GL84 Arriving in Africa to explore a previously unexplored section of the jungle, anthropology students realize that the whole trip was a trap in order to gather bait for a race of ferocious, highly-developed apes and try to get out of the jungle alive.This here was a little disappointing, but still managed to get some good parts to it. One of the biggest marks here is the fact that the jungle here has a really great atmosphere that really helps to up the tension, at times really bearing down into an oppressive force that really highlights the ominous feeling quite nicely, especially the beginning of the trek through the jungle or the later scenes of them searching that really helps the film turn out to be pretty tense when it tries. There's also some fun to be had with the ending half, with its action, chases and everything else fun about it. The chase through the woods is intense, marked by the repeated use of trying to get to safety while trying to remember a trick done earlier, the encounter in the cave is just tops with the whole thing being done through night-vision goggles and having a bunch of large shocks, a fantastic conclusion and some more fun to be had, and it comes from the heels of a spectacular series of scenes in the jungle to make it all the better. There's also some really nice gore in here that comes from its' nice kills from the couple of brutal scratches, part of the face bitten off, a couple violently beaten and dragged away, as well as a spike-trap that punctures through the back to make for a rather nice surprise. These are enough to hold off the few flaws in here. One of the biggest issues here is the extended amount of time spent on showing their trek into the area which is just way too overlong to really amount to a lot of interest in the first half. It's filled with such droning and endless scenes of the group just wandering around in the jungle that there's about half the time devoted to just meandering around while the professor begins endlessly going off about their research or the other ravaged campsite yet none of this really does anything toward generating a good pace. This one here doesn't have much action until the half-way point as it saves most of that until the final minutes, but it feels really dull for large portions of time because it follows those weird pacing patterns. The other big flaw here is the fact that, like just about every single one of the Sci-Fi Channel's creature features, the fact here is that the monster is done through really terrible CGI. The shots of the ape are just plain terrible, looking like they were done on an obsolete computer from decades ago simply days before it was put together, and it offers up absolutely nothing in terms of being fearful of the creatures. What makes them even worse is that this is only accomplished through one shot at the end, comprising all of ten seconds of the film's time. That's all that's shown of the creature, beyond a flash here or there of a hairy arm or a large body moving through the distance. It's hard to get over this, and as a result, the movie really fails at times.Rated R: Graphic Violence and Graphic Language.

SnakesOnAnAfricanPlain A film so stupid there are no monkeys in sight. There are apes, which look like your average CGI gorillas. That is to say, not too impressive. Just use people in suits if they are average sized gorillas. The film has a cast of annoying characters, from the whiny monkey fodder, to ACADEMY AWARD WINNING F. Murray Abraham pretty much screaming "I'm a psychopath". It's annoying and confusing, especially the urinating scene. The monkey/apes/whatevers are disappointingly absent throughout the entire film. They manage to show up just in time for a five second shot, in a Blair Witch style ending. It's a shame the film forgot the monkeys and the fun.

maxim3 Is it beyond the realm of possibility that there may be more than one Robert Young? You are correct in the fact that Robert Young is not listed in the cast - however, he is the director of the film. No, Robert Young did not come back from the dead to direct it, there are actually 18 Robert Young's listed in IMDb. I do have to say that this review section proved to be more exciting than the film. xminusone, please , before railing somebody else's opinion, do your due diligence by at least reading some of the credits first. Nice review Richard! Keep up the good work. F Murray Abraham's performance is well done, but that is to be expected. I have to agree that this film seems to be one step above the usual Sci Fi junk (ie anything starring Lorenzo Lamas).

Richard Hawes F. Murray Abraham pays the rent by lending his Oscar winning credibility to this routine creature feature. As a mad scientist type he joins an obligatory ensemble of bickering students as they wander around a forest in Thailand until its time for the creature to turn up. Its all very by-the-numbers and elderly film and TV veteran Robert Young keeps the quality reasonably high considering the limitations. Fans of the genre (a mainstay of the Sci-Fi Channel) will know what to expect, though this is of higher quality than many similar productions, but thats not saying much when a film displays not a single novel trait.