Dinocroc (2004) Review

Dinocroc (2004) Review

Dinocroc is about a prehistoric dinosaur-like crocodile that escapes a secret lab and terrorizes a small town. It was produced by Roger Corman, famous for having produced and directed numerous low-budget sci-fi and horror films over the years (including Carnosaur), but is not among his most-widely known productions, so why am I talking about it? Somehow, it spawned a little franchise, followed by Supergator and even Dinocroc vs. Supergator. While subsequent films are more in the vein of Sharknado with purposefully bad scripts and effects, Dinocroc actually tries to be more than its little budget allows, which is what makes it so funny to watch. 

The characters are what you would expect: a sheriff, an animal catcher, some shady scientists, a croc expert dressed exactly like Crocodile Dundee, a buffoonish everyday guy (the main character), and his kid brother, who is looking for his lost dog. The cast is made up of bad actors, with two exceptions. One is the sheriff, who’s pretty good, and the other is the main character, played by Matthew Borlenghi, who is unbelievably bad. It’s like he’s drunk or something in most scenes, but he isn’t annoyingly bad, at least. It’s kind of charming how bad he is. 

The “Dinocroc” is apparently supposed to be a hybrid of modern croc and Suchomimus, which was a real dinosaur, but the name on the cage says Sarcosuchus imperator, which was a crocodilian species, but nothing like the primarily-bipedal Dinocroc. Whatever the case, the script rips off all kinds of better sci-fi/horror films, but what’s really outstanding about it is some of the dialogue. It’s as if the screenwriter didn’t know how real humans speak. I don’t want to blame the actors entirely (although they don’t deliver the dialogue well, so I don’t want to give them any credit, either), but it’s really laughable.  

The music is bizarre, with overdone choir singing, I guess in an attempt to make things scarier. A good soundtrack can increase a horror film’s scariness significantly, but in this case, I think they tried too hard. They pull out all the stops when it comes to utilizing monster movie clichés. There’s unwary people getting attacked at the beach, the fake out ending where you think it’s dead but comes back, and they even show the creature’s POV, which uses one of the worst filters I’ve ever seen.  

As for the monster? Well, the image on the DVD doesn’t lie. It’s rendered entirely in terrible cgi. It’s a couple notches above Sharknado-levels of atrocious, but still a far cry from a realistic or cool-looking creature. This Dinocroc loves to swim at high speeds without disturbing the water’s surface, and explode out of the water so fast he barely makes a splash, but of course when it comes to chasing people on land, they have a pretty easy time staying ahead of him. 

Dinocroc is inept, but still entertaining from time to time in a so-bad-it’s-good way. There are a couple entertaining scenes with Dinocroc killing people, some really poor camera work, and the typical final fight to the death. Even for fans of this type of film, though, it’s a disposable one-time watch.