MonsterHunter

This is one of those “raping swamp monster meets I Was A Teenage Werewolf” movies that was all the rage back in the late 70s and early 80s. Writer Tom Holland (Child’s Play) apparently thinks we’ll be entertained by seeing women raped by slimy creatures and teenage boys turning into really icky and horny monsters. He obviously has us humans confused with hentai fans.

It all starts way back in 1964 when Eli MacCleary is taking his new bride, Caroline, on their honeymoon. In what is a portent of the abysmal life she will lead in the future, Caroline’s honeymoon is to beautiful rural Mississippi! Yes, you and the cheapskate, loser husband you’ve been saddled with get to spend two days and one glorious night lost in the swamps of Niobi, Mississippi. While there, your worthless she-male of a husband will get lost in the boonies and also get the car stuck in the ditch. He’ll leave you to go get a tow truck, while you are chased down in the woods, stripped and sexually assaulted by an unidentified swamp monster!

Your honeymoon will continue in nine months when you will bear a child from this unholy union. As he gets older, your progeny will suddenly have the urge to eat human flesh, rape chicks and generally behave just like his good-for-nothing swamp monster father. If I was Caroline, I probably would’ve have passed on this honeymoon package and taken my chances on turning lesbian.

Seventeen years later, her son (Michael) is in the hospital and is fighting to survive and no one knows what’s wrong with him. The doctor says stuff like, “is there anything you haven’t told me? Like did you ever hook up with the Swamp Thing for a one night stand or something?” and the parents just kind of look at each other. Eventually those two go out in the hall to have a confab about all this and it’s obvious that Eli doesn’t want to say anything because he doesn’t want it to get out all over Mississippi that he got cuckolded by a swamp monster his wedding night.

They decide that the best thing to do is to take a field trip to Niobi and see if anyone knows where the swamp monster is living. They figure that if they can just talk to this swamp monster and get some medical history from him, then they can go back to the doctor and get a diagnosis. I should note that Eli constantly moans about how pathetic their doctors are and always wants to take the boy down to Houston for medical treatment. He even tries to sell this by telling the boy they could go see the Astrodome, the Eighth Wonder of the World! Is he a brochure from the Houston Chamber of Commerce?

Well, they roll into Niobi, and you can tell that Eli never has really done well in life since they’re driving the wood panelled station wagon you may recall from National Lampoon’s Vacation as the Family Truckster. They split up with Eli going to see the crooked judge (is there any other kind in the South?) and Caroline going over to the local paper. The judge tells Eli, that “nope, I sure don’t remember no swamp creatures raping anyone back in ‘64, but that was a long time ago.”

Caroline looks at the back issues of the local paper and this proves to be the most horrifying scene in the film! These papers are kept in boxes without any kind of collector’s Mylar bag or acid-free backing board! I cringed as I saw how yellow they had turned! That collection isn’t worth spit!

Caroline doesn’t see any “Swamp Monster Ravages Caroline MacCleary!” headlines but she does see one about some local dude getting murdered. She steals that paper and meets up with Eli and they go to the Sheriff’s office to get some more info. Meanwhile, the judge and the newspaper guy exchange nervous phone calls, tipping us off that we’ve got ourselves one of these “small town is harboring a dark and secret past” situations that seem to frequently crop up in these swamp monster epics.

The sheriff is played by a dude calling himself L.Q. Jones. Apparently this actor, whose real name is Justus E. McQueen, played a character in the movie Battle Cry named L.Q. Jones and liked the name so much he took it as its own. Eli and Caroline visit Sheriff Pool to get some information on the murder Caroline noticed in the newspaper. He tells them that he was a deputy back then and worked on the case and it was your basic dismemberment situation where pieces were found everywhere like a swamp monster tore him up, ate him, or raped him or something and no, they never did get around to arresting the swamp monster for the crime.

Later back at the Niobi Motel 6, they get word that Michael has disappeared from his hospital room. We flash to Michael who is having these visions of a house and something in the basement and Michael asks if he lets the thing out of the basement, will he leave Michael alone? Michael drives down to Niobi and shows up at some fat guy’s door. There’s a lot of talk about how hungry Michael looks. Yeah, hungry for stupid fat dude!

Michael gets this look in his eye, jumps this guy and rips his throat out and kind of chows down on him a little. Later we see Michael pretty much collapsing outside the house of the local prom queen and she takes him in and gets him to a hospital. Michael’s parents are summoned and they go and see that Michael is looking and feeling much better. In fact, Michael feels so much better that he checks out of the hospital so that he can stalk this girl full time.

Michael and the prom queen go off walking in the woods and Michael asks her about a particularly scuzzy and creepy part of the woods and she says that it’s Black Pine Bog and that nobody goes there since its so scuzzy and creepy. So Michael makes her go there with her dog and they’re making out (just Michael and the prom queen, not the dog) and while they’re getting busy, Rover returns carrying a severed arm! Understandably, this breaks the mood and the two lovebirds go off in search of the authorities. Soon, they’ve got every available man digging up the bog and have thirty plus bodies on their hands, including some that were supposed to be buried in the town cemetery!

Sheriff Pool and Eli decide it’s time to question the local mortician. He’s related to the judge and everyone else involved in this swamp monster scandal. The mortician professes his innocence, so Pool leaves to go dig up the grave where one of the victims is supposed to be buried. In the meantime, Michael has another bout of swamp gas and attacks the mortician, embalming him alive.

Later we see Michael and the town drunk having a conversation where Michael’s voice changes and he talks to the drunk like they’re old buddies. He tells the drunk that he is really Billy Connors inhabiting a new body and is bent on revenge for the murder that happened back in 1964. Later, Michael throws the town drunk onto a power transformer and we get to see him electrocuted. Smells like burnt schnapps!

The movie’s centerpiece is the extended transformation of Michael into his really ugly and undoubtedly smelly swamp monster alter-ego. There’s skin that rips, giant bubbles that pulsate on his head, drool everywhere, and mothers recoiling in horror! Some of the effects are really well done and others look a little fake, but there are times when this kid is looking like the Elephant Man that you really tip your hat to the special effects and make up guys.

Finally, this beast breaks free and runs amok. Meanwhile, everyone has taken refuge at the county jail, where the judge appears sans toupee. Crooked and bald? What a piece of crap! Eli threatens to shuck him back outside for the beast to get unless he comes clean about what he knows. When he eventually coughs up the tale about Billy Connors, it involves an affair, cannibalism, and all kinds of cool stuff.

This was a pretty effective movie, surprising in the levels of brutality and gore it presented throughout. Eli is played by Ronny Cox, between his time as the wishy-washy banjo guy in Deliverance and his time as a prick on St. Elsewhere and in Robocop 2. He is a quality actor trying to deliver a believable performance in a movie where his son is a sexually predatory cannibalistic swamp fiend. He does well communicating the concerned father gimmick. Paul Clemens (Michael) also doesn’t do too badly at looking alternately sickly and psychotic.

The reason sort of given (or maybe not given at all) for Michael being a monster makes no sense and I’m not really sure that aspect was ever addressed in the big Scooby-Doo moment when the judge spilled his guts, but you can’t argue with good effects, loads of violence, and characters that are more than cannon fodder. The presence of Designing Women’s Meshach Taylor as a deputy only adds to the horror of a film that transcends its dopey premise to become a fairly nasty diversion.

© 2008 MonsterHunter