It’s the crummy Mummy as a Brendan Fraser lookalike (Jeremy London) faces ancient mythology and creaky SFX in another cheap and cheerful creature feature from the Sci-Fi Channel.

The basilisk is a fearsome snake-god from North Africa, able to turn men to stone with a single beady-eyed glare. And it is about to be unwittingly sprung on an unsuspecting American public by archaeologist Harry McColl (London).

At a grand unveiling held during a solar eclipse, the fiendish worm breaks free from its stony tomb and immediately turns the museum into a meal wagon.

Never fear, though, because here’s Colonel Douglas of the National Guard (Cleavant Derricks, giving it the full Carl Weathers).

"My men are highly armed, highly trained, military responders," he growls. Predictably, the beast scatters, splatters and/or shatters his men at the double.

Help is at hand in the form of Harry’s new colleague Rachel (Wendy Carter), whose pretty face isn’t enough to distract us from her colossally boring snippets of cryptozoology, Egyptology, and... sorry, what was that again, sweetheart?

She says that the only way to stop the basilisk is to turn it to back to stone using the gold-and-diamond sceptre (the ‘Eye of the Medusa’ or somesuch) that came with it… which has been snatched by Hannah, the greedy wife of a museum benefactor (played by Yancy Butler – imagine Liz Hurley with a sense of humour).

But, like any red-blooded US military man, Douglas just wants to break out the nukes: “Look, we don’t need a full history lesson here... where’s the snake?” Damn straight, brother.

So as Harry and Rachel pursue Hannah and her sceptre through sewers and shopping malls, the monster occasionally slithers along to chew strips off the odd unconvinced-looking (and thus unconvincing) extra.

Though it looks like a reject from a Chinese New Year parade, the basilisk is actually a precious find in the bargain basement of special effects.

There's no shortage of ketchup being slopped around, but what's the beast using to spit its venom? A water pistol?

And while the mumbo-jumbology might be sound, as any National Geographic viewer or amateur herpetologist can tell you, snakes have a third, pineal ‘eye’ which is heat-sensitive. Ergo, posing as a shop dummy wouldn’t do you much good.

However, unless you’re a hot blonde professor, pedantry has no place in the sort of pure, dumb, ropily acted escapism that Basilisk proffers in spades.

But since we’re on a roll, the title’s not quite right either since this particular serpent ‘king’ turns out to be female.

Maybe ‘Serpent Queen’ sounded a little camp? And we couldn’t have that now, could we?

Elliott Noble