The film was still a fun one that will make you laugh and have you leaving the theater feeling like you just stole something valuable and got away with it.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

John Sayles, who wrote Brother from Another Planet, strikes again. In this crazy, fun little film, a little girl's pet alligator gets flushed, encounters medical waste and GET's GIGANTIC. It terrorizes Saint Louis, gets hunted by Henry Silva and Robert Forester and there's all kinds of havoc, A really fun B monster movie.

A certain old urban legend that you may have heard of brilliantly takes on a life of its own in this underrated horror classic. There were scores of these straight-to-video monster movies that were made in the eighties and early 90's, and so many of them are so cheap and boring that they're barely memorable, and you watch this film and every scene has got the genuine charm and really great dry wit, the script is superb and the story terrifically-paced, most genre movies these days would take forty minutes to cover the same amount of ground that this one does in a quarter of an hour. There's no bulls**t, just flush, boom, and right into the action! To me it's just an extremely fun film to watch, a throwback to an old-fashioned great B-movie, in the best sense of it. I think it looks very professional considering how old it is, which you can tell, but I really wish more films would have been made like this, as I find its style more entertaining than most of the big-budget Hollywood monster films. I don't deny that a couple of hundred-thousand dollars more for special effects couldn't have hurt, but I don't know if that would have made it a better picture in the long run or not. I personally love the effects, there's a very effective mix of various practical effects and scenes where they'll have a real live juvenile gator crawling through a miniature set, and even as a little kid I could tell that's what it was. But it just works, the effect still looks pretty good, whenever they show the victims trapped in the huge jaws of the scaly beast it looks real! The models look a little funky at times but they fit the picture, and are used in a competent way that you buy into them. The sequence where I think they show way too much of the alligator is the big crazy wedding massacre which is too over-the-top and silly for me now, with the ridiculously obvious looped screaming in the background and oh no, not the wedding cake! And how long does it take for a crowd to clear one party? Apart from that, I'm glad they don't show the creature all that much. I find it far more frightening and sinister when it's mostly unseen and lurking in the dank darkness of the sewers... The parts of this movie that I enjoy the most are all the sewer scenes, they're so fantastically creepy and atmospheric, it makes me uncomfortable just watching those scenes! They combine the fear of water and the dark. Anyway less is often more when it comes to practical effect monsters. No matter how good a beastie they created, the more it's seen the less effective and interesting it becomes. You start to say, "oh look how well designed and animated it is", but you're not afraid of it anymore, you become accustomed to it. When you look at something like Alien, where you never really see the monster, that's really scary and fun. I think about this movie and others like it from the time, that again a lot of them are far more entertaining than flicks like the 1998 Godzilla say, because it's about character,then humour, then the horror. It's not all about the special effects, and that's what makes this film endure where other films where they did all the perfectly planned special effects, they're soulless vacant kind of movies, and this one still really holds up. Especially when it comes to the characters. Robert Forster's burned-out performance delivers such a perfectly jaded, well-rounded likable gruff hero that you really want to see win and kick that gator's ass! His kind of dead-pan delivery was so spot on. And Robin Riker's nerdy yet sexy, cool and collected reptile expert who still lives with her mother is also solid. I found their romantic chemistry virtually nonexistent, but they still made a great team together. I just loved the lively old gal that played Marissa's mother! She was so natural, it wasn't even like it was acting, it was like the nicest lady ever, what'd they catch her on a coffee break and stick her in front of the camera? And also the tobacco-chewing Perry Lang was witty and gorgeous.. The picture basically exists to me as a horror thriller with overtones of comedy brought out by the characterisations. It just had comedic aspects to it, but never goes into downright parody. There's such a great balance between the horror and the humour. I find the scene where the little boy is made to walk the plank and is devoured very grim and disturbing. The way the mother turns on the light and reveals the hungry maw of the gator just as he's being pushed in, it's totally the stuff that nightmares are made of. And that was damn ballsy at the time, daring to kill a kid. Hell, even Friday the 13th had Jason spare a little girl! All you see is a cloud of blood, but it's still a horrific shock moment that's very memorable. I also loved the moment during the creepy sequence where Madison and Kelly are searching the sewers and when the torch shines behind them you catch a glimpse of the alligator for a second as it stealthily moves back and the light reflects off its eye, and it's one of the film's eeriest moments, and a very effective use of lighting effects. The movie is also aided by a fantastic score that does a great job of accentuating the fun yet scary tone, I find the theme that plays over the end credits seriously chilling. It's a monster movie that knows what it is and has fun with it. Always a true pleasure to watch again and again. Bless you Alligator!!!

RELEASED IN 1980 and directed by Lewis Teague, "Alligator" chronicles events in Chicago after a baby alligator is flushed down the toilet and mutates to great size from eating chemically contaminated dog carcasses in the sewers. A policeman (Robert Forster) and a beautiful reptile expert (Robin Riker) team-up to track down the beast when it escapes the sewers and preys on citizens."Alligator" is kind of boring for the first half hour or so, but the last hour perks up and generally keeps your attention. Unlike "Jaws" (1975), which is completely serious and scary, most adults won't take "Alligator" too seriously or find it remotely scary. In fact, I busted out laughing numerous times when the creature would attack people. Speaking of which, you'll sometimes hear Jaws-imitation suspense music as the creature approaches its prey. Some viewers understandably compare "Alligator" to another "Jaws" rip-off flick, "Piranha" (1978), but that movie's all-around more entertaining.What makes "Alligator" mandatory is the awe-inspiring Robin Riker, who doesn't appear until half an hour into the story. From thereon she's featured prominently. Robin was 28 during shooting but possesses such a mature and classy air that she seems at least 35. While I'm on the subject, watch out for the blonde reporter in a red jacket and jeans at about the halfway point (43 minutes). Like Robin, she has an exquisite buttocks sculptured by God Himself. There are also some highlights that you won't likely see in pictures nowadays. For instance, a kid gets chewed up in a suburban pool. And a "great white hunter" (Henry Silva) amusingly corrals three black dudes in the urban jungle to assist him in his hunt. Of course this wouldn't be "politically correct" today.THE MOVIE RUNS 87 minutes and was shot in Los Angeles and the Los Angeles River. WRITER: John Sayles.GRADE: B-

In the second half of the 1970s, and beginning of the 1980s, whenever a movie that blatantly ripped off Jaws never fully upset me for two reasons: I loved When Animals Attack movies of that era and they only made me appreciate the masterpiece Jaws was all the more.To be fair, 1980's Alligator isn't a complete duplicate of 1975's Jaws. Alligator had its own ideas, settings and some clever ideas, but for the most part, it was the A-B-C of the When Animals Attack genre that Jaws pretty much shot to popularity.I'm no expert, but kids, or well, anyone, having a baby gator as a pet? Really? But, anyways, a child brings home said baby alligator and, rightfully – or not, per this movie's plot – the dad flushes the little man-eater down the toilet. Twelve years later, baby's grown up, way up…or, more accurately out?The movie goes through the typical in-the-shadows death here, questions there, cop from the beginning who asks all the right questions slowly becomes the sole hero, more shadowy deaths, finally people believe said hero and the beast emerges into the light for more terror.While not that bad, and sometimes scary, it's an effective way to get your 80s When Animals Attack fix. But, I must say this: I'm a fan of Robert Forster – Jackie Brown's one of my favorite movies and he was born in my hometown (irrelevant, but still) – but, damn, please put back on your shirt you take off too many times here. You might have inadvertently given Harrison Ford, in his later years and roles, the wrong idea about when it's okay to bare a bland chest…It's never okay when the camera's rolling.* * * Final thoughts: I honestly remember this movie, but I'm equally honest that I don't remember if I had seen it all the way through before. I absolutely remember the eerie opening when the dad flushes the baby gator – and in perfect 1980s, that one act terrifies me because the phrase "Oh, this can't be good" fits the mood. And I slightly remember the effective limo scene attack towards the ending. I had never, nor since, been afraid of alligators, but this movie certainly made an argument for me to be.