Friday, January 18, 2008

Beneath Those Manholes, A Man Eater Is Waiting

I love me a good horror/suspense flick that takes an animal and makes it the ultimate killer - Jaws is of c ourse the granddaddy in the cinematic sense of this genre, but I like them a little more shocking - sure Jaws is great and the whole beginning rocks but then it turns into more of a drama where the sequal Jaws 2 which follows a group of kids on a sailing trip systematically pegged off by a giant shark - now that's a great piece of cinema.

I have a fondness for all of these movies - including the wonderful yet obscure The Bermuda Depths - an eerie little flick about of all things a giant sea turtle, then there's the endless case of snakes, alligators and crocodiles that wreak havoc from the swamp to the urban mecca. Hell there's even Night Of The Lepus, a movie I thought I made up but actually exists, in that one Janet Leight (among others) are terrorized by.... wait for it, wait for it - giant killer rabbits! I know!

Spiders are also a great little animal that gets a lot of starring roles, though I must say that kind of falls into a sub genre of when animals go bad - in which it's the insects taking over...

So for Christmas, my pal Amy Cissell got me one of my all time favs on DVD - the restored version of Alligator - in which a little girl's father flushes her pet alligator down the toilet and the thing ends up eating dogs and cats that are thrown into the sewer by a loser pet shop owner whose sending defenseless cats and dogs to a scientist doing (of course) hormone therapy. Now I won't ruin the movie, but let me just tell you this is one of the more clever ones, as they know they are making a B movie - the dialogue is funny, the whole thing is a tad campy and in one of the more enjoyable twists - little Michael Fairgate from Knots Landing (Pat Peterson) is even in it! For some reason I found the lead character Robert Forster uber sexy, and I'm not sure why? Oh and did I mention the first person killed is sewer worker Edward Norton? Here's the trailer:



After watching Alligator the other day I was desperate for more Animals Go Bad so luckily I had rented a few from my beloved Net Flix. ... but alas there's a story with this one...

When I was but a wee tyke my mom and dad took me to the drive in with them - I think they probably couldn't find a babysitter and figured I'd just fall asleep in the back of our gigantic station wagon.. that's the reason I can think of for them taking me to a double feature horror drive in show where one movie had a couple of old ladies who had some hidden monster in their basement and another movie I thought for sure didn't exist Dogs! Yep, those cute little suburban dogs you find in every back yard of suburbia turn on their masters and make a bloody mess of a small California town... The one thing I always remember of the flick was some poor woman getting chomped on in her shower! For some reason it always stuck with me and I swore it was a gross fest with the blue and white fragments of guts and gore on the shower floor when it was all over... I know what an image.

A few years ago I read an interview with the uber cool Linda Gray - Sue Ellen of Dallas, and the interviewer asked her about her big role in the flick Dogs in which she was killed in the shower! Can you even believe it? Not only did the movie exist but it was frickin' Sue Ellen (Swellin' as I like to call her as it not only is how the Southern accent of her co-stars say it, but it also gives kudos to the characters penchant for booze and more booze) -

So after adding Alligator to my wish list on Amazon (again thank u Cissell) they started adding recommendations and wouldn't you know it - Dogs was on there! On DVD! I couldn't believe it... It took a bit of a hangover to get the Leivas to watch it with me, but we watched it and let me tell you does have some bloody little moments - I obviously did fall asleep cause I so don't remember the ending - and as for Miss Gray's horrible shower scene, it's still bloody but not nearly as disturbing as I had it made it out to be in my mind - and just for you, my fans and friends here is Miss Gray's big scene:



But wait there is so much more because we watched one more little Animals Go Bad and it has to be the mother of all - a little flick from New Zealand called Black Sheep. Let me just say that this movie is complete genius - it's hilarious - including the demise of some of the sheep - a crazy little scene where a bunch of people are attacked which is similar to Alligator - so I'm sure it's an homage and even a scene where a sheep comes flying at someone - it's a frickin' riot - I'm so glad that the Leivas bought it so we can enjoy it over and over again... anyone want to come over and see sheep go baaaad?


Now I'm off to watch Pirahna - not the one where they sprout wings and fly but the original where they just chew up Young & The Restless' Melody Thomas (are these the only kind of movies soap stars are allowed to do?) and make little fishy chirpy noises - it's no wonder I don't go outside with all these crazy ass animals going crazy...

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posted by swivek @ 10:04 AM

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