killed the night before is reported missing, the photographer puts two and two together and along with a broken boat realizes something is not quite right. The hotel owner however is not convinced, and as he has his first guests coming to stay he doesnt want to start a panic. Its now down to the photographer and his girlfriend to prove the great alligator exists. I like all these italian rip off movies from the late seventies and early eighties and this one isnt too bad at all. Sergio Martino is a solid director who seems to make good, handsome, well made movies that are better than their low budgets would suggest, mountain of the cannibal god, A man called blade and 2019 after the fall of new york are a few examples. There is not much gore and the alligator is rarely seen, but the locations are nice as is the camera work. I liked the ending as well. Some may find the film a bit dull and slow but I liked it and recommend it.

Very bad film. Very, very, very bad film. It's a rarity, but it defenitly is not worth hunting down. This Italian Jaws rip-off makes little sense most of the time, and no sense the rest. The "alligator" is not at all convincing, and many of the sub-plots go nowhere. If it's at the local video store, you may want to watch it if you're a fan of monster movies, but it's not worth hunting down.

A film that I had never heard of before, found thanks to the advent of streaming movie services and not sure if that is a good thing, or bad thing. Many films tried to capitalize on the success of Jaws and the Italians made many films themselves. A lot of the time they would use sharks or mutant sharks and in the case of this film they would use either a crocodile or alligator. Who the heck knows? In the title they use gator, but they're always mentioning crocodiles, but then they kind of imply it may be a gator...so it is one or the other and definitely a mutant of some sort as the poor beast seems unable to leave the water, which both alligators and crocodiles can do!

The story, a photographer and the skinniest model go to take some shoots to help promote this new African resort. A place that lets the tourists get close with nature and the animals and is obviously not in Africa. Well, we get lots of tension building with no payoffs for the first half hour and then finally we see a couple get killed and the photographer starts making it a big deal as the hotel owner downplays it, but with virtually no proof I would have to side with the hotel owner. Then again, the idiot spent three million to build a resort in Africa, I mean why? If I had that money, that is the last thing I would do as it would take forever to see any returns on the investment! Wait, oh yeah, forgive me as I forgot I was writing about a whatever in the water killing people and you will forget too when watching this! It all builds up to a rather crazy and entertaining conclusion, but boy it takes forever to get there!

Barbara Bach of Bond girl fame and various other movies is the most notable star along with Mel Ferrer who is in so many Italian horror films you may not know the name, but you will know the face. Also a bit interesting is the little girl who I recognized from another Italian horror film, but was not sure which, then I saw her here and linked her to the girl in House By the Cemetery who tries to help good ole Bob!

So, you get a whole lot of not a lot going on in this one and then all of a sudden you have people being chomped left and right, impaling themselves, people being shot with arrows and vans crashing into the river while the crocodile or gator tries to eat the occupants making for a somewhat satisfying conclusion. Still, not enough to make that tedious first hour and ten minutes worth going through. When I saw this thing was Italian, I figured it would be bad, but a lot of fun; unfortunately, the fun is all compressed into like the final 15 minutes of the film.

An entrepreneur (Mel Ferrer) introduces his new exotic resort off the coast of south-central Asia to a photographer and employee (Claudio Cassinelli & Barbara Bach). When the 'god' of the remote river is angered by the intrusion he manifests as a giant alligator and starts killing people, including Natives. Naturally, the local tribe rises up to get rid of the tourists.

"The Great Alligator" (1979) is an Italian production, also known as "The Great Alligator River," "The Big Alligator River" or merely "Alligator." It's an Italo knock-off of "Jaws" (1975) and its immediate copies "Piranha" (1978) and "Grizzly" (1976), albeit with a huge crocogator and a south-central Asian setting. It lacks the finesse of "Jaws" and the amusement of "Piranha," but it has more pizazz than the bland "Grizzly." The eccentric score is a highlight, mixing 70's prog rock, tribal percussions and disco.

Lory Del Santo as Jane is notable as one of the partying tourists; she is featured in two superb shots from behind (you'll know when you see 'em). There's also an amusing precocious girl with her mother who's ready to par-tay. Just don't look for any semblance of political correctness (which is a good thing).

The movie runs 1 hour, 29 minutes, and was shot in Sri Lanka.

GRADE: B-/C+

A year after The Mountain of the Cannibal God, Sergio Martino decided to go back into the jungle - although instead of bloodthirsty cannibals, this time he brought with him a ridiculous looking fake crocodile! The influence from this film obviously came primarily from Steven Spielberg's Jaws (which was a big hit among Italian film directors in the seventies), with a bit of the cannibal sub-genre thrown in for good measure. It's safe to say that this film isn't very good - and has nothing on Sergio Martino's more successful films (his Giallo's in particular), but at least the film is fun enough for most of the duration. The plot revolves around a legendary crocodile that lives near a tourist resort in Africa. Unfortunately, the over-sized crocodile is not pleased about the tourists' intrusion and so takes it upon itself to kill everyone! On the land, the natives believe that they are being killed by the tourists and so they take to the lake in a boat...but in the lake, the hungry crocodile awaits them!

Of Martino's three jungle movies (the other two being The Mountain of the Cannibal God and Island of the Fish Men), this one is definitely the weakest, although it's not all bad news as it's still entertaining enough. Naturally, the crocodile looks completely ridiculous but this adds charm to the film and I'd rather see a silly looking and obviously fake crocodile terrorising people than a CGI one. Unlike Martino's other films, this one doesn't feature much in the way of gore, nudity or sleaze which is a shame as I would have preferred more of all three. Like Island of the Fish Men, this film stars Barbara Bach and again she looks absolutely great. Her co-star is Claudio Cassinelli (also from Island of the Fish Men, as well as Mountain of the Cannibal God) and he looks the part as the rugged male lead. The scenery is good and the film is obviously shot on location, which helps Sergio Martino to build the atmosphere surrounding the "mythical" central monster. Overall, The Big Alligator River is silly and fairly poor quality, but it's a fun viewing and therefore isn't all bad.

For many people this is one of the worst by Sergio Martino, but I really love it. First I gotta say that I love Sergio Martino and for me he is maybe the best exploitation Italian director, better than Di Leo and Lenzi too. Big Caimano River is a real b-movie, and I say that as a compliment: a real b-movie as today nobody do anymore. It's a sort of "Jaws" rip-off, with a big alligator which scares a small village in the forest. The movie is sometime stupid, but is so funny. You can easily see that the alligator is fake, but this doesn't disturb me. Instead, I think it's almost touching: that time is over, the time of the house made fx-effects. The underwater ending sequence is fantastic. Also the truck is fake but, you know, that's b-movie. And that's what I like.

In some ways this movie reminded me of ''Jaws'' as there are the same underlying themes, (human greed that hinders our protagonists and a monster that we actually see in a few scenes) but there is something also of King Kong (primitive peoples, human sacrifice and wild nature).

Although it takes a lot from a successful movie, it has not become a masterpiece, indeed it has many problems but it is still worth seeing.

Some kids bathtub toy goes on a killing spree. I mean, some ancient jungle god (in the shape of a Giant Alligator!) gets offended by a resort being built in the heart of the jungle. Then a supermodel sleeps with a native and REALLY cheeses him off! Actually, I suspect it might have been the incredibly irritating "bocka-ch-wocka" disco music that plays relentlessly through the entire film that drove the reptile to kill in the first place. The Great Alligator goes on a boring munchfest, eating more innocent natives than guilty white people and requiring that soaking wet and barely dressed shapely women be tied to rafts and offered as a sacrifice. Yeah, okay. Poor Richard Johnson plays some weirded out prophet who lives in a cave and looks like the guy from Monty Python. I kept waiting for him to run up to the camera and croak out: "It's!" at any given moment. The alligator is silly, bobbing back and forth and looking like a big rubber toy. This was obviously "Jaws" inspired, and sadly, imitation is NOT always the sincerest form of flattery. Stick with Piranha. This movie makes "Eaten Alive" look better than I originally gave it credit for.

The premise sounds promising, even if it's sure to end up mostly just being an ordinary creature feature. Early exposition is rather hokey. Far worse is the racist language of European colonizers; worse still is the exploitative writing that fetishizes and infantilizes non-white people of the global south, and treats them as playthings. There's also the fact that Sri Lanka is kind of standing in for Amorphous Tropical Country, but sure, okay, I guess that's the least of the issues to greet us in the first fifteen minutes. Unfortunately, while these are the most severe issues to trouble 'The great alligator river,' they are not the only ones, and what could have been a fun blend of horror and adventure just turns into a bland, rather limp exercise in unconvincing, poorly shot violence and poorly conceived ill-doings.

I actually quite like Stelvio Cipriani's flavorful original score, and some of the music here rather adds tension and atmosphere; I quite dislike the questionable pacing, where by the time the picture is more than half over a reptile has barely been seen at all, and in general less happens over eighty-eight minutes than you'd think. The filming locations are beautiful, and the sets, costume design, hair and makeup, and props are splendid; given far weaker treatment are the expected themes of corruption, the indifference of the wealthy and powerful, and above all environmental destruction and encroachment on the lands and beliefs of indigenous people. Actually, the writing at large is very meager: characters fall into one of a few different archetypes without any meaningful expansion (the hero, the damsel in distress, the innocent, the harbinger, the bad corporate guy and his lackey, the ignorant nobodies just waiting to be destroyed, and the offended community); scenes as written similarly tend to boil down to the most basic and uninteresting forms of a few different flavors; the narrative is nothing more than the "paint by numbers" conglomeration of these scenes and characters. Worse still is that instead of the vibrant suggestion of the premise, or the nuanced exploration of "civilization" spoiling wilderness and disrespecting indigenous people, or even just a "nature run amok" creature feature, the plot mostly comes across as dubious, nonspecific "natives versus white people."

If not for Cipriani's score, I'm unsure if Sergio Martino's direction or Giancarlo Ferrando's cinematography bear the strength to make any of the proceedings matter. True, there is much to like here in terms of stunts, practical effects, and action sequences - even if the direction, cinematography, and editing treat them poorly - but it all more or less comes across as random violence and death for its own sake. What we effectively have here is a slasher, substituting a reptile and native villagers for a masked killer, and a remote tropical setting for an upstate camp or suburbia. I see what 'The great alligator river' could have been, and most of the footage that was already shot could have been used to create the movie in its ideal form. Sadly, what it could have been is not what it is, and what we get is just a generic, middling, flimsy assemblage of ideas and action scenes. There are worse ways to spend your time, but unless you're a huge fan of someone involved or have some other major impetus for watching, there's just not much reason to check this out.

Everything thing about this movie is subpar. The acting, the effects, the plot. It's all borderline laughable. The plot centers around a resort that is maintained by aboriginal locals, where a legendary alligator god comes to life and starts eating people, so the locals turn on the resort guests because they think the visitors caused the god to come to life. The effects are downright insulting, the gator is nothing but a floating toy, there's a scene where the car falls into the water and you can tell it's a toy car. I realize this is an older movie, but to put things in perspective, jaws came out 4 yrs before this. They could have at least tried. Do yourself a favor and avoid this at all costs.

This movie is one of the worst movies I have seen. No joke, it's not good. Very poorly done too.

I'm sorry but this is just plain pathetic. The little girl was a brat, their were no enjoyable characters and the plot sucked. Besides it wasn't even a gator as the film would like us to believe. If you check out any complete guide to reptiles you will find that it really is a Crocodile, not a gator. Obviously they didn't hire a real animal expert or they would know that the creature is a croc. It is a sad excuse for a movie. Especially the ending. I nearly fell asleep with this one.

Let me start out by saying I can enjoy just about any bad Italian horror movie or jungle exploitation flick from the 1970's. Seriously. This one was downright awful.

There are way too many elements that Martino tries to inject and none of them work (except for the croc-gone-wild thing) very well at all. There are some ignorant Westerners, of course, who set up a resort in the jungle somewhere. I don't even remember where it takes place...how sad is that... Basically, people come to the resort to see this native tribe and its' ceremonies but eventually they upset the 'Alligator God' of the river who then proceeds to go on a rampage, killing said vacationers and some tribesmen as well. Sounds good, yeah? Well, don't get your hopes up. There is minimal violence until the end, the special effects are so bad it was like a kindergarten class performed them and the love story thrown in is laughable.

There is seriously a few scenes where it appears they set up a camera underwater in a pool and threw a toy alligator, like a dart, into the water and that is supposed to be the gator attacking. I'm not kidding. In another wonderfully crafted special effect, a Matchbox van is targeted by the incredible sinking plastic gator, who all of a sudden is five times the size of a van. (A few minutes ago, he was only big enough to eat a human, but now he dwarfs a full-size cargo van...) It is really pathetic. The only other flick I can think of where the effects were so bad I was pulled out of the story was Bruno Mattei's masterpiece, "Rats," what with the plastic rats on the conveyor belt and all who COULDN'T be terrified.

Normally I'd say anything Sergio Martino was a solid must-see but this one is a must-pass. Waste of time and definitely not worth buying for the $15+ sticker price from No Shame. This one is a SHAME.

2 out of 10, kids.

Obviously a stylized foreign film like this would fly right over the heads of American audiences.

The late Claudio Cassinelli stars as a photographer who (with his girlfriend Barbara Bach - wife of Ringo Starr) helps to combat a giant alligator god "Kruna" from destroying a multi-million dollar tourist trap (in more ways than one) in Africa somewhere. Of course their exploits are further complicated when the local tribesmen decide to go on a violent killing spree and slaughter nearly all the annoying tourists. (yay!) Mel Ferrer (Audrey Hepburn's hubby) also stars as the greedy landlord of the resort, who lives just long enough to see his dreams of wealth and high society burning to the ground.

I really loved this movie; excellent Stelvio Cipriani 70's jungle music and some cutting-edge Giancarlo Ferrando camerawork gave this a uniquely cruel and menacing atmosphere. The alligator is great looking and the death scenes are done with great skill and panache. Great cast too, with small parts played by Bobby Rhodes, Richard Johnson, and Romano Puppo. Would have been Sergio Martino's best film if not for 2019 - After the Fall of New York. Not to mention an extremely high bodycount and a slick script co-written by George Eastman (!), Ernesto Gastaldi, Cesare Frugoni, and several others.

Martino went on to ruin his career with such turkeys as Mani di Pietra (HANDS OF STEEL) and CASABLANCA EXPRESS.

BTW - at one point the characters do express surprise that Kruna is an alligator, not a crocodile thank you very much.

Highly recommended.

The year before the American killer-reptile flick "Alligator" went on its way to becoming the high-water mark for this sub-genre, filmmaker Sergio Martino ("Torso") brought this epic to the screen. It's set in Southeastern Asia, where a slimy businessman (Mel Ferrer, "Nightmare City") has opened a resort that he calls Paradise House. The Kuma natives grow displeased with this exploitation of their land & people, and so their god Kroona takes on the form of a massive gator to chow down (and chow down, and chow down) on any chump victim in its vicinity. A fashion photographer (Claudio Cassinelli, "Warriors of the Year 2072") becomes the likely hero since he's one of the few characters in this story with more than half a brain in his head. Of course, he's quite taken with the businessmans' comely assistant (Barbara Bach, "The Spy Who Loved Me").

The final half hour basically makes the movie, with a steady supply of carnage. Euro-cult horror fans will be happy with the high body count, although the film may not be quite gory enough to suit some tastes. As can be expected, the exotic locations *are* well photographed in widescreen (by Giancarlo Ferrando). The music score by the reliable Stelvio Cipriani is appropriately atmospheric. Some of the ladies (Geneve Hutton plays a model named Sheena) are supremely sexy. While nobody here rises above this material, the actors play it with game, straight faces - most of them. Richard Johnson ("Zombi 2") hams it up in a brief cameo as a crazed prophet in a cave. Also appearing are Bobby Rhodes ("Demons" 1 and 2) as Ferrers' foreman, and child actress Silvia Collatina ("The House by the Cemetery") as a bratty kid.

The special effects are generally entertaining, with a decent practical-FX gator created by Carlo De Marchis. This viewer laughed with appreciation every time it made an appearance (and especially when it claimed a victim).

"The Great Alligator" is pretty cheesy overall, but is sufficiently amusing to rate it as a good time.

Seven out of 10.

Not to be confused with Lewis Teague's "Alligator" (1980) which actually IS an excellent film, this "Il Fiume Del Grande Caimano" laboriously ends the exotic trilogy Sergio Martino made around the end of the seventies (including the rather watchable "L'Isola degli uomini pesce" and the not so good "La Montagna del dio cannibale"). Tracing outrageously the plot of "Jaws", the script fails at creating any suspense what so ever. The creature is ludicrous and its victims are simply despicable. Stelvio Cipriani's lame tune poorly illustrates the adventures of these silly tourists presented from the very beginning as the obvious items of the reptile's meal. No thrill out of this, rather laughters actually! And we could find this pitiful flick quite funny if the dialogs and the appearance of the natives were not so obviously inspired by pure racism. Very soon the giggling stops in favor of a sour feeling witnessing such a patronizing attitude. We could excuse badly made films and poor FXs, but not that kind of mentality. Never!