Reptilicus 2001 Horror Movie Review

You’d have to be pretty desperate to enjoy this cheesy Danish monster flick, imported by American International Pictures in 1962 to capitalize on Japan’s barely-better Godzilla movies. The titular beastie begins as the frozen tail of a prehistoric reptile, discovered when a scientific drill hits a bloody mass of monster flesh buried deep in the Lapland tundra. The tail is accidentally thawed (echoes of The Thing) and regenerates into a massive demon-lizard that spits fluorescent green ooze and terrorizes Copenhagen! Padded with archival military footage and stampedes of panicking Danes, the movie’s too earnest to be campy (save for some funny hamming by the science lab’s handyman) and too cheap to qualify as a guilty pleasure, with special effects that make rubber-suit romps like Godzilla look masterful by comparison. By the time an unwitting army general says, “It’s a good thing there are no more like him,” you may find yourself wishing he was right. —Jeff Shannon