Runtime:
90 minutes
Directed
by: Bill Rebane
Starring:
Stafford Morgan, Katie Hopkins Zerby, Richard Kennedy, Buck Flower,
Janus Raudkivi
From:
Studio Film Corp.
Would you believe I saw two Bigfoot movies last night? As you'll see later, they were very different from one another:
Recently I discovered that auteur Bill Rebane once made a Bigfoot
movie, and as that would fit well with what I would watch immediately
afterwards (that review will be up in a matter of hours) it seemed like
the logical thing to do. While his most famous movies are the likes of
Monster-A-Go-Go and The Giant Spider Invasion-which made for a great
episode of MST3K but I wouldn't dare watch it without Mike, Tom Servo
and Crow-I will still give him credit for emigrating from Latvia,
settling in Wisconsin and becoming a regional filmmaker. Even with an
output that many would rate as “not great at all” he still was able to
make some movies in his adopted home state.
Curiously, the “Bigfoot” seen here is more like the Abominable Snowman (i.e. the Yeti; he might as well have been the creature from the Rankin-Bass Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer stop-motion animation cartoon) rather than the brown hair critter that people associate with Sasquatch and was seen in the (probably staged) Patterson-Gimlin Bigfoot footage. That creature has a child and well, it's very protective so that's why what was just thought to be a Native American legend starts killing people... and why a way over the top maniacally laughing villain character named Olsen wishes to capture it for profit.
The movie, it's technically not good. The story has its share of issues, the actual filmmaking is quite weak at times and ooh boy, is there some bad child acting. Yet I can't hate this movie. The creature suits are acceptable. There is plenty of local northern Wisconsin flavor (the strong accents, how the people looked, signs advertising Schlitz, Pabst Blue Ribbon and Old Style beer), and it was set during the winter so the scenery was pretty as there was plenty of snow on the ground... which makes the Yeti thing make more sense. The music is all over the place, which was fine for an eclectic fellow like myself. One tune was rather prog rock, which was unexpected yet a treat for my ears.
I did get some solid laughs out of it-the chief one was how even in tiny Gleason, Wisconsin... there are lodges or clubs or what have you that feature bands which play disco-tinged songs and there are women dressed up shaking their asses. Also, there is 70's soft rock music you get to hear, which I thought was a pleasant surprise. I'll be kind and say that because it was not a painful watch and you at times would get bizarre moments like the town sheriff doing impressions of people like Bogie and John Wayne for no reason at all, I will rate this as average.
Curiously, the “Bigfoot” seen here is more like the Abominable Snowman (i.e. the Yeti; he might as well have been the creature from the Rankin-Bass Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer stop-motion animation cartoon) rather than the brown hair critter that people associate with Sasquatch and was seen in the (probably staged) Patterson-Gimlin Bigfoot footage. That creature has a child and well, it's very protective so that's why what was just thought to be a Native American legend starts killing people... and why a way over the top maniacally laughing villain character named Olsen wishes to capture it for profit.
The movie, it's technically not good. The story has its share of issues, the actual filmmaking is quite weak at times and ooh boy, is there some bad child acting. Yet I can't hate this movie. The creature suits are acceptable. There is plenty of local northern Wisconsin flavor (the strong accents, how the people looked, signs advertising Schlitz, Pabst Blue Ribbon and Old Style beer), and it was set during the winter so the scenery was pretty as there was plenty of snow on the ground... which makes the Yeti thing make more sense. The music is all over the place, which was fine for an eclectic fellow like myself. One tune was rather prog rock, which was unexpected yet a treat for my ears.
I did get some solid laughs out of it-the chief one was how even in tiny Gleason, Wisconsin... there are lodges or clubs or what have you that feature bands which play disco-tinged songs and there are women dressed up shaking their asses. Also, there is 70's soft rock music you get to hear, which I thought was a pleasant surprise. I'll be kind and say that because it was not a painful watch and you at times would get bizarre moments like the town sheriff doing impressions of people like Bogie and John Wayne for no reason at all, I will rate this as average.
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