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It’s Willard all over again, but with serpents.

Remember Willard? The original, I mean, not the lame remake. Okay, now imagine Willard as a Chinese film with snakes in place of rats. With a little more sex and gore thrown in for good measure. That’s pretty much what we get with Killer Snakes, a mid-1970s effort from the Shaw Brothers.

Originally titled She Sha Shou, Killer Snakes is the story of a young man who lives a pretty crappy life. He lives in a hotel, has no friends, and is often the target of cruelty by those around him. He lives next door to a snake emporium, whose owner mutilates the serpents for profit. Our “hero” finds one of these snakes, nurses it back to health and soon finds that all of the snakes’ buddies are ready to do his bidding for his kindness. So if you have control of hundreds of snakes, the first thing you’d do is book yourself on the Tonight Show, right? Nope, you exact revenge on every person that ever looked at you funny, and that’s just what our boy does.

To say Killer Snakes is a sleazy movie is an understatement. We get rape, bondage rape, and bondage rape by snake in the film. There really isn’t a single likeable character, and you pretty much know where the story is going from the word go. That said, the film looks nice, with a great widescreen transfer print. Released by Image, the disc contains an original trailer, some so-so photo galleries and…well, that’s about it.

I took to Killer Snakes not for any of its concrete attributes really; it just happened to be one of those rare “animals attack” horror films I never heard of before, and that always captures my interest for a few minutes. If you can handle the sleaze and nudity, you may like Killer Snakes, but in the end, I suggest you probably just watch Willard instead.

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