Hazard! Crawl 2 is crawling towards us soon Cinemax
Do you like alligators? If your answer is “yes” or at least “not in reality, but yes in cinema”, the following news will please you. “Crawl 2” is being developed by Paramount, and there is already some exciting news related to this. With horror giant Alexandre Aja behind the camera and a different cast and location, this film seems very strong and could even surpass the first. Here’s everything we know about what’s next.
Like Jaws, Only With an Alligator in the House: The Plot of Crawl
2019’s “Crawl” was a pretty impressive success. It was produced on a relatively low budget of around $14 million and managed to gross around $91.5 million at the worldwide box office, making it very profitable for the studio. When this happens, it is clear that a sequel is expected, although in this case the wait is relatively long and will be at least six years.
“Crawl”, written by brothers Michael and Shawn Rasmussen, received favorable reviews with a positive score of 84% on Rotten Tomatoes and a weighted critic score of 60 on Metacritic. It combined a classic natural horror film with disaster movie elements (don’t expect too many wild effects, because it’s not “Twisters”), included scenes of suspense and a well-constructed relationship between a father and his daughter, trying to find him in the middle of the storm, in a house flooded with alligators.
Like many survival films in recent years, “Crawl” showed that crocodiles aren’t the only threat facing the heroes (one of the film’s taglines is “If the storm doesn’t get you, they will”). Surprisingly, the film did this rather convincingly, and it was not too messy or clutteredas happens too often. It’s clear that “Crawl isn’t the best survival movie ever made, and maybe not the best crocodile horror movie, but it definitely stood out in a subgenre that includes too many cinematic disasters.”
Here is the trailer for “Crawl”:
Crawl 2: Florida OUT, New York IN
The question regarding movie sequels of this type is what to continue, from the basis of the original film, and what they should try to improve on.
The first exciting decision in this case is to change the location of the film, which can also affect its style and plot. The “Crawl” took place in Florida during a category 5 hurricane and deals with a young woman trying to locate her father in a flooded house which happens to be attacked by alligators running through the sewers.
The location here is anything but accidental. Florida is known for its hurricanes: in recent years we have heard about, for example, Hurricane “Ian” which will hit it with force in 2022 or the current storm “Debby”, which has already caused enormous damage. Additionally, Florida is known as “alligator country.” It is estimated that there are as many as 1.3 million alligators in Florida’s 67 counties, meaning there is one alligator for every 10 to 15 residents. In other words, the storyline of crocodiles attacking a flooded house during a hurricane may seem fictional at first glance, and the first film certainly contributed to that with some confusing decisions and plot holes. Still, if there’s any state where this could happen, it’s probably Florida.
Therefore, the fact that the next film will reportedly take place in New York is undoubtedly intriguing (it will also be filmed in Europe). Instead of the rural setting of Florida, the new film will have to deal with the challenges of a dense urban environment.
It will be interesting to see the plot explanation of the crocodile attack, assuming it happens and who will face the life and death battle against the fearsome creatures. Will we see a fight for survival between several characters cut off from the world, a personal story in the middle of a collective disaster in a troubled city, or a situation bringing together several stereotypical characters with different backgrounds in a public place?
Encouraging news: Alexander Aja returns to the director’s chair
The most significant news regarding “Crawl 2” is that the excellent French director Alexandre Aja, who directed and produced the first film, will take over the reins. Aja broke out in 2003 with the excellent “Haute Tension”, a sort of slasher that paid homage to the great slasher films of the past.
Then came several other projects, such as:
- The bloody remake of “The hills have eyes” from 2006 (originally a Wes Craven film)
- The remake and the 3D version of ““Piranha” (2010) a fun trashy movie for fans of scary fish movies
- “Horns” (2010) with Daniel Radcliffe and Jono Temple, based on the book by Joe Hill (the pseudonym of Joseph Hillstrom King, the son of Stephen King who wrote, for example, “The Black Phone”)
- “Mirrors” (2008) – One of the best mirror movies out there, which included a scene that made us (and Amy Smart) drop our jaws
- “Oxygen” (2021) – A claustrophobic thriller about a woman (Mélanie Laurent) who wakes up in a medical cryogenic chamber, without knowing how she got there and what she must do to get out in time
From this list and Aja’s additional credits as producer (“Night of the Hunted”, “The Other Side of the Door”, “The Pyramid”), you can see that Aja is one of the busiest horror creators in recent years. Not all of his films are masterpieces, and sometimes the quality is far from there, but he’s definitely someone who knows how to create intense horror scenes and maintain high tension (see what I did there?).
Aja will produce the film with Craig Flores and Sam Raimi – who of course needs no introduction to horror fans – with whom he collaborated on the first film. The screenplay will be written this time by Andrew Deutschman and Jason Pagan, of whom you will only find two films so far: “Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension” and the not bad Found Footage “Project Almanac” (about a group of young people who build a time machine and discover what can go wrong with it), both from 2015. Perhaps this limited filmography shows in a certain extent that the film will move in the direction of technology. or even science fiction. And maybe not.
Crawl 2 Cast: New Names (Probably)
Remount plans to shoot the film in Europe this fall. We have not yet determined who will star in the film. However, it seems that we will have a new cast here, that is to say without Kaya Scodelario (“The Maze Runner”, “Pirates of the Caribbean: Salazar’s Revenge”, “Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City”), who played the girl and Barry Pepper (“Saving Private Ryan”, “True Grit”… and also the “Labyrinth” films) who took his father’s place.
So, what can we learn about “Crawl 2” in the meantime? Overall, this is a promising project combining the talent behind the success of the original film with new ideas and challenges. The move to New York and the change in the writing team tells us that we could have a new direction, or even a sequel that attempts to expand and develop the world of the original film.
