Movie Gazette

It’s a known fact that the “Versus” film wipes the floor with all others. Over the years it’s given us ‘Kramer vs. Kramer’, Freddy vs. Jason, Alien vs. Predator, and I’m still crossing my fingers in the hope that one day someone will make ‘Die Hard vs. Terminator’ (because let’s face it – once that one’s been made, there’ll be no point in anyone else even ATTEMPTING to top it with something better).

But, while we wait for Hollywood to get its rear-end in gear and give us the John McClane-against-Arnie face-off the planet craves so desperately, here’s a little something to fill the time: ‘Boa vs Python’. It’s about this great big 100-foot boa who, one day, is forced to go scale-to-scale with an equally massive python! Great stuff! And it’s even got a naked girlie in it! Seriously, just try looking anyone in the eye and telling them that this isn’t the best idea for a movie you’ve ever heard in your entire miserable life. You can’t do it. It can’t be done. So there.nnThe whole thing kicks off when thrill-seeking big-game hunter (Adam Kendrick) invites a gaggle of like-minded types to trap and kill the humongous boa constrictor he’s somehow managed to bio-engineer (strangely, the science behind this feat is never quite explained). Of course, the monster escapes and embarks on a bloody rampage on the outskirts of Philadelphia, so what do the FBI do? That’s right – they head for the Institute of Bloody Great Boas and get themselves a giant snake of their own. And, before you can say “this surely isn’t helping matters”, big ol’ slitherer number two has been released with the mission of tracking down and killing the meddlesome python. Genius.

Anyone who knows and loves amateurish tongue-in-cheek B-movie horror should be in their element with this one. It’s silly and it knows it – the acting’s terrible, the script’s cheesy (“Die you slithering piece of shit!”), and the special effects look like they’ve been created on a ZX Spectrum. But how could anyone fail to love a movie which revels in its own crapness quite as much as this one? As someone who’s watched a Helluva lot of pretentious up-its-own-arse cinema over the last few years (The Hours has suddenly popped into my head for some reason), I saw ‘Boa Vs. Python’ as a breath of fresh air. It doesn’t try to be anything it’s not – if you pick this up from your local DVD rental store, you’re getting exactly what you pay for. It just so happens that in this case you’re paying for an hour-and-a-half of gleefully bad nonsense about two massive snakes beating the living snot out of each other.