Customer Reviews

Lake Placid (Widescreen)

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(28)
3 star:		(20)
2 star:		(24)
1 star:		(21)

 

 

I am looking for this movie because I want to buy it for my son who has seen "Jaws" already for the millionth time and I am afraid he will wear the disc out if I don't get him another comprable movie. This is the movie that I thought of that can match "Jaws" becuase it's sort of that fun, boo-scare-you, flick. It doesn't take itself seriously and the movie is full of interesting characters played by big name actors. What stood up for me is Betty White. Hands down she is the gem of this movie. It's like she won the "funny lines" lottery when they handed out the scripts. She plays a Lake resident who's husband is missing and the way she finally tells what happenned to him was so funny I was rolling on the floor. Oliver Platt got annoying, a little bit but thank god Bridget Fonda and Bill Paxton interceded with their likeable characters. I've rented this movie when it first came out on DVD and thought about buying it to include in my slumber party collection and I think this is the way this movie is going to get resurrected, through people who have a enough sense of humour and who knows what an excellent "giant animal ran amok" movie is all about. Gingerly place this next to your "Jaws," "Godzillas," "Tremors" on your DVD shelf, it belongs there.

A Fish and Game worker is doing a survey of beavers in a placid lake with the local sherrif when he suddenly becomes half the man he was and dies. Local law enforcement, Fish and Game, and a New York museum worker set out to discover what happened. They are soon joined by an eccentric millionaire who loves crocodiles.

Is there a crocodile in the lake? At first few believe that such a thing could be until hard evidence shows up. The Crocodile is not an ordinary one, it is thirty feet in length. The camp is quickly split between those who want to kill it and those who want to save it. To learn it's fate you will have to watch the film.

This is a very well-done piece of work. The characters are interesting and there is just enough sarcastic humor to really lighten the mood. Betty White plays a foul-mouthed local resident and her delivery of her "I'm rooting for the crocodile" line is an instant classic. This is a fun film and far from typical. It is not just a giant-lizard-eating-people film. Check it out.

The story is about a large Asian crocodile that travels across the Atlantic Ocean, and takes up residence in a lake in Maine. An old lady (wonderfully played by Betty White) is feeding the crocodile, as it had become kind of a pet to her and her late husband. Unfortunately, the crocodile isn't satisfied with just eating the cattle that are provided to it. It also doesn't mind snacking on a human or two. And let's face it, if this movie were about an old lady feeding a crocodile, it wouldn't be here, now would it?

After a tooth is uncovered, it is sent to a museum to be analyzed. The museum director sends one of his colleagues (Fonda) to the lake to find out what is going on. There she meets the sheriff (Gleeson), the local game warden (Pullman), and arriving shortly thereafter, an eccentric man (Platt) who believes that crocodiles are godly, and enjoys swimming with them.

While there are some genuine scary moments in the movie, it tries too hard to be funny as well. If the filmmakers had tried to stick to just one style of movie, either humorous or scary, they would have fared a lot better. Instead of a very good film, what they ended up with is a movie that is trying too hard to be both scary and funny at the same time. While there are a few surprises in this movie (one that took me *completely* off guard), the ending is all too predictable. Some movies can get away with combining the horror aspects and the comedy aspects, like the above mentioned TREMORS. Unfortunately for LAKE PLACID, it couldn't quite pull it off.

You know the drill: "guilty pleasure!", "so bad it's good!", etc. This movie is basically a pre-fabricated B-movie, one that is even panned by its own packaging (e.g. "This year's 'Anaconda'!").

David E. Kelly wrote this, which is why it will feel to some like an extended episode of ALLY McBEAL gone camping. The animatronics are definitely on par, and the "witty" banter gets wearying for the same reasons that led to the insubstantial ALLY's cancellation. People always see through glibness eventually. So the moderately amusing dialogue passes the time, since they make the creature as absent as they can possibly get away with, but it's pretty lazy altogether. The music is really funny. They try and gin up this really sinister stuff when the helicopter does a fly-by of this blandly idyllic Maine town. It's very funny.

Bill Pullman is a genius, I've decided. His understated style carries this movie. Bridget Fonda over-hams the "NY Girl Goes Camping" routine, and keeps falling in the water.

Don't fall in the water! The creature lives in the water!

Platt and Gleeson have some sort of recurring personality conflict throughout most of the movie, the basis for slapstick yucks, which are really just some sort of surpressed homoerotic display behavior between two adult men. You'll see what I mean. Betty White plays the role of her lifetime...which means she has a couple of funny lines.

This is not the worst movie. I wish they had gone all out and tried for that distinction. Instead they ended up making a moderately bad movie instead of going for gold; inexcusable mediocrity, that. Thus, the charm of ANACONDA just isn't there.

Both the actors and the fake looking reptile become tierdsome about ten minutes into the film, you want the monster dead, but first get rid of the cast, because they stink. David E. Kelly does bad TV shows, and he's no better at films.

I first rented this on VHS at a local video store when me and the family decided to go riding about, I was completely captivatated from the beggining to the very end! The crocodile looks so realistic that it gave me nightmares! This wonderfully entertaining monster flick has great actors (Bill Pullman, Bridget Fonda, Oliver Platt is the man), a fun-to-watch sherriff, a crocodile kook (Platt), an old (potty-mouthed) farmer lady, an incredibly convincing croc. This is an awesome movie and is very underrated and is right up there with JAWS! The ending is just as good as well.

I rented and watched this over and over and over again and NEVER got tired of watching it because it was soooooooo cool! Every time me and my folks would head to the video rental place, I would always, always, ALWAYS choose LAKE PLACID! LAKE PLACID is a movie I could watch about once or twice a week! And now, IT'S ALL MINE ON DVD!!!

lake placid was a excited and scary movie about a crocodile who terrorized the people who came into it's habitat.An old woman feeds the crocodile her LIVE STOCK[cows or horses]....................

After seeing this movie advertised on tv, I thought that I just had to get it on DVD. This would have to be one of the poorest made movies that I have ever seen. Its very predictable, the acting is sub standard,there is very little action, the story line is weak and cheesy, and its a very short movie. It was hard to stay awake while watching this 1 hour long movie.

Stereotypical monster horror movie directed by David E. Kelley about a giant crocodile eating unwary visitors in a Maine lake resort(Maine? Why not Antarctica while they're at it?) starring Bridget Fonda, Bill Pullman, and Brendan Gleeson.

Completely unoriginal and boring to add to that. There aren't even any of the sort of monster attacks one would expect to see in this type of film. After several minutes of just watching scenes of the lake, I thought I was watching a documentary on fishing. I wanted to yawn after the first 15 minutes. The movie has an absurd script made even worse by a lot of bad acting. The only credit I give to the movie is that it lives up to its title: it's placid allright.

Think of three things you want to see when you go to the movies. If you answered giant crocodile, obese town sherrif, and Oliver Platt, then Lake Placid is the movie for you!Wittness the terror of the beaver dam, a cow being dangled from a helicopter, and a showdown between a crocodile and a grizzily bear. Its actualy a pretty good movie, even if it is kind of stupid. It is fun to watch and the special effects are good. Its worth renting but i wouldn't waste my money buying it, unless you can find it cheap somewhere. Betty White is amusing as a foulmouthed old lady.