HOLY WEDNESDAY (1974)

  Also known under the title FANGS, which make this sound like more of an animals-attack movie(which it kinda-sorta is) I first caught this one as part of an all day horror movie marathon and this was by far the highlight of the day. Obviously taking it's inspiration from WILLARD(and more directly STANLEY since it features a man who really loves snakes!) it veers off quite a bit for a large chunk of the movie and just plays like a crazy hicksploitation film. Large Marge(Alice Nunn) has a big part as one of our protagonists, bestiality, go-go dancing, theological discussions on the nature of meat-eating and marching band music also play a part in this. The underlying message here seems to be don't fuck with a man's schedule! An exploitation classic that needs to be seen more. AKA SNAKELUST

THE DOGS (1979)

 Going into this French flick I was expecting more of an animals run amuck kind of deal. What you get here seems a bit deeper than that though. It involves a town that are really into having dogs for protection and they train them to kick ass which is a good thing I guess since there's also a rapist and a bunch of hooligans running around. It's basically a very odd version of a vigilante film involving a lot of canines of many different breeds. There really aren't any clear cut "good guys" here though since we also deal with racism and, like with most vigilant films, taking things too far. 

 Director Alain Jessau mostly did artsy movie and you can certainly lump this one into that category. 

 Star Gerard Depardieu allegedly took the role here of a pretty mean dog trainer after being bitten by a dog and attempting to overcome his fear of them.  

                                   Known in Italy as DOGS MAN!:

SNAKES ON A PLANE (2006)

               "I've had it with these motherfucking snakes on this motherfucking plane!"

  I know I'm almost 20 years behind everyone else who's seen this already but I had so much better stuff to watch first. This might have been a bit better if every snake didn't look like a cartoon CGI thing but then again maybe not. I'm more of a horror film fan and this is more of a thriller/action movie with some slithering killer snakes thrown in for a few gross-out thrills. OK for a one-time watch but pretty mediocre overall. 

THE BLACK CAT (1966)

  Being a fan of the legendary punk rock group The Angry Samoans, I knew this film as supplying the cover image on their 1980 album INSIDE MY BRAIN. Unfortunately this is quite a big spoiler as there aren't a whole lot of characters in this tale of a demented fellow who seems to be on a downward spiral due to a black cat that has come into his life and it depicts the gory demise of one of the main players. Luckily it's still a decent enough watch even if you know there's an axe murder going in. Loosely based on the old Edgar Allan Poe tale with some rockin tunes, animal abuse, a car chase and possibly a zombie cat thrown in for added thrills. 

                         On a 60s double feature with a Filipino horror:

Los Angeles punk rock!:

UNINVITED (1988)

  A killer cat escapes from a laboratory where it was infected with this disease that makes humans that it bites explode blood out of their bodies. Oh and there's also a mutant cat that rips out of our regular-looking cat every now and then to wreak havoc. Most of the action takes place on a boat where George Kennedy, a rich dude(Alex Cord) and some sexy younger folks are thrown together for some flimsy reason that only happens because the plot needs to move along. There's minimal nudity despite our main gals being in bathing suits and being horny for most of the film but the blood flow is very ample. An ALIEN-esque chestburster is teased but never happens. A fun stupid one from the dumb 1980s. 

Released in Norway as KILLER CAT:

MAN'S BEST FRIEND (1993)

  Having only seen the trailer back in the day I had always assumed this was about a killer robot dog(something like THE TERMINATOR on 4 legs) on the loose. It's actually about a dog that's genetically spliced with a bunch of other animals to make it the ultimate watchdog (or killing machine if there are any mishaps, so guess what happens).  While not up to the wackiness of the great animals run amok flicks of the 70s this was a pretty decent watch and considering it was made in the 90s, when most horror films were complete wastes of time, it's surprisingly entertaining. Ally Sheedy and Lance Henriksen do a great job in something that could otherwise be pretty shlocky. 

SLUGS: THE MOVIE (1988)

  I've always considered this to be one of the dumber animals run amok movies out there but upon a recent re-watch I found it to also be pretty damn entertaining. Of course you get armies of killer man-eating slugs with big chomping teeth who can swim(leading to some JAWS-rip-off scenes), some pretty gory deaths as people's skin is ripped right off(this was directed by Juan Piquer Simon the man responsible for one of the greatest slasher movies ever PIECES so you know what to expect) and our hero is a health inspector named Mike Brady(Michael Garfield). 

 It is all based on a book by Shaun Hutson who apparently never allowed another film based on any of his books after this which seems like a terrible business decision! 

CALAMITY OF SNAKES (1982)

  Well a lot of snakes certainly lost their lives making this movie. What we got here is a Hong Kong version of an animals-run-amok movie. This time with an apartment built over a pit of various slithering snakes. If you don't like animal violence in your entertainment this one definitely isn't for you. A good portion of the movie is really just snake snuff footage with them being chopped up by shovels, swords and even an earthmover. If that's not enough they also get set on fire, beaten to death and skinned alive.  If you're a snake lover it's probably best to pretend this(and a lot of similar extreme Asian cinema) doesn't exist. It is quite the ride for people who enjoy gross spectacles though even if it all does get a bit repetitious with the snake attacks.

 There's an alternate South Korean cut of this titled WAR BETWEEN MEN AND SNAKES with different footage and plot. 

BEN (1972)

  I haven't seen the original WILLARD since I was a little kid back when it used to play on TV and I'd never seen this sequel so I figured it was about time(It also helped that the local weirdo movie theater was having a showing). It definitely falls into that goofy animals-run-amok subgenre that was so popular in the 70s. We get a little boy character that veers from being annoying to sympathetic depending on your tolerance level, lots of silly-looking rat attacks, singing marionettes, a big final battle that takes forever and let's not forget the Academy Award-nominated best song( a love song about a boy and his best friend who's a murderous rat) sung by Michael Jackson.  Worth a look but I recall WILLARD being a bit more classy. 

 

                                                               The #1 hit!:

 

                                                                Italian poster:

RAZORBACK (1984)

  This giant-pig-on-the-loose-in-Australia epic is way more stylish than it has any right to be. This is obviously due to it's director Russell(HIGHLANDER) Mulcahy who started off being a music video director before embarking on his feature film journey. I've seen this compared to that wild Australian classic WAKE IN FRIGHT and while this might have some of the same energy as that it is clearly something made with a very 80s sensibility(especially with Duran Duran on the soundtrack). Check it out for something that's elevated above the average trashy JAWS-inspired animals-run-amok dreck. 

DAY OF THE ANIMALS (1977)

   This is that movie where Leslie Nielsen takes off his shirt and fights with an angry grizzly bear. It's not done for laughs though since this was years before Nielsen became known for being a funny man. In fact in this he's about the biggest douchebag you could imagine!

  Directed by William Girdler, who just one year earlier had given us the similarly-themed nature-run-amuck epic GRIZZLY, this one throws dogs, snakes, birds, wolves, mountain lions and few other creatures into the mix of revenge-seeking animals. There's also a pretty dumb ecological message about the ozone layer thrown in to explain everything that's going on. Good goofy 70s fun that would make a great double feature with FROGS. 

Re-released as SOMETHING IS OUT THERE to trick people:

    Also released on VHS under this title(there are sadly no crazy monkeys in this movie):

GRIZZLY (1976)

  A giant man-eating bear vs. Christopher George and friends at a camping resort. An obvious JAWS-rip-off that they make even more obvious by the tagline on some of the versions of the poster. A decent time-waster directed by THREE ON A MEATHOOK's creator William Girdler. He would go on next to make the similar animals run amuck epic DAY OF THE ANIMALS which is even goofier than this. Arms, a horse's head and even a little boy's leg are among the appendages lopped off by our super aggressive predator. Crazily enough it was only rated PG when it was originally released. 

 There is a sequel GRIZZLY II: REVENGE which I have never seen and seems to be one of those deals where they ran out of money and never actually finished the film until years later. 

THE PACK (1977)

  I got to see a very blurry copy of this a couple of weeks back so it was not the optimal viewing experience. What I could make out though I did enjoy. It's a pretty standard 70s animal-run-amok tale of a bunch of dogs, who act more like a pack of insane, vengeance-driven wolves, getting revenge on humanity for leaving them abandoned in the woods. Probably would be a good watch for vegans, vegetarians and other folks who value other animal's lives over people except, of course, you're gonna see a bunch of dogs getting offed in various ways including run down by a truck and blown away with rifles.  WALKING TALL's Joe Don Baker is our hero in what starts off like a made-for-TV movie and ends up being a pretty action-packed flick. There are also a bunch of familiar 70s character actors including R.G. Armstrong and Ned Wertimer(from THE JEFFERSONS). I really need to see a print that doesn't look like it was shot underwater.  AKA THE LONG DARK NIGHT and THE LONG HARD NIGHT

ANTS! (1977)

 

 In the upper echelon of goofy 70s made-for-TV horror flicks sits this creepy crawly classic about some very pissed off ants who have had enough of being sprayed with insecticide and decide to fight back. Effective and memorable for the time it was made and it has a surprisingly high body count. Suzanne Somers, right before she went on to star in THREE'S COMPANY, is one of the featured cast who must have had quite the crappy acting experience getting covered in bugs and Myrna Loy carries on the great 70s tradition of classic Hollywood starlets of the 30s and 40s showing up as an old lady in a spooky flick. 

This same year saw the release of Bert I. Gordon's giant ant masterpiece EMPIRE OF THE ANTS truly making 1977 the year of the ant!

 Originally broadcast under the way less exploitative title of IT HAPPENED AT LAKEWOOD MANOR. 

                                                       ABC Friday Night Movie!:

PLEASE DON'T EAT THE BABIES (1983)

  While this 80s trash flick certainly has a memorable title that's kinda the best thing about it. The title is also a bit nonsensical since there aren't any babies at all but there is some flesh-munching depending on which cut you view of this. I was lucky? enough to get to see the full 101-minute experience which cuts back and forth between various edits(one of which is titled ISLAND FURY). In one version there are actually large insects that devour people that apparently some numb-skull edited out of their cannibal family on an island plot in other versions. The main problem with this flick though isn't a lack of killer bugs but really a lack of anything all that gory(outside of one guy chomping down on a lady) or compelling. For a lot of the runtime it plays out like an 80s action movie without the action scenes. I think the main appeal of this lies in the fact that it's so obscure and not much else. 

 Another off-putting aspect of this is that it feels like 2 different movies that were edited together and that's sorta true since the orignal portions of the film were shot in 1982 and then the wraparound story, that takes place years later, were shot 6 years later to complete it.    

 

CHOSEN SURVIVORS (1974)

  This one starts off as an end-of-the-world disaster flick then a bunch of killer bats show up turning it into an killer animals gone wild movie and then they throw a big twist right in the middle which I won't spoil. While there's probably not much rewatchability to this I did enjoy it on my initial viewing. One thing that has to piss off most viewers is that star Jackie Cooper(yes the same guy who was little Jackie on THE LITTLE RASCALS) plays a really reprehensible character who gets away with some horrible acts, including rape at one point, and never really gets much of any comeuppance. This is a pretty good reflection on reality though so I'll give it points for that.  

   Filmed in Mexico(where apparently bat-lives are cheap), so here's the Mexican poster!:

 

Double feature horror show with British flick THE FREAKMAKER under it's alternate title:

ALLIGATOR (1980)

 

 One of my personal favorite animals-run-amuck features that I first saw on T.V. as a wee lad. In what is ostensibly a JAWS rip-off(especially in the underwater alligator-viewpoint scenes) you get a stellar cast led by Robert Forster as the cop who's in charge of finding our titular giant mutated menace. Henry Silva also shows up as a big game hunter sent to track down the beast and my favorite character actor, Sidney Lassick is the guy responsible for the alligator becoming gigantic in the first place thanks to him dumping some dead laboratory animals in the sewer. A kid gets chomped in a swimming pool, the gator crashes a party and generally wreaks havoc on the world that flushed him down a toilet. So it's really just a tale(tail?) of sweet revenge.

 There was a sequel called ALLIGATOR II: THE MUTATION but that didn't come out until the 90s so it probably sucks. 

                                         Known in Turkey as REVENGE OF THE BEAST!: 

The Japanese poster has a very James Bond-ish flair to it!:

THE KILLER SHREWS (1959)

  This one is a pretty typical but fun 50s monsters-on-the-loose epic. The "shrews" here are just dogs with some long fangs and other accouterments added on.  Our main hero is played by a young James Best that all 70s kids know went on to become Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane on THE DUKES OF HAZZARD program. The main baddie is Ken Curtis which TV Land aficionados would know as Festus on GUNSMOKE. So it's quite the future all-star cast. The plot almost becomes a blueprint for NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD at a certain point with a group of people trapped in a house fending of an invading force which makes me think George Romero was probably a fan.  

 There was crappy-looking sequel called RETURN OF THE KILLER SHREWS in 2012. CGI shrews don't seem like much fun to me. There was also a spoof called ATTACK OF THE KILLER SHREWS! made in 2016 which looks like they used puppets for the creatures but it's also supposed to be a comedy so that's an unfortunate thing that exists. Finally there's also a colorized version of the original out there if you're not cool enough to watch a black and white movie. 

   Originally played on a sweet double-feature bill with this equally wacky 50s monster flick!: 

CRAWL (2019)

 French director Alexandre Aja, who blessed us with that HIGH TENSION movie back in the early 2000's when gory French horror was the in thing, gives us a tale of alligators run amok in Florida. It's a pretty well done creature feature full of expected jump scares and tension while a dad and daughter try to escape a basement full of large bitey creatures. Probably would have been better if the monsters weren't CGI and looked like floating ghosts but in 2019 I guess it's impossible to have a movie that doesn't remind any adult watching it of a video game. Even more egregious, and hard to believe, than this though is that they set the movie in Florida and expect me to believe someone built a house with a basement in a swampland. Talk about a stupid setup! Still this might be the best animals gone crazy film you're gonna find in 2019.

THE RATS (2002)

 Very generic title for a movie about killer rats. In this case it's kind of appropriate though since this is a super generic movie. Killer rats invade various locations around New York City(though it was filmed in Toronto so don't look too close) including a high-end department store, a swimming pool full of kids, the subway etc. They spread a terrible disease if you're lucky and rip you to shreds if you're not. Nothing particularly gruesome is shown, probably because this was originally a made for T.V. movie though it was released in some countries outside the U.S. theatrically(poor countries!). There is a longer cut that has a bit more blood and even some boobs in it.
 This is allegedly a remake of 1982's DEADLY EYES but that one didn't feature a bunch of c.g.i. and I recall it being a lot more entertaining and fun. So if you don't feel like watching what look like video game rats(in one particularly terrible looking sequence the rats shoot up out of a drain like a fountain)chase people stick with the original.

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