SYNOPSICS
Basilisk: The Serpent King (2006) is a English movie. Stephen Furst has directed this movie. Jeremy London,Wendy Carter,Cleavant Derricks,Griff Furst are the starring of this movie. It was released in 2006. Basilisk: The Serpent King (2006) is considered one of the best Action,Adventure,Comedy,Fantasy,Horror,Sci-Fi,Thriller movie in India and around the world.
Two millennia ago, a Lybian king has a basilisk (snake-shaped dragon), which petrifies people, subjected to the same fate with a golden scepter during a solar eclipse. Both these and several victims are dug up by modern archaeologist Harrison 'Harry' McColl's expedition. Despite a cryptic warning from tribal locals, everything goes to his Colorado university's museum. It's all exhibited during another eclipse, which leads to the monster reviving. Harry and some of his friends must try to petrify the monster again.
Basilisk: The Serpent King (2006) Reviews
This is why giant serpents are not allowed in shopping malls
Opening scene mayhem introduces a formidable beast, a serpent with spiritual vengefulness. It can petrify victims to stone in Medusan fashion, and it can swat you like a fly too. Odd that it has Greek Mythological power, since it's lurking in the Mid-East desert. Treasure hunters and a full moon unleash the giant serpent to emerge and wreak more destruction. Promising start, but after that initial scene, this film decides it's a junior high school production, and degenerates into unbridled silliness. When the creature is unleashed, does it utilize its horrifying powers for a grandiose or symbolic attack? Like other monsters would? No, it just tears up a museum and a shopping mall. It also wipes out a bunch of "soldiers" who look like they trained for combat by playing war games with GI Joe dolls. The acting is painfully bad. Somebody recites a line loudly, and then pauses expectantly, as if waiting for a laugh track to be inserted. It reminded me of one of those tween sit-coms on Disney channel. The archaeologist guy (a Robert Downey look-like) wanders around with a pie-eyed gaping expression. He makes dumb quips, and he just looks weird. There's a stock nerdy geek, who has neon-yellow bleached hair and horn-rimmed glasses. The female love interest looks like she's going to laugh hysterically at any moment. The red-dress greedy rich femme-fatale wannabe girl deserves special recognition. Her tough vamp routine looks more like a shampoo commercial. She runs around with a big heavy gold staff, looking like she's going to trip over her stiletto heels any moment. One guess on how shampoo vamp ends up. And it'll seem way over due. About as scary as a Care Bears cartoon. For its unintentional humor, it's good for a couple of laughs.
Entertaining monster film
"Basilisk: The Serpent King" is an incredibly enjoyable Sci-Fi Channel original creature feature. **SPOILERS** On a dig in Persia, Professor Harry McCall, (Jeremy London) and his team Rudy Skeeters, (Griff Furst) and Sierra, (Sarah Skeeters) find a series of ancient statues depicting soldiers and a large unknown creature. Meeting up with fellow scientist Rachel Donegan, (Wendy Carter) they attend a party honoring the discovery, and during an eclipse, the creature statue comes to life as a Basilisk and goes on a rampage. While trying to escape, they find Col. Douglas, (Cleavant Derricks) and his National Guard unit fighting the creature. When they realize that the only way to fight the creature is a scepter held by thieves Hannah, (Yancy Butler) and Brock, (Doug Dearth) they race to get it back before it continues it's rampage. The Good News: This one really surprised me by how good it was. A giant snake loose in a major city is one of the few ideas left in this series, and here it works magically. Rather than just having out in the middle of nowhere with very few targets, the snake is loose inside an urban center, which holds the possibility for tons of damage and tons of fun, which this has plenty of. The snake itself goes on a major rampage, biting off limbs, decapitating a couple, having objects crushed when they collide with them, and even the requisite number of people turned to statues. Those are handled very well, not really looking very CGI at all and looking quite natural. The various action scenes are all nicely paced and quite exciting, keeping it moving forward and always on the move. There's very little down-time between pretty much anything, as the pace moves along very rapidly from once scene to another. The snake itself is out and about very rapidly as well, coming out very early and staying that way for most of the most of the movie. The reawakening is a great action set-piece, with tons of bodies flying everywhere and a general mass panic. The mall sequence features some great action parts as well, making it a real highlight. The fact that the mystical creature gets explained in here with some factual evidence gives this one some more weight to it that most don't really have in the science background, and really sounds quite credible. Though it does look quite fake, the snake does have a rather creepy look to it in certain scenes, with a snake-like body mixed with a crocodilian jaw and a set on horns along the side of the body. Far better film than it should've been. The Bad News: It's getting very tiresome to call these films on the very badly-done CGI, and this one is no exception. Here, the same applies. Very rarely does the CGI used to make the creature look anything close to being believable. The CGI is apparent on the creature whenever it moves for a period of time, but when it doesn't really move is when there's a believable appearance, but it's still pretty easy to tell it's not a real creation. This is a common problem, and one that really doesn't show a lot of signs towards ending, and must really be endured more so than most other films. However, this is the one main problem with this. It's really not all that bad. The Final Verdict: Far better Sci-Fi Channel original than it had every right to be, this falls into the upper echelon of their pantheon of films and features a lot to like about it. Sure, there's the fact that it doesn't look real at all, but that is becoming par for the course with these films and is now a given. Fans of the past films should see this one immediately. Rated R: Graphic Violence and some Language
At least the Basilisk likes the ladies
I give the Basilisk props. In one confrontation, he bites the hottie with the scepter in her hand and rips her dress off. Instead of, oh I dunno, say, running for her life, she sits there in her undies and yells at the Basilisk for ruining her dress. The Basilisk stares at her for two seconds, then chomps her torso off. Not only is it a comically bad scene, but we also got to see Yancy Butler in her skivvies. Tremendous. As for the rest of the movie, it's your standard SciFi Original fare. People find relics of an ancient creature somewhere in Persia. Despite warnings from the locals to leave well enough alone, they take everything home to a major metropolitan museum and the thing comes to life. Military grunts come in talking all big and bad about how they'll blow this thing to smithereens, then run like little girls after it starts ripping them to shreds. Science geeks study its habits and try to find a way to kill it. The Basilisk looked pretty cool. The ending was a little dumb, so that pulls the overall rating lower. But if you're in the mood for some bad horror hijinks, "Basilisk: The Serpent King" (kind of a silly title, since toward the end of the movie the Basilisk was proved to be female) will fit the bill.
My nomination for Best Screenplay
As a veteran aficionado of the SciFi originals, I had my usual expectations going into "Basilisk". Laughable special effects, transparent characters and formulaic situations clumsily stumbled into by unwitting victims of the CGI beast-du-jour; all comprising a solidly entertaining and heartily enjoyable experience. While "Basilisk" dutifully fulfilled many of my preconceptions, I have to say that it was a cut well above the standard Saturday night fare. This creature flick can rightfully take its place among such greats as "Hammerhead: Shark Frenzy" (Jeffery Combs can't make a bad movie), "Frankenfish" and many of the other SciFi offerings but I have to put "Basilisk" into its own category all together. The effects are of the same caliber as its worthy cousins, but I think that what lifts this one for me is the script. It is witty without being contrived and never leaves a slow moment or the feeling of awkwardness that comes with so many screenplays that try too hard to be hip (see: Lucky Number Slevin. Actually, don't see it, it's terrible). Cleavant Derricks does an outstanding job as the weekend warrior Colonel and his bantering exchanges with Jeremy London are the stuff of high theatrical art. So all in all, this one is not to be missed. Next time SciFi decides to air it, set the TiVo and prepare to be entertained. You will not be sorry.
While not the best, it's not the worst
This is the latest monster movie tromp from the Sci-fi channel. While many other sci-fi channel movies like "Kraken" were absolutely terrible, this movie is pretty good. But if compared to "Aliens" or "King Kong", this movie would be considered terrible. The plot centers on a basilisk running loose around a city and scientists trying to stop it. Also two bad guys steal a staff that has the power to kill the basilisk but at the same time find a great treasure. Of course the bad guys want the treasure. But with the basilisk following the bad guys, things get complicated. While the characters are like card-board cut-outs and the special effects not so special, this movie exceeds in is a story that moves along fast enough to keep people entertained and excited. This movie is fairly enjoyable and only moderately disappointing. If sci-fi keeps making movies of this caliber, than i will tune in on Saturdays much more often.