To Catch a Yeti

TO CATCH A YETI is an awful kid's adventure film about a baby Yeti that finds itself kidnapped by a pair of hunters and transported to America, where it falls in with your average family and yearns to get back home to the snow again. That's the entire plot of the film, which mainly consists of dumb scenes involving a model Yeti that rips off the look of Gizmo in the GREMLINS movies. Highlights of the film include the Yeti going on a skateboard ride through a local park and being smuggled in somebody's backpack. The animatronic effects are very poor, leaving this looking like a plastic model for the most part.

Even worse are the performances, especially those from a couple of the worst child actors I've seen in a while. A couple of the women seemed to have British accents and if they truly are British actors then I can only apologise for their presence here. Meat Loaf is the most fun actor as the stereotypical villain but even he's poor, just slightly less poor than everything and everyone else around him.

In 1994, Meat Loaf fiercely attempted to end his acting career by playing Big Jake Grizzly, a hunter who tries to catch a yeti.

Okay, brace yourselves, here it comes: the mighty yeti is about 20 inches tall and looks like the furry result of a disastrous love affair between a Gremlin and a Monchichi. Yikes.

The Yeti escapes to the big city and hides out with an American family. The whole thing is of course reminiscent of E. T. and ALF... if you subtract the homesickness drama and all the humor. The frazzled teddy doesn't talk, he just stares super cutely. He hardly ever moves, just squats around or is carried. The puppet animation is just lousy, so that there is no sympathy for the annoying sit-down monster.

This movie is so stupid that you wonder how something like this could ever be filmed. It thankfully only ran on TV and was released on VHS, but my goodness, real people watched this! The makers should be prosecuted for this.

Ever look at a ratty stuffed toy and wish that its eyes moved around a little and its mouth sort of opened and closed? Well, have I got the movie event you've been waiting for! For the rest of us unfortunate enough to watch this piece of poo, you'll want to kill yourself just like the police in the small town will apparently do if you told them someone stole your yeti! Yes, the makers of this film thought lets make a film about a crummy looking stuffed toy and have the most horrifically obnoxious characters ever interact with it and for reasons that still baffle me, they thought Meatloaf was some sort of real super strong badass who could portray a hunter...

The story, Big Jake and his traveling companion fatboy or lard guy or something along those lines are in Nepal searching for a yeti that is not at all like you would expect as it is not large, but rather looks like a scraggly piece of rodent roadkill. It eludes capture by hiding in a bag of a person camping and he somehow does not notice it as he packs his bags and heads home where his daughter unnaturally leaves a piece of pumpkin pie outside the bathroom door for her father and this seemingly unnatural act is the first of many as when the creature is discovered the girl proudly says that she found its penis, thus, she knows its a boy! Meanwhile, Big Jake keeps tracking it and never breaks out in song while we see the most obnoxious portrayal of a kid ever! The only way I made it through this drek is that it is featured on Rifftrax and even then the jokes made at the movies expense could not make this film so bad its good...

The only 'actor' of note is musician Meatloaf who was kind of trying to do acting during this time. The makers of this film apparently thought he was a tough guy, but I remember him most for singing a song and getting axed by Dr. Frankenfurter from Rocky Horror! I have never pictured him as anything but a dude who would most likely grow tired and pass out after a few seconds in a fight. The yeti looks horrible, some other reviewer thought that thing was cute, but I have seen decomposing animals on the side of the road that looked more alive and less ratty than the thing in this film. Also, it apparently starts to die when it overheats, so shouldn't it have died like when it was in the dude's bag for like the longest time ever?

So if you wish to torture yourself and watch a ratty toy go on an adventure, this is the film for you! For everyone else, I implore you to never lay your eyes upon this most foulest of crap! It is an excruciating film to watch as you watch people act unnaturally as people who have sons that purposely electrocute maids do not buy them a yeti, they send them to military school or therapy!

I only watched this to see just how bad it was and because it involved Meatloaf (RIP). Speaking of which, what the hell was he thinking when he signed on for this? I'm not at all surprised this took less than two weeks to film, because it completely shows.

Meatloaf plays a hunter named Big Jake Grizzly who is hired to catch a Yeti by an evil millionaire while accompanied by his dim-witted assistant, Blubber. The Yeti stows away aboard a plane, winds up in New York, is taken in by a suburban family and is named Hank by the daughter, Amy. Naturally, Grizzly and Blubber follow to continue their hunt and collect their payment while shenanigans ensue as Amy tries to send Hank home.

First off, the little Yeti puppet looks nothing like a Yeti and spoke volumes of the films crummy budget. He looked very cheap and unimpressive, as if he were a reject puppet made for a kids show from a decade prior, and his rat-like tail, and buck teeth made him look hideous. He hardly even moved by himself at all, and every sound he made was annoying. The rest of the effects were just as bad, with choppy editing and poorly executed slow/fast motion during the action scenes.

All of the actors are as wooden as 2x4s as they phone in their roles. Meatloaf himself couldn't save this movie and looks like he doesn't even want to be here. The other characters are either dull or as annoying as the Yeti, and worst of all was Wesley, the spoiled rich kid and likely future serial killer since he just wants the Yeti so he can abuse it.

Ultimately, this was an ET rip-off mixed horribly with the Yeti genre. I highly doubt even young children would enjoy this. Personally, I was bored to tears and couldn't even be bothered to watch anymore after the first half-hour, because that was more than enough to conclude that this film is trash and deserves its low rating.

I don't know why I thought this might be good. Turns out it's virtually comedy free and full of plot holes. There was one only funny moment in the entire movie. The best joke was when they were in the train station and they announced the last train to Clarksville, but it wasn't funny enough to make me laugh. You might like this if your are 8 years old but anyone older won't enjoy this for a minute.