Gators Attack in Alejandre Aja's "Crawl"

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Submitted by RJ Carter on Thu, 10/10/2019 - 07:00

During a devastating hurricane, a young woman finds herself trapped in the crawlspace of a house with two enormous alligators. Cue the terror.

Haley (MAZE RUNNER's KAYA SCODELARIO) is a professional swimmer who gets a call to check on her estranged father as a hurricane barrels down on the state. Defying evacuation orders, she drives through a roadblock to ensure her father (BARRY PEPPER) is safe.

He's not.

While making a repair in the crawlspace of the family home, he got mauled by an enormous alligator. Fearing him dead, Haley barely escapes the maw of one alligator, but her luck runs slimmer the longer she's forced to find a way out of the crawlspace as the floodwaters rise, threatening to drown them both.

The alligators are huge, and abundant. As others come near the house, unaware of the situation, they become food for these swamp monsters. Claustrophobic, and full of "spring-loaded cat" momens (or spring-loaded gators), CRAWL doesn't have to tell much of a story to carry it for it's under-90-minute run. But beyond the tale of survival, CRAWL is a reunion of father and daughter, as they come to terms with the events that separated them, as a hurricane rages around them.

Director ALEJANDRE AJA (THE HILLS HAVE EYES) turns in a suspense film that, while unrealistic in many aspects, nonetheless feels real. It's plausible for someone to remain behind during a hurricane evacuation, just as it is plausible that alligators might break a drainpipe and nest inside it. You just have to overlook how many gator bites one can endure and still survive. But by the climax of the story, you end up with a feeling of shared, albeit costly, victory.