The Beast and the Vixens

An old codger mired in a clump of bushes recites the history of the Yeti and Sasquatch, warning us, "The story you're about to see could be true."

A furry creature with bad teeth tippy-toes around the woods. It kidnaps a topless sunbather and a hiker and hides them in a cave. Meanwhile, city girls Mary and Ann vacation at an isolated cabin, sleep in the same bed, and skinny-dip with two 70's hippie couples who've gone back to nature.

The hippies leave table scraps for the grateful creature, who repays them with some old doubloons. Two psychotic criminals, laying claim to the coins, tie-up and terrorize the young people. One of the crooks murders an old prospector, which enrages the monster. Both are killed. The enormously big-breasted Uschi Digard -- who stars in this makeshift mess -- and her friends get away. We never find out what happened to the women in the cave.

Released on video as THE BEAUTIES AND THE BEAST, this is the only X-rated Bigfoot movie I have seen. Two surprising near-porn sex scenes probably kept the film out of most drive-in theaters (where it played in 1973 as THE BEAST AND THE VIXENS). Every time Uschi drops trow, which is often, the soundtrack plays stripper music. Watch at your own risk.

A very ragged-looking voyeuristic Bigfoot kidnaps girls to keep in his cave for no apparent reason whatsoever. Enter two girls vacationing at a cabin (one of whom is Ushi Digard who can barely speak English) who meet up with a small group of hippies. Soon they're all attacked by some bad guys looking for their stash until Bigfoot shows up. This is a shoddy production all around with sex scenes that go on WAAAY too long. There is one bizarre dream sequence of a showdown between two girls wearing only gun belts and boots. Recommended only to liberal-minded Bigfoot completists only.

The legendary Bigfoot monster does his usual...erm...Bigfooting around some woods where a couple of vacationing young lovelies and a communal household of rather irritating hippies(oh Gawd....that folk song...)spend their time in various states of undress. The titular "beast" is a pretty shoddy man-in-a-gorilla-suit mess with what appears to be a cro-magnon head mask. Our Bigfoot carries unsuspecting girlies to a cave, where he keeps them captive for future(implied sexual)activities.

This rock-bottom crud has everything trash film mongers crave...it's astoundingly cheap, with more nudity than you might expect of it(full-frontal, both male and female....the Bigfoot, however, is devoid of any obvious genitalia....perhaps the monster is of the lesbian persuasion?) Pisspoor editing abounds....either the video I bought is badly cut, or several key issues are left entirely unresolved. Who cares, though? You're watching this to see boobs and cheesy monster mayhem, and that's just what you get.

Ten filthy little stars....now go buy yourself a copy.

I love how this movie opens with an sincere on screen narration about scientific facts, examples of newspaper clippings and alleged factual sightings of an American Sasquatch monster, and then stupidly continues by saying "the story you're about to see COULD be true…". Well of course it could be true! Stuff like this happens all the time! Not a week goes by or I read something in the papers about lewd and nakedly parading around wenches getting abducted in the woods by Sasquatch himself! "Beauties and the Beast", like the title implies, is a rancid and utterly nonsensical sexploitation product of the early 70's; simultaneously cashing in on the Bigfoot hype in horror cinema at that time as well as benefiting from the always popular concept of voluptuous girls practicing the Free Love principles. It's Big-foot meeting Big-boobs, as Russ Meyer regular Uschi Digard (with her lovely Scandinavian accent and her even lovelier triple-D balcony) and her friend drive up to a remote cabin in the woods where a big and perverted guy in an ape suit resides. In earlier sequences we already witnessed how he collects scarcely dressed girls and stores them in a cave without even sexually harassing them. Now, that is weird! I personally expected at least one repulsive monstrous rape-sequence, to be honest. Anyway, the girls encounter a bunch of hippies (who have been there since 8 months but never spotted the Yeti…) and subsequently some thugs in search of golden coins, so the monster never really has a proper chance to demonstrate to Uschi what a hot date he is. "Beauties and the Beast" is a pretty lousy but undeniably entertaining piece of trash, with a large amount of unintentionally hilarious sequences (for example the guy running away naked upon spotting the Sasquatch; leaving his girlfriend behind) and harmlessly tame sexual footage. The last fifteen minutes are quite strange. It feels as if, after a whole movie of redundant sex images and pointless padding, the story suddenly becomes ambitious and eventful. There's violence and rape, new characters and the titular beast actually becomes the day-saving hero! In the end, they all live happily ever after in harmony, and nobody even bothers anymore about the Yeti's first victims, who are mostly likely still entrapped in the cave.

Usually bigfoot movies and sexploitation are a winning combination whether they're arty ("La Bete"), cheesy ("Monster at Camp Sunshine"), or somewhere in between ("Tanya's Island"). This movie, however, is just boring. Actually, it's really two different boring movies with only the most tenuous connection between them. In one movie a ridiculous bigfoot-type creature kidnaps naked women. But all he does is seal them in his cave (if you're looking for some bestiality here, forget it). In the second movie, a bunch of hippie campers sit around talking endlessly, playing godawful guitar music, and having a lot of sex. And even the latter is boring because the incompetent filmmakers always managed to find the most unappealing angle from which to shoot the action and then held the same shot practically forever. It's hard to believe a movie like this that is barely more than an hour long (and at least half of which is devoted to sex scenes) could seem to drag on forever, but it does. Some of the more rabid Russ Meyer fans might appreciate the appearance of the top-heavy (if otherwise totally untalented) Uschi Digart. I really wouldn't recommend this to anyone else though.