Rogue (2007) d. McLean, Greg (Australia) (99 min)
As a follow-up to his unvarnished, viscerally effective serial killer flick Wolf Creek, writer/director McLean continues to thwart the Australian tourist trade with this derivative but reasonably entertaining creature feature. Pitting an enormous crocodile against a riverboat full of tourists on a leisure wildlife cruise, Rogue goes through the predictable series of chompings and near-chompings... and that’s about it, finding little new to do with the milieu.
As was the case with Creek, McLean has a terrific eye for juxtaposing the jaw-dropping beauty of the Outback’s flora and fauna with its more vicious and lethal inhabitants, and the cast members, headed by Radha Mitchell (Silent Hill) and including Ozploitation legend John Jarratt (Next of Kin), Sam Worthington (Avatar), and young star-in-the-making Mia Wasikowska (Stoker), acquit themselves nicely as they squabble and scream.
In the ranks of “Nature Strikes Back” entries, this one might have benefited from a lighter touch, stronger pacing, and a higher body count (more than half the cast survives to the credits), but McLean delivers the goods in the finale, with Michael Vartan squaring off against the toothy terrorist in a shadowy echo-chamber cavern.
Also worth checking out is the 45-min. making-of documentary included on the Dimension Extreme DVD or Blu-ray, which details the various challenges the actors and production team encountered while bringing El Croco to life using a impressive combination of computer-generated and practical effects, as well as negotiating the, um, REAL-LIFE ACTUAL HUMAN-EATING CROCODILES IN THE WATER.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
Audio commentary by writer/producer/director Greg McLean
"The Making of Rogue" documentary by Greg McLean (45 min)
"Welcome to the" Territory mini-documentaries
"The Real Rogue" featurette
Theatrical trailer
Rogue is available now on DVD (curiously, it does not look like it has received a R1 Blu-ray upgrade yet) from Dimension Home Video and can be easily found on Amazon HERE:
https://www.amazon.com/Rogue-Unrated-Michael-Vartan/dp/B000NVT0TI
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