This so-dumb-it's-numbing Sasquatch cinema stinker holds the dubious honor of being possibly the first-ever American movie made about the legendary Bigfoot. Alas, it's also one of the worst-ever movies ever made about Bigfoot.
A small tribe of Sasquatchs -- one giant bad male, three babbling females, and a homely, noisy "whattheheckisit?"-type hybrid baby critter -- abduct luscious young human babes for unsavory procreative purposes. Everybody involved with this putrid turkey comes out stinking worse than filthy old socks. Bouncy, buxom blonde bombshell Joi Lansing, clad only in a skimpy pink nightie, runs shrieking through the woods with a grunting, lecherous Bigfoot in hot pursuit. Robert Mitchum's no-talent son Chris, trying to look tough with his scruffy beard and bandanna, makes for a pitifully unconvincing biker hero. John Carradine, sporting a hideously overdone Southern drawl and a juicy hamminess that could be made into a dozen cans of Spam, gives an unbearably unrestrained performance as traveling salesman Jasper B. Hawke, who wants to nab himself a Bigfoot so he can make a bundle exploiting the beast to the ninth degree. Robert Mitchum's no-talent brother John grates on the nerves with his insufferably whiny turn as Carradine's sniveling partner. Former cowboy movie star Ken Maynard came out of retirement to do a useless bit as an elderly shopkeeper. Comic actor Doodles Weaver briefly appears as a forest ranger. Such familiar B-picture faces as William Bonner, Jennifer Bishop and Russ Meyer starlet Haji (the latter having a very bad overbleached bouffant 'do day) pop up as members of a sickeningly wimpy chopper gang.
The Bigfoot creatures are stupendously sorry-looking: With their tatty, you-can-see-the-seams brown gorilla costumes, buggy eyes and rubbery, puffed-out monkey faces, they resemble rejects from a fifth-rate carnival freakshow. There's little action, nudity, violence or excitement to speak of (at one point Bigfoot wrestles a portly, out-of-it bear, but even this scene is so maladroitly staged that it fails to alleviate the incessant tedium). But there's plenty of dreadful dialogue ("As a former student of archeology I recognize these markings as having a peculiar significance"). Among the other malevolent cinematic blunders to be found within this beyond bad Bigfoot bogusity are stubbornly stationary cinematography, a hopelessly dated "groovy" semi-psychedelic rock score, a draggy pace, a meandering narrative and, last and definitely least, Robert F. Slatzer's horribly ham-fisted so-called "direction." The absolute pits.
A small tribe of Sasquatchs -- one giant bad male, three babbling females, and a homely, noisy "whattheheckisit?"-type hybrid baby critter -- abduct luscious young human babes for unsavory procreative purposes. Everybody involved with this putrid turkey comes out stinking worse than filthy old socks. Bouncy, buxom blonde bombshell Joi Lansing, clad only in a skimpy pink nightie, runs shrieking through the woods with a grunting, lecherous Bigfoot in hot pursuit. Robert Mitchum's no-talent son Chris, trying to look tough with his scruffy beard and bandanna, makes for a pitifully unconvincing biker hero. John Carradine, sporting a hideously overdone Southern drawl and a juicy hamminess that could be made into a dozen cans of Spam, gives an unbearably unrestrained performance as traveling salesman Jasper B. Hawke, who wants to nab himself a Bigfoot so he can make a bundle exploiting the beast to the ninth degree. Robert Mitchum's no-talent brother John grates on the nerves with his insufferably whiny turn as Carradine's sniveling partner. Former cowboy movie star Ken Maynard came out of retirement to do a useless bit as an elderly shopkeeper. Comic actor Doodles Weaver briefly appears as a forest ranger. Such familiar B-picture faces as William Bonner, Jennifer Bishop and Russ Meyer starlet Haji (the latter having a very bad overbleached bouffant 'do day) pop up as members of a sickeningly wimpy chopper gang.
The Bigfoot creatures are stupendously sorry-looking: With their tatty, you-can-see-the-seams brown gorilla costumes, buggy eyes and rubbery, puffed-out monkey faces, they resemble rejects from a fifth-rate carnival freakshow. There's little action, nudity, violence or excitement to speak of (at one point Bigfoot wrestles a portly, out-of-it bear, but even this scene is so maladroitly staged that it fails to alleviate the incessant tedium). But there's plenty of dreadful dialogue ("As a former student of archeology I recognize these markings as having a peculiar significance"). Among the other malevolent cinematic blunders to be found within this beyond bad Bigfoot bogusity are stubbornly stationary cinematography, a hopelessly dated "groovy" semi-psychedelic rock score, a draggy pace, a meandering narrative and, last and definitely least, Robert F. Slatzer's horribly ham-fisted so-called "direction." The absolute pits.