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THE CROCODILE HUNTER: COLLISION COURSE

By Eric Campos | July 13, 2002

Crikey, what a croc o’ s**t! But hey, at least the title of this film lets you know exactly where it’s heading. So as painful as this movie is to watch, if you willingly buy a ticket, you’re only doing it to yourself.

As I’m sure most of you know already, there’s really no reason for this movie whatsoever. Who wants to sit in a theater for 90 minutes with a bunch of crying kids to watch what they can see on one of several cable channels at home, drunk and naked? Well, I did. I wanted to see how bad this “Collision” was going to be. Now I know and I don’t feel a better man for it. Like I said before, I done it to myself.

At film’s beginning, a hunk of satellite falls from space and lands in the outback where an ornery croc is quick to devour it. The big problem here is that the hunk of satellite contains some sort of top secret information that, if put in the wrong hands, could change the entire power structure of the world. Crikey! So, a couple of non-threatening secret agents are sent to Australia to find the information back, equipped with a tracker that picks up on a signal the satellite hunk is giving off. The signal keeps moving, so it’s concluded that a croc has swallowed it.

Meanwhile, as this riveting story is unfurling, we cut to scenes of Steve-O, the Crocodile Hunter, doing what he does best…messing with animals and insects that would rather just be left the hell alone. All during the first half of the film, whenever we have a scene with Steve and his wife Terri, it’s basically stuff we’ve all seen a million times on Animal Planet, ‘cept this time it sucks. I love watching “The Crocodile Hunter” on TV and I even pay attention to what he has to say, but in a movie theater, the last thing you want is some bozo holding a snake by its tail for five minutes while he gives you a blathering run-down of how much you would be up s**t creek if it crawled into your sleeping bag at night. Booooooring!

Finally, midway into the movie, Steve and Terri are called in to remove a croc from a river system that runs along the land of an ornery rancher who spends her time trying to put some buckshot in the overgrown lizard’s a*s, so it will stop eating her cattle. And yes, this is the very croc with the satellite chunk in its belly. So Steve and Terri manage to wrestle the croc into their boat to take it to a different river system, but now they have the agents hot on their tail and a chase ensues. This unexciting chase through the outback resembles one of those live stunt shows at Universal Studios. These are the kind of thrills that aren’t very thrilling.

As far as acting goes, what can you say, Steve Irwin is a goofy guy. For this movie, all he had to do was be himself, talking into the camera more than Ferris Bueller ever would if you were to watch his “Day Off” three times in a row. But his wife Terri…oof. She sports some of the worst on screen presence I’ve ever seen. I saw more life in the characters of that “Final Fantasy” movie.

So that’s two croc movies in the space of a single year that have completely blown and if I was forced to choose which one I’d rather watch again, I think I’d have to go with Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles. Or if going blind was an option, I ‘d pick that.

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