Crawl (2019)
A hurricane season tradition.
This week I was unable to deliver the content I wanted for everyone out there as mother nature had other plans for me. So let me pull back the curtains for a moment, I live in one of the weirdest places on earth…..Florida. In Florida there are a couple things we have in abundance, alligators and hurricanes. This year I was visited by a near annual nemesis of mine, this one was named Helene. First me an my family are safe and feeling very lucky. My thoughts are with everyone in the southeastern United States who were not as fortunate as me.
A recent tradition of mine when caught in the path of a Hurricane is to revisit one of my favorite creature features of the last few years Crawl (2019) a film that feels more like a real Florida happening than any film I know of.
A Florida University swim team athlete finds herself in the path of a hurricane and can’t get in contact with her dad who lives somewhere further south. The movie doesn’t do a lot of explaining about the locations and distances but residents of the state would be familiar with the location of UF and the road signs give clues as to how far south she must travel. Haley played by Kaya Scodelario while weather conditions around her are declining rapidly is finally able to find her father Dave played by Barry Pepper trapped in a crawl space under a house he was renovating. As if weather conditions from a large hurricane weren’t scary enough our duo is soon faced with a large group of frenzied alligators.
Director Alexandre Aja does a fantastic job of conveying the most realistic fear of a hurricane, the rising waters. Anyone who knows a thing or two about alligators would also know that as the water gets deeper they become far deadlier. The dual threat of things that can kill you is what makes this a one of my favorites of the genre. The special effects are great, the gators look very realistic and don’t pull you out of the story. While this film would never be screened in front of your art house friends it’s a fun watch
I will not spoil this one for you if you haven’t seen it go watch it and find out for yourself if they ever escape the crawl space! I’m also fairly certain shooting for Crawl 2 has recently begun or will be staring soon. As for me I hope to get back to my normal content schedule this week. I would also like to encourage anyone reading this to do your research on charitable organizations making a difference for those impacted by Helene and consider making a donation. The American Red Cross is a great starting point and I have seen them with my own eyes providing shelter for displaced families. Also apologies in advance for any egregious errors as this is going out with zero proof reads because I still have a fence to fix.