Lake Placid

This is not what you'd expect from a monster-lurking-at-the-bottom-of-the-lake scare pic; instead, writer David E. Kelley -- yes, the guy behind Ally McBeal and The Practice -- kicks the generic material into high gear with some devilish dialogue and a poignant dash of camp. Think Ally McBeal versus Jaws, except that in this dicy little flick a resilient Bridget Fonda subs in for the frail Calista Flockhart, and the rampaging leviathan is the mother of all crocodiles.

A crocodile in Maine sounds silly, but that's the film's strong suit. Lake Placid is a tart comedy of human folly layered atop a nonsensical horror-thriller -- à la Tremors or Piranha. And it doesn't hurt that FX master Stan Winston (Jurassic Park) is on hand to conjure up the gargantuan croc with mind-boggling realism. In Kelley's bubbly parade of stark personas lurking lakeside, Fonda and Bill Pullman are amiable and romantically awkward as the wilderness-naive paleontologist from the big city and the authoritarian game warden. Oliver Platt and Brendan Gleeson generate a hilarious rivalry as an eccentric academic and a gruff sheriff, but the film belongs to "Golden Girl" Betty White as the reclusive old bat who coddles the ravenous reptile and employs obscenity with gut-wrenching precision. At the bottom of this flake lies a depth charge of disemboweling good-humor.

-- Tom Meek