Curse of Bigfoot (1976)

This is a most peculiar and much boring Bigfoot movie. CURSE OF BIGFOOT is apparently an amalgamation of a prior flick from the 50s called TEENAGERS BATTLE THE THING and some new boring scenes (much of it stock footage) to lengthen the runtime and produce a “better” product. Being a made for TV film, I understood things couldn’t get too graphic or sexy, but apparently it could be as lame as it wanted to be.

A high school class on the supernatural is learning about strange, mythic creatures and they are expecting a guest speaker who has first hand experience with Bigfoot. The man in question is Roger Mason and he has a whopper of a tale.  But before we can ease into storytelling mode we get some sort of a documentary on Bigfoot sightings. That pretty much consists of a new understanding of Bigfoot as a prehistoric being, a monster of evolution! Then we learn of two woodsmen that walk around the forest for a long time, looking for the Bigfoot creature. This scene drags on and we get lost in the bright, sunlit foliage and beige plaid shirts.

After the short doc the real plot (Roger’s tale) starts to develop. A group of enthusiastic kids and two teachers (one of them being Roger) go on a field trip to an archaeological dig site to study shards of pottery and sticks on the ground. They uncover a tablet on the ground with strange writings. When they pull up the tablet, smoke blows out and they realize that what they are looking at was a sealed cave. Inside there is a mummified body preserved in a layer of thick mud. They take the corpse to the cabin and during the night Bigfoot breaks out of the wrappings and begins to stalk innocent people. Along with the sheriff, the group hatch a dumb plan to destroy the monster. They lure him out of the grove, splash gasoline on him and set him on fire!

Bigfoot’s face is fashioned from paper mache. He has fuzzy hair, fangs, and moss covered body. I thought he looked pretty cool, but the bastard is barely in the film. The few kill scenes we get are just close-ups of his face and the victim screaming in the background. I wanted him to grab someone by the throat and throw them across the room and snap their necks. There is a shitty brawl he has with the sheriff but that’s still not enough.

The first half of this movie is yawn inducing; so much so that I seriously considered turning off the TV and selecting another movie to review. The plot about the kids on a field trip is not much better but at least Bigfoot shows up for what it’s worth. We have to wait for it though, because they spend a good chunk of time walking around and discussing archeology. CURSE OF BIGFOOT has become a new addition to my list of “Zen” movies. These are movies so boring that you get lost and your mind wanders to a peaceful yet unnatural state. It’s as if you are meditating with the help of the movie. Five minutes after you watch it the whole thing vanishes from your mind like smoke rising from incense. The real curse is that many of you, including myself, will develop a sick desire to watch this movie again as many other reviewers have mentioned.

0 / 5 STARS