For all those film critics who claim that Hollywood is scared to try new ideas, here's proof that Hollywood will try anything. After making monster movies which feature every imaginable kind of vermon and pest, Hollywood got desperate and made one about monster rabbits.
(Monster RABBITS?)
That's right, the word "lepus" means rabbit. The story concerns a group of scientist who try to solve a rabbit over-population problem in the Midwest by injecting the bunnies with a hormone intended to decrease their breeding abilities. Instead, the hormone increases the rabbits' growth rate until they weight 150 pounds, stand four feet tall, and roar.
(ROARING rabbits?)
Right! That's part of what makes them MONSTER rabbits. The special effects involve a combination of real rabbits on miniature sets and actors in monster rabbit suits.
(Monster rabbit SUITS!?)
The National Guard is called in to battle this menace to mankind.
(The National Guard battles BIG BUNNIES!!?)
Yes, indeed. Producer A. C. Lyles and director William F. Claxton knew full-well that a distinguished cast was needed to lend credibility to this bold and risky venture, so they hired Stuart Whitman ("City Beneath the Sea"), Janet Leigh ("Psycho"), Deforest Kelly ("Star Trek"), Rory Calhoun ("The Texan"), and Paul Fix (numerous westerns).
These fine stars did their best, but alas it wasn't enough, and "Night of the Lepus" is considered a failed experiment. What the film needed was Morris Ankrum as an army general who uttered lines such as,
"Good Lord, if we don't stop these monsters, there won't be a single carrot left on the planet!"
Now that I would love to see.
