User Reviews

Is there a book titled "How to Make a Movie with Every 'Man vs. Nature' Cliché Imaginable"? If not, Ants would make excellent source material for the chapter on killer insects. Ants doesn't have one shred of originality to be found at any point of its 100 minute runtime. I suppose the most surprising thing about Ants is that they actually stretched the film to 100 minutes. The set-up, the characters, the various sub-plots, the death scenes, and the way the ants are presented have been done before any number of times – and in most cases, much better. It's amazing that so many of these Insects on a Rampage films were made in the 70s because they're all basically the same movie.

And can someone please tell me what in God's name Myrna Loy is doing in this monkey-turd of a movie? A woman as talented and classy as Loy deserved better than Ants as one of her final movies.

Another reason to proclaim the 1970's as the coolest decade for horror and cult cinema: those numerous "nature revolting against humanity" flicks! The seventies were plentiful of movies that introduced all sorts of animal species, in various sizes and degree of cuddliness, as relentless killing machines. Insects and arachnids were particularly popular because their ugly appearance automatically scares a lot of people, so the idea of these little critters going on an intentional killing spree would be really petrifying. "Phase IV", from 1974, understood this very well and depicted a simple ant colony as an aggressively revolting army, but "It Happened at Lakewood Manor" can only aspire to be something unsettling, scary or suspenseful. This is actually quite a hilarious movie, even though that definitely wasn't the makers' intention. Sleazy businessman Tony Fleming is heading for Lakewood, a quiet and peaceful holiday resort near the coast, to purchase the cozy Adams' family hotel and turn it into a casino. Right next to the hotel is a construction site and the workers stumble upon billions of hostile ants whose bite became poisonous due to – of course – mankind's continuous use of pesticides. Luckily the ants only attack if they feel threatened. So basically the situation isn't catastrophic at all and there is plenty of time to safely evacuate the hotel guests, but since nobody believes his ant-theory, the alleged "hero" goes bonkers and starts agitating them with his bulldozer for a seemingly endless amount of time! Naturally the seriously upset insects invade the hotel after that, but it's his own entire damn fault! From then onwards the movie gradually becomes more ridiculous with every minute that passes. A handful of people remains trapped inside the hotel with ants closing in on them even though, at least according to, they could easily just walk out and squish hundreds of them underneath their shoes. They're ants, for Christ's sake, not grizzlies! What happens next is the world's worst organized large-scaled rescue operation in history. Here we have the local police force, the fire department and the coast guard collaborating together, but they actually bring lives in danger rather than saving them. I swear, if these people would ever have to fight a really big fire, we would have a severe massacre on our hands. They don't know how to operate rescue ladders and literally blow killer ants upon innocent spectators. If all this isn't embarrassing enough just yet, "It Happened at Lakewood Manor" ends with a serious anti-climax by showing the remaining survivors sitting still for nearly ten minutes. Another lesson learned: you can survive an ant invasion if you remain motionless and breathe through a straw of wallpaper. The film stars Suzanne Somers, who I only know from that dreadful sitcom "Step by Step" in which she was married to Patrick Duffy and had some really hot daughters, in a very suitable role. She's the mistress of the obnoxious businessman and throughout half the film she tries to convince him that she's more than just a blond bimbo with a nice rack. Obviously, all she ever does is behave like a blond bimbo with a nice rack and then she gets eaten by ants! Anyway, as you can tell, "It Happened at Lakewood Manor" isn't a good – or even remotely decent – horror film, but you definitely won't feel bored. The special effects must have been quite cheap in this case. From a bit of a distance, the ants just look like little black spots on the walls and the ceiling. It's strange that the script of this film was penned down by Guerdon Trueblood, who also wrote the other creature features flicks "Tarantula: The Deadly Cargo" and "The Savage Bees" and directed the exploitation classic "The Candy Snatchers". All of these films are numerous times better than this inept and wannabe tense TV-excuse for an eco-horror movie. Generous rating 5 out of 10, but only for laughs and entertainment value.

I'm huge fan of killer creature Featurs , This as be on my watch list for some time.

Finally had time to watch it, I enjoyed it , actually I really enjoyed it for what it was.

I found it very entertaining from start to end I didn't find it boring at all.

The Ants attacks scenes was decent for a TV movie, I didn't expect any blood or anything ,

I did laugh a number of times, silly stuff in th8s movie, that is meant to be taken seriously but it very funny.

(Small Spoiler ) Chef I kicked had 2₩ ants on his foot, he didn't one of them for a least 5 mins) it was so bad , it was funny, Which the movie so bad it good.

Acting wasn't great but decent.

This nicely creepy and enjoyable 70's made-for-TV killer animal horror item centers on a nest of lethal and poisonous ants which are unearthed by a construction crew working on a posh lakeside resort. The ants proceed to attack a few folks and trap a handful of others inside. Among those trapped in the resort are feisty elderly owner Myrna Loy, her comely daughter Lynda Day George (who also dealt with a larger array of deadly critters in "Day of the Animals"), rugged construction foreman Robert Foxworth (who later faced off with a murderous misshapen mutant bear in "Prophecy"), jerky sleazeball businessman Gerald Gordon and his lovely partner Suzanne Sommers of "Three's Company" sitcom fame, health inspector Steve Franken, and sexy drifter Karen Lamm. Trying to rescue the people trapped inside are construction worker Bernie Casey and fire chief Brian Dennehy. Capably directed by Robert Scheerer, with a tight script by Guerdon Trueblood (who wrote "Tarantulas: The Deadly Cargo" the same year), several truly skin-crawling ant attack scenes (the sequence where Sommers gets munched is a definite highlight, plus a little boy has a close call with the ants as well), a nice snappy pace, and uniformly sound acting from a fine cast, this baby makes for a most satisfying and occasionally harrowing little scarefest.