RATTLERS (1976)

[The Burgomaster]

If you're looking for a fun, low-budget snake movie, this is NOT it.  (The budget is low, but the fun is definitely missing).  If you must see it, it is included in the DRIVE-IN CLASSICS 50 MOVIE PACK.  I believe that "Something Weird" also has a version available for sale.

Anyway, journeyman actor Sam Chew (who has appeared on TV shows like THE INCREDIBLE HULK, THE LOVE BOAT, and THE BIONIC WOMAN, and in movies like10 TO MIDNIGHT and OSCAR) stars as a snake expert who is sent into the desert with a female photographer (who resembles Ali MacGraw) to find out why rattlesnakes have suddenly become extremely aggressive and started killing the locals.

* * * WARNING: POTENTIAL SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!!! * * *

This movie is incredibly cheap and the script and acting are incredibly bad.  Among the dumb elements are:

* After several people have been killed, the snake expert and the photographer go into the desert, pitch tents, and sleep on the ground.  Sounds like excellent precautionary measures to me.  Lie down right there on the ground where the snakes can get you.

* Of course, the snakes get into one of the tents.  Luckily, a soldier shows up at exactly the right moment and shoots the snakes with an M-16 (on full automatic) while the snake expert and the photographer are standing about 1 foot away.

* A snake bites a jeep tire (while the jeep is moving) and the tire goes flat.  Yeah, I KNOW this is science fiction, but STILL . . .

* Some of the soldiers have regulation haircuts, others have slightly long "1970s hair."  At LEAST use realistic haircuts, dammit!

* Soldiers and police shoot at the bad guy, even though he has a cannister containing a biological weapon right beside him.

* Following an explosion in a mineshaft where the snakes are nesting, everyone basically drives away thinking that the deadly snake menace has come to an end.  What . . . none of them are smart enough to think that maybe SOME of the killer snakes were NOT in the mine at that particular moment and might still be roaming around looking for victims?

Oh, the pain . . . THE PAIN!!!!!!

[RCMerchant]

I have seen this very,VERY,bad movie on late nite TV years ago.I had a hangover...this did not help.Cool ad,though! If only the films could match the posters! If the movie FROGS was as wild as the poster...!

[Shadowphile]

Sounds amazingly bad.  I must find it....

[The Burgomaster]

The really amazing part is that the version in the DRIVE-IN CLASSICS 50 MOVIE PACK is in widescreen format.  It's amazing when you can get 50 movies (no matter how bad they are) for under $20 bucks and some are widescreen!

[Flangepart]

Just ther film to Hiss off the B-flick crowd. Sounds good!