User Reviews

George Shevtsov plays a slow and methodical Croatian hitman. Through circumstances he ends up broken down at Marilyn's (Georgina Haig) house. She is an employee of Slim (Paul Holmes) who hired "the Croat" to perform the hit. At this point we have the home break-in formula.

The film utilizes a 1950's suspense thriller soundtrack. There are attempts at dark comedy and symbolism that doesn't work too well. A quirky film that misses the mark.

Worth a rental.

Parental Guide: F-bomb. No sex. Blurred shower nudity, spanking. Drug use.

The unwritten but relentless rule: "be wary of unknown movies that put all sorts of meaningless awards and praising quotes on the poster/DVD cover" once again proves itself to be very accurate and reliable. The poster image for "Crawl" spawns a whole miscellany of glorifying words and an accumulation of prizes won at random international festivals, but – as secretly feared – the movie itself eventually turned out a terrible disappointment. I don't know what kind of jury hands over these awards, but I bet they think of themselves as important and knowledgeable cinema experts. I can name a whole lot of things wrong about "Crawl", but most important key errors would definitely be boredom and pretension. "Crawl" isn't a so-called slow burner; it's a dead waste!

Some quotes claim that the China brothers (Paul and Benjamin) are as talented as the Coen brothers, but I feel they're just lame wannabe copycats. The Chinas are probably even less talented than the Coen brothers' most distant cousins from their father's side of the family and "Crawl" can't hold a candle to their amazing debut "Blood Simple" and most certainly not against their widely acclaimed masterpiece "No Country for Old Men". The rudimentary plot, simply summarized as 'man hires eccentric killer and complications arise', is hugely unoriginal and even then it's full of dumbness and holes. Even more annoying, however, is Paul China's complete lack of knowledge on how to build atmosphere and/or generate suspense. You don't create tension just by stretching every scene five times longer than necessary. You don't necessarily make your pivot characters more mysterious by revealing absolutely nothing about them. Aborting sub plots all of a sudden does not make your movie artistic. Planting a silent Croatian killer (with a cowboy hat) in an Aussie setting doesn't qualify as black humor!

The more I think back about my "Crawl" viewing experience, the more frustrated I get. It's just a downright inept movie with a retarded plot, and I will illustrate this through three simple bullet points: 1) the events take place in a remote and incredibly small town community. The local bar owner hires someone to kill the local gas station owner. First of all, what kind of pathetic vendetta could they possibly have? An unpaid bill for about $50, perhaps? And secondly, how does the bartender ever think he will get away with conspiracy to murder in a small community where every inhabitant knows about your quarrel with the victim? 2) Nobody, and I really do mean nobody, walks around his/her own house or work place at such slow pace as the people here. Nobody reaches for a light switch or a doorknob in slow-motion, neither. 3) If your car breaks down at approximately five minutes walking distance from your destination, you don't aimlessly hang around and throw yourself in front of another car hoping the driver will help! You just walk home through the corn field and call a mechanic from home. This way you don't get run over and killed, you stupid moron! Truly retarded movie; the only two stars go out to lead actresses Georgina Haig and Lauren Dillon for being so cute.

I'm a big fan of clever movies and sometimes feel the less action the better, but wow is this utter garbage. I can tell that there was a decent idea in there somewhere, but the execution was so bad the idea died on the vine. Either that or the director thought drawing everything out five times longer than needed was a good substitute for suspense.

Other than the excruciatingly slow pace, and the multiple references to crawling that weren't clever at all the move suffered many other issues. At the heart was a hit man who was older than my grandfather (easily 80 and looked about as threatening), an idiot fiancé, a overly creepy bar owner (I mean who would work there after the interview?), and a heroine that moved at a snails pace and stared every time there was the slightest noise. The worse criticism I can give is that the movie was relatively short at just under 80 minutes, but still seemed 40 minutes too long.

The acting was decent and the lead actress was very attractive, but the lack of character development made it pretty irrelevant who lived or died. In short unless you really like slow, painful movies without any payoff skip this clunker.

This was a Glasgow Fright Fest selection according to some of the other reviewers. I did not go to that one but have to say what do the organisers have against Scots. This is not a horror movie. It is slow and ponderous. They way they keep panning back from every shot and I keep thinking. Yeah I know get a move on. This movie should have lasted for forty minutes but again and we get the same shot take over and over again.

The plot is some twaddle about a Croatian dude trying to kidnap some woman.

Spoiler alert.

The only funny bit in the whole movie regards a chocolate cake left outside a door.

Spoiler over.

Other than that this is ponderous, slow and predictable. Yeah it does have some fake blood. Also it has a good sound track but in the end the movie just leaves you with the thought why did I bother. Do yourself a favour and do the washing up instead.

***SPOILERS**** Totally bazaar movie about this creepy Croation hit-man, George Shevtsov,given a job by an sweaty looking Australian bar owner Slim Walding,Paul Holmes,to do in a scuzzy and greasy looking auto mechanic Rusty Sapp,Bob Newman, for welshing on a debt that he owned him. With the job complete and and Rusty having his brains blown out the Croation leaves the murder weapon at the scene of the crime so the police can find it and frame Walding, whom the gun belonged to, for the murder! There's just on problem in all this is that as the Croatian was making his getaway he hit and fatally injured biker Joe Travis,Andy Barclay, wrecking his car and leaving him out in the cold.

The Croatian looking for a place to stay for the evening finds this house that waitress Marilyn Burns,Georgina Haig, was living in with her boyfriend who just happened to be Joe Travis the person that the Croatian ran down and left for dead. Desperate to check out of the area before the police arrive the Croatian ties up Marilyn and at the same time goes back to the accident site and murders the brain dead Travis to cover his tracks and leave no witnesses to his crime. There's also Slim after finding out that his gun is missing and the Croatian stole it to use to murder Rusty and as insurance frame him for it. Slim after taking a brake in the action and having a game of "The Crawl" with his other waitress Holly,Lauren Dillon,whom he ends up spanking black & blue then goes to Marilyn place, thinking that his gun was there, only to end up getting axed to death by the Croation who was there waiting for him!

****SPOILERS**** The films ends with Marilyn getting the upper hand on the Croatian who's too clumsy and uncoordinated, due to the injury he suffered in his car accident,to finish her off. Off beat movie with long stretches of almost no talking at all as the Croatian bumbles his way through the house after Marilyn slipping and falling in his effort to get and kill her. As for Marilyn she was lucky that the Croatian seemed to have taken a liking to her and let her escape when she was helplessly tied up and ended up doing the wild and crazy guy in. That after the Croatian had so many chances to kill her and let just her slip away from him.

The Croatian comes to town and sanctions (kills for hire) the owner of a petrol station, Rusty Sapp. He gets paid by the Slim Walding (who owns the bar where most of the other characters work) and leaves town. He runs over a pedestrian on the way to his next stop. This turns out to be Travis, who's truck had stalled out.

Marilyn prepares for the return of her fiancé to be, Travis. He's late for business reasons. Then he keeps on being late. The Croatian breaks in, ties her up, and gags her. He's looking for transportation, but Travis had the truck as well as the keys to the old motorcycle.

The police come visit Slim Walding about the murder of Rusty Sapp. Later, Slim and Holly play the spanking game to work off Holly's debt to Slim. He makes her crawl to him before she gets over his knee, bares her bottom, then spanks her hard.

The Croatian goes back and kills what's left of Travis, then steals the engagement ring from the corpse. Slim finds his gun missing; he figures he's being set up. He drives to Marilyn's house, finds Travis' blood, Travis' truck, but not Travis. So he heads to Marilyn's house; he steps in the chocolate cake Marilyn's friend left on the stoop. He sees the blood from the Croatian's wounded leg. He tries to get answers after he unties Marilyn, but she has few answers. The Croatian comes in and disrupts their conversation. Then the Croatian goes after Marilyn.

Do we find out the Croatian's motivations? Does Slim get what he seems to deserve? Will Marilyn survive all this? -----Scores-------

Cinematography: 10/10 Excellent.

Sound: 8/10 The incidental music was often spot on, but sometimes overbearingly loud.

Acting: 7/10 Just fine if one likes the acting style that the Coen brothers favour.

Screenplay: 7/10 Just what was the plot against Slim? What was the history with Slim and Holly? How did the Croatian come into play here? There are a few too many loose ends here.