Night Fright

Why film a movie if you are not going to provide light for the cameras. The film would have been about seven minutes long if it were not for the shots of people walking through the woods. I enjoyed seeing the typical sixties dress and the 60's cars. I couldn't help but ask myself what self respecting kid would drive a Tornado, though they were neat cars. The music was tedious and repetitive. Ten minutes of people dancing in the dark was too much. I've seen worse acting, but the manikin should have had top billing. At least it kept it's mouth closed. I think the motivation for making the movie must have been that someone had a lot of film available that had gone beyond the expiration date and they didn't want to see it go to waste. It went to waste.

Something in the forest is killing and mutilating the denizens of a rural Texas community. Could it have something to do with the nearby crash of a recently launched rocket? Probably. Sheriff John Agar leads an investigation as the obligatory group of wild local teens get their kicks in the danger zone.

Besides being shot far too dark, NIGHT FRIGHT is technically not much worse than many other regional indie horrors of the period. The worst thing about it is that it just isn't very interesting, and when the wheels are finally greased for some good cheap thrills, the delivery is too little too late.

Yep, NIGHT FRIGHT is kind of a snore. However...the clothes, hair, and interior furnishings are hilariously dated, so if you have an aesthetic taste for kitsch Americana, you'll at least find it a wealth of amusing mid-century retrocities. Most of the production crew are noted for their contributions to the notoriously low-grade cinema of director LARRY BUCHANAN, so it's no surprise that it looks a lot like something from his inglorious filmography.

3.5/10. Not recommended.

There is one adjective that describes everything about this film - acting, plot, effects, continuity, etc. - and that word is poor. The government wants to asses the effects of space travel on certain organisms but the capsule crashes and a mutant something-or-other (looks like a guy in an ape suit with the top of a football helmet over his face) wreaks havoc around the accident scene, which includes a favorite place for the window-fogging, partying set. Therefore, some young people - as well as a law enforcement officer - are among the creature's victims. You gotta be extremely unparticular about how you spend your time - or rich, if you spend any money - to view this epic.

Okay it is terribly, and I mean terribly, easy to pick apart this film. C'mmon what do you expect with the title, synopsis, and actors in leads such as Carol Gilley, Ralph Baker Jr., Dorothy Davis, Bill Thurman, and, my personal favourite, Roger Ready. Yes, B star John Agar is here as a sheriff out to rid the Texan landscape of a robot-like ape from a NASA experiment gone awry. The movie has dreadful performances, dreadful scenery, dreadful special effects, and dreadful lighting. I really cannot find much good to say about it other than as bad films go you could do a lot worse as far as finding something dreadful to sit through. It is bearably short and has many moments of unintended humor. Missed cues, lighting faux pas, off-screen terror, an unbelievably inane score, and of course John Agar trying his level best to be the core of the film with an earnest performance amidst this muck. The beginning is the hardest part to sit through as it seems like it takes forever for these two teens to get their comeuppance for traveling in the woods down the Texas back roads where great ape soon will reek his vengeance in his own terrible way...Yeah right! Night Fright! Bah!

I am a fan of bad horror films of the 1950s and 60s--films so ridiculous and silly that they are good for a laugh. So, because of this it's natural that I'd choose this film--especially because with John Agar in it, it was practically guaranteed to be bad. Sadly, while it was a bad film, it was the worst type of bad film--dull beyond belief and unfunny. At least with stupid and over-the-top bad films, you can laugh at the atrocious monsters and terrible direction and acting. Here, you never really see that much of the monster (mostly due to the darkness of the print) and the acting, while bad, is more low energy bad...listless and dull.

The film begins with some young adults going to Satan's Hollow to neck. Well, considering the name of the place, it's not surprising when they are later found chewed to pieces! Duh...don't go necking at Satan's Hollow!! Well, there are reports of some sort of crashing object from the sky, so what do the teens go? Yep, throw a dance party--a very, very, very slow dance party where the kids almost dance in slow motion. So it's up to the Sheriff (Agar) and his men to ensure that the teens can dance in peace without fear of mastication.

As for the monster, it's some guy in a gorilla suit with a silly mask--a bit like the monster in ROBOT MONSTER. Not exactly original and not exactly high tech. To make it worse, it makes snorting noises and moves very, very slowly--so slow that even the most corpulent teen could easily outrun it! How it manages to kill repeatedly is beyond me.

Overall, too dull to like--even if you are a fan of lousy cinema.