I must start with saying that my expectations to the 1999 movie "King Cobra" were slim to none, especially since I had never heard about it prior to finding it in 2017. And I do like movies with monstrous sized creatures, although many of them turn out to be less than adequate given questionable CGI.
Now, the story concocted by writers and directors David Hillenbrand and Scott Hillenbrand was a very generic story, even as creature features go. So you know what you will get here from the very beginning. So you shouldn't expect a grand masterpiece of script writing here. You will get exactly what you could expect from a movie such as this.
One might start to wonder why a snake of this proportion wouldn't have raised any notice as it lived out in the wilderness where it had to devour a substantial amount of living creatures in order to become so big.
The acting in "King Cobra" was adequate, though there were very few familiar faces among the cast list. It was a hoot to watch Pat Morita appear in this movie, and also a small but hilarious cameo by Erik Estrada. The only other familiar face to me was Courtney Gains, and he was only there in a small role.
What made "King Cobra" work was the special effects and CGI. The team behind this really upped their game and created a very realistic and believable snake. And taking into consideration that the movie was made in 1999, then the CGI actually still stands solid today, so that is somewhat of an impressive feat. So a big thumbs up on the special effects department and the people responsible for the CGI effects.
If you like creature features, then "King Cobra" is definitely worth taking the time to sit down to watch. Just a shame that the mundane and generic storyline served as an anchor around the movie.
King Cobra
1999
Action / Adventure / Horror / Sci-Fi / Thriller
King Cobra
1999
Action / Adventure / Horror / Sci-Fi / Thriller
Keywords: giant snake
Plot summary
When a team of scientists led by Dr. Irwin Burns tests an experimental drug that increases aggression in animals and humans, their biochemical lab explodes and a mutated nightmare escapes. Half African King Cobra and half Eastern Diamondback, Seth is pure evil. He's 30 feet long with a giant appetite for terror.
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A generic slithering storyline that is saved by impressive CGI...
Trashy, family friendly snake movie
The dumb-but-fun ANACONDA was a giant snake movie that received a lot of flak from the critics. Personally, I thoroughly enjoyed the film, both at the cinema and at home on television. So when I saw the reviews for KING COBRA (itself marketed as ANACONDA 2 in some instances) I didn't take too much notice of them, figuring them to be just more negative comments from guys who hate the genre in the first place. Sadly, the criticism received by KING COBRA is entirely correct, as this cheap and tacky killer snake flick scrapes the bottom of the barrel in every instance. Heck, even the poorly-acted low-budget '50s B-movies with appalling effects were more fun than this modern variation, which has better effects but is substandard in every other way.
Anybody expecting the monster rampage usually offered by such "creature features" will be disappointed by the minimal action on offer here; the film progresses as usual, with the creation of the threat and then the gradual deaths of townsfolk living in the outskirts of the town in the woodland, but things never progress from here. Instead, the best entertainment value the film can offer is throw a bunch of dumb rednecks into the snake's lair and have it eat them all one by one. Later, when a wooden actor uses a Van Damme kick to repel the snake, you know the film is in big trouble. The snake P.O.V. shots are also WAY overused, to the point of exhaustion, whereas any opportunity for gore or sadism is kept to a minimum, unfortunately, by the film's PG-13 certificate.
Not that there aren't any incidental pleasures. Indeed, one of the film's highlights is an out-of-nowhere appearance by a down-on-his-luck overacting Erik Estrada, playing the town's campest inhabitant, whilst an aged Pat Morita appears to offer an amusing spin on his KARATE KID mentor character and gives the film some of its best humour. The special effects of the snake itself are very well created, unsurprising when it turns out that the reliable Chiodo Brothers are behind the menace, and it's just a shame that they aren't used to a greater purpose. The anti-climatic ending is also stupid and unexplained and as a whole the entertainment value is kept to a minimum, with just a few high points of so-bad-it's-good value. Definitely not a film to bother with unless you have a really high tolerance for pure trash.
The snakes scenes deliver the goods with scares and chills though with short budget
The film tells about Dr Burns in charge a environment lab making scientific experiments but it turns out to be a bio-genetically King Cobra that has a taste for human flesh .The researcher makes a chemical crossing two species, creating a weird and dangerous hybrid ,being transformed into deadly vipers: an African King Cobra and an American rattle snake with approximate length of thirty feet and whose bites killing its victims.But the laboratory instantly explodes .Two years later the giant snake makes a reappearance and and get loose, attacking at a small town and threaten the populace.Noriyuki, Pat Morita as a snakes expert tells: the African King cobra kills more people than one shark along hundred years .Morita says the snakes have bitten him 167 occasions and he's continuously injecting serum and keeps records with a bite black Mamba snake.The King Cobra simulates death for attraction the victims. and causing a breakdown of the blood cells.The poisonous Cobra-Rattler attack at random and slither down the mountainside,woods and slither around small town,ready to attack anyone in its path.
This is an average scary snake movie .Creepy,scary,campy and low budgeter story about a large snake attacking human beings. Mediocre performances though the actors reacts appropriately to becoming snake food.Rather sympathetic characterization by Pat Morita for the horror genre.Besides Hoyt Axton as the Mayor and Eric Strada as a gay man organizing the brew-fest.The snake are made by Animatronics ,no by nowadays very prolific computer generator,as usual. Another films about this sub-genre are : SSS(Bernard Kowalski),the successful Anaconda(Luis Llosa with Jennifer López),Python 1,2,Boa and Rattlers.The motion picture is regularly directed by David Hillenbrand.