A-List: Animals Eating People Movies
By Stephanie Star Smith
July 1, 2005
Nearly since the beginning of the horror film, a favorite sub-genre has been the Animals Eating People, or AEP, movies. The name says it all: some fellow creature a little lower down the food chain takes its revenge upon humankind for all the indignities that have been visited upon it over the eons. Sometimes this happens because the specimens in question have undergone some sort of mutation: Radiation and assorted other nuclear-based changes were a favorite in the ‘50s; pollution took center-stage in the ‘70s; and lately, genetic tinkering has been the mutagen-of-choice. In this sub-genre of the sub-genre, the beasties that go on the rampage are usually either larger, more vicious, no longer extinct, or some combination thereof. Other times, the beasties just start munching on mankind because...well, we've not been all that nice to Mother Nature, and now she's pretty damned pissed.
Below is a list of some of my favorite When Animals Really Attack flicks, along with some Honorable Mentions that just missed the cut, and some Dishonorable Mentions for films that managed to make huge beasties devouring humans a boring proposition.
Piranha (1978)
Probably the coolest thing about this movie is that piranhas, unlike some of the beasties favored by AEP filmmakers, are actually pretty damned dangerous to humans. And animals and fish and just about anything else made of meat that has the misfortune to blunder into their paths.
For this go-round, the piranhas have been - wait for it - mutated through some sort of nefarious governmental experimentation, creating more vicious fishies than the variety normally is. Which passes understanding when one stops to think about it, but just as it should, this film doesn't give the viewer time to ponder much; it just heads out on that roller coaster track and speeds you through its thrills and dark humor, courtesy of scripter John Sayles and director Joe Dante. Lots of swipes at science and the military-industrial complex gone mad and business taking precedence over public safety, and the usual don't-ignore-someone-just-because-he/she-is-a-nonconformist/rookie lessons, the latter itself a variation of the treasured ‘50s conceit nobody-believes-the-teens-until-they-save-the-town/world. And just in case that sounds a tad too highbrow, there are plenty of piranha feeding-frenzy scenes and all those lovely near-misses horror films like to show with children frolicking in the surf or hotel guests having a party on the oh-so-exclusive beach whilst the piranhas come closer and closer and closer and nobody listens to the man telling them to get the hell out of the water NOW. Great camp fun.
The film was remade in 1995 as part of Showtime's Roger Corman Presents series, and serves as an object lesson that remaking a film just to take advantage of advances in F/X is almost never a good idea. Avoid the '95 version at all costs.
Deep Blue Sea
Another AEP where man is, at least partly, directly to blame for the monster now looking to make him dinner, Deep Blue Sea takes our favorite ocean-going predator, the shark, and genetically enhances it so it's as intelligent as humans. Bad idea, because any nature show will tell you that sharks are the planet's most effective predators, aptly-named killing machines that only do four things: hunt, eat, sleep and make more sharks.
Deep Blue Sea is a bit different than the majority of films in this sub-genre mostly due to its surprises. It follows the basic Red-Shirt, Red-Shirt, Who's the Next Red-Shirt? format, but throws in quite a few surprises. Also, instead of one group of potential meals trying to escape together and being picked off one by one, Deep Blue Sea follows a couple of parallel storylines, and you're not sure at any given point who's going to snuff it on which arc. This is a case where advances in F/X and animatronics are a plus, for unlike dear Brucie, the mechanical shark in Jaws that looked so fake Spielberg couldn't shoot it full-on - which had the unintended benefit of heightening the fear factor - the shark here is not only quite realistic-looking, but pretty bleeding scary enough without the genetically-enhanced intelligence. The filmmakers also made excellent use of the shark's natural hunting style of an ambush predator, so you never really know quite when or where Super-Shark might show up and chow down. The film also makes it very clear early on that no one, including those the experienced AEP viewer would tend to automatically eliminate as potential shark food, is safe. Having the action set at an ocean-going research facility only heightens the dread; Super-Shark is completely in his element, whilst his erstwhile Happy Meals on Legs are at a distinct disadvantage. Sprinkle a bit of "If he escapes the enclosed environment, humanity is doomed!" onto the mix, add a generous pinch of black humor, and voila! The best shark-attack AEP since the granddaddy of them all.
Lake Placid
Most of the AEPs that have made my list are served up with a generous helping of black humor, and Lake Placid is no exception to that. In fact, Lake Placid can almost be said to have its tongue firmly planted in its cheek, because there's not only gore but laughs to be had in copious and nearly-identical amounts.
Lake Placid follows that other water-based highly-efficient predator, the crocodile. And our crocodiles here aren't enhanced in any way, shape or form: Their genes haven't been tampered with, they haven't mutated due to pollution, the government isn't trying to create some sort of super biological weapon; they're just crocodiles. Extremely large crocs, but crocs just the same. This flick avoids the nobody-believes-X-until-
it's-too-late convention, but there are still lots of crocs munching people and edge-of-your-seat near-misses. And if nothing else, you really should check out Lake Placid for the hysterical turn by Betty White as a crotchety old woman who is decidedly more fond of the reptiles in the water than the bipedal primates who would do them harm.
Nightwing
Outside of Hollywood and Hammer Horror, vampire bats are not a threat to humans. Although in South America the bats have been known to attack prey as large as cattle, in general, they prefer smaller prey, and they pretty much leave Homo sapiens alone. Nor are vampire bats generally killers; they suck such small amounts of blood at any one time that larger mammals they feed upon barely notice the loss.
In Nightwing, greedy oil-company types are trying to steal sacred land from two Native American reservations, with the help of a corrupt Bureau of Indian Affairs official. The movie identifies the tribes as the Pahana and the Maskie; I'm not sure if Maskie is a real, hitherto unknown tribe, but Pahana is a legendary Hopi spirit who will one day return and punish mankind for not taking care of its Mother Earth. The vampire bats begin by attacking their usually-largest prey, cattle, albeit to a deadly extreme not normally seen. Soon, however, our newly-lethal winged terrors move on to attack humans. The local Native American sheriff and his veterinarian girlfriend are soon joined by an expert vampire-bat hunter as they try to stop the ever-growing slaughter before the vampire bats decimate the human population around the sacred valley.
There are a couple of cool things about Nightwing. First, it is pretty educational; the viewer not only learns a fair amount about vampire bats, but also how to survive if one becomes stranded in the desert and about the culture of the Southwest Native American tribes, in particular sacred rituals. Then there's the Native American mysticism, an integral part of the story that kicks Nightwing up a couple of notches on the AEP hierarchy. And of course there's the always-satisfying evil people-get-their-just-desserts angle, which in this film happens to pretty much everybody who tried to desecrate sacred lands with destructive mining, disrespecting Mother Earth in the process. And the ending is rather mystical and symbolic as well; though a bit off the beaten track when it comes to AEPs, it adds to the overall spiritual quality of the film.
Nightwing isn't your typical who-gets-eaten-next flick, and it might be a bit too high-brow for some, but it's a unique packaging of the essential AEP elements, and definitely a film that will give you food for thought as you watch the end credits roll.
Reign of Fire
Although technically this isn't an AEP - the dragons, as far as the film ever shows us, don't eat people; they just incinerate them - but it is a classic tale of man versus nature, and a sobering demonstration of just what the fate of humans could well be should a creature higher up the food chain ever come along.
The big draw of Reign of Fire is the dragons. In a film like this, where all the focus is on the beasties that are destroying humankind, said beasties have to be pretty impressive; this is even more important when the critters are not based in reality (as far as we know), and so our disbelief must be suspended not only for the film's plot, but for its main characters as well. Reign of Fire passes this test with flying colors, as it were; the dragons are large, fierce, fire-breathing marvels, seeming indestructible and definitely formidable enough to hunt man to near-extinction, even given what one would believe is humanity's clear advantage in the weaponry department. In horror films, even more so than in comedy, you have to buy the premise before you can buy the bit, and by the time we start following the few remnants of humanity leading a hard-scrabble, almost medieval existence and just barely avoiding extinction, we have completely bought the premise, thanks to the wonderfully-rendered dragons. In fact, the dragons are so cool, the fight to re-establish mankind at the top of the food chain has the audience's loyalties torn; while we want our future brethren to thrive and return to what we see as a normal existence, we're not altogether thrilled with the realization that in order for the Earth to return to that normalcy, the dragons have to once again be made extinct themselves. Always the hallmark of a good horror film, especially an AEP, when you find yourself rooting at least in part for mankind's opponent.
Forget all the bad things you heard about Reign of Fire during its theatrical release; it's a film that is more than worth the almost-hour-and-three-quarters time investment.
Snakehead Terror
A Sci-Fi Original Pictures production, Snakehead Terror focuses on a real amphibian. Snakeheads are voracious carnivores every bit as deadly as piranha and sharks, except snakeheads have the extra-added attraction of having legs and being able to chase prey on land. There have been several instances in recent years of these predators invading local waterways and decimating the native fish population. They also tend to be extremely difficult to kill or relocate once they've established themselves, wreaking havoc on the local economy both by undermining fishing concerns and in the cost of ridding the lakes of the invaders.
Snakehead Terror combines this real-life scenario and adds the man-messing-with-the-ecosystem device, in the form of the illegal dumping of chemicals, namely HGH. The few remaining snakeheads that survived an earlier mass poisoning to rid the lake of their presence now grow to ginormous dimensions, and once again humans lose their spot at the top of the food chain as the snakeheads take to preying on the only food left to them: us. This flick also eschews the usual nobody-believes-the-monster-reports convention as the majority of the townsfolk, having endured the first infestation, easily accept that the creatures are back, and it doesn't take many attacks for them to acknowledge that this time, the snakeheads aren't just threatening the indigenous fishies or the town's economy.
The eponymous creatures are a bit cheesy CGI-wise, but the film does provide some cool predation sequences, and what appears to be dastardly doings that created the problem turns out to actually be a simple, if incredibly stupid, act of survival in a town that is only just beginning to recover from the devastated economy brought about by the snakeheads' first invasion. Sci-Fi Original Pictures are a crapshoot in terms of quality and compelling plots, but Snakehead Terror definitely falls to the decidedly-watchable end of that uncertain ruler.
Honorable Mentions
DinoCroc
Just putting a brief mention here, as this is the subject of a future Slimy Wall, but this was a neat little take on the cloned dinosaur DNA theme that managed to throw in a couple of unexpected twists as well as employing the fake-ending chestnut - not once, but twice - in a unique and amusing way. Plus Roger Corman produced, and as far as I'm concerned, the man has the Midas touch when it comes to horror films.
Jaws
No discussion of AEPs would be complete without at least a mention of the granddaddy of the modern AEP, our friend Brucie the mechanical Great White, the shark hunter who saw first-hand how nature's killing machine operates when he went down with the Indianapolis, the former big-city-cop-turned-small-town sheriff who's not real comfortable on the water and was looking for a little peace and quiet, and the overwrought ichthyologist who just really needs a tranquilizer or six. The film that established Steven Spielberg as the wunderkind on his way to becoming a Hollywood legend, it also succeeded in making people a bit skittish next time they ventured to their favorite beach, worried about what might be lurking in the ocean, and established a short leitmotif in the public consciousness as a permanent harbinger of Bad Things About to Happen.
Jurassic Park
Another Spielberg entry in the AEP pantheon, the dinosaurs of Jurassic Park were certainly more cooperative from a filming standpoint than poor old Brucie, who needed camera tricks to look frightening. There are also the usual caveats against science trying to play God with a side of corporate greed, industrial espionage and a reminder that just because we can do something, it doesn't necessarily mean we should. Now if they'd only play Weird Al's Jurassic Park over the closing credits, this would come very close to being a perfect film.
Them!
As the Atomic Age dawned at the beginning of the ‘50s, a Golden Age of sorts began for the AEP. The ‘50s staple, of course, was gigantism caused by radiation from nuclear sources, and filmmakers of the era tended to choose animals and insects that are ordinarily either harmless or mere annoyances and make them dangerous, enormous adversaries. Them! is the gold standard of these films, taking those picnic nuisances, the humble ants, and turning them into huge murderous creatures that will stop at nothing to get what they want: sugar, and a place for the queen to lay her eggs. Although the idea of instantaneous mutation from exposure to radiation has since been proved to be pretty much bollocks, the science as presented in the film is sound within its own established parameters, and having the scientists and the Army being the good guys for a change is still a rarity. More than any other radioactively-overgrown creature feature, Them! still holds up today as a great thrill ride and a fine example of the sub-genre.
The Killer Shrews
MST3K-worthy though it is - in fact, if memory serves, I believe Joel and the bots had a go at it - I have a soft spot for The Killer Shrews. Such a good bad movie, what with the dogs decked out in bugly masks pretending to be giant, ravenous shrews that had somehow suddenly become poisonous as well; the humans-trapped-on-an-island scenario and the pitting-of-the-intelligence gambit; lots of G-rated attacks accompanied by copious bad acting; and the bad guys getting their comeuppance whilst the good guys escape. While it's certainly not a film I'd recommend you actively seek out on your next trip to the local video emporium, if you happen to run across it late one night whilst flipping channels, stop down and have a laugh.
Dishonorable Mentions
Sabretooth
This flick is a Sci-Fi Original Picture I saw on a TiVo-created double-bill with DinoCroc, and I actually expected this to be the better film, DinoCroc being Roger Corman-produced notwithstanding. I mean, a sabretooth tiger provides a lot more potential for playing Red-Shirt, Red-Shirt, Who's the Next Red-Shirt? than a boring old crocodile. Plus, John Rhys-Davies is in the cast, an actor I think has never really gotten the acclaim, nor the work, that his talent deserves. And at the start, the film seemed like it might be promising. The way in which the sabretooth was unleashed on the unsuspecting countryside was telegraphed about a hundred miles out, but hey, the beastie has to get loose somehow, or else how is he going to eat all those PYTs? After all, AEPs, much like slasher films, have to follow certain conventions. Even the meta-reference Scream flicks had to stick to the accepted path even as they skewered the standard story arc.
Sadly, however, this was only the first of many, many things that even a half-asleep two-year-old could see coming from six light-years away.
In AEPs, just as in slasher films, it's always fun to lay bets with yourself as to who gets offed and who makes it to the last reel. But it is never a good thing when a movie paints the targets on the backs of the future animal food for you right from the first reel. There isn't a single surprise in this entire film; in fact, one of the victims is so obviously a future sabretooth meal he's even wearing a red shirt. Ain't no fun when you know who's getting snuffed and pretty much in what order.
It also doesn't help that both the Sabretooth Chow and the survivors are cardboard cutouts about as well-rounded as a boxing ring. From the Mad Scientist Looking for Glory and Protective of Her Creation to the Industrialist Seeking More Wealth to the PYTs consisting of the Street-Smart Black Kid, the Asthmatic Computer Geek, the Young Lady of Easy Virtue, the Lovers on the Outs Who Will Reunite by the End Credits and on through to the Big Game Hunter, the script provides the outline of these stereotypes yet forgets to give them anything even remotely resembling personalities. Which has the unfortunate, and one presumes unintended, side effect of keeping you from caring one whit what happens to this lot.
The acting also leaves a great deal to be desired. In fact, the only people in this turkey who even deserve to be called actors are John Rhys-Davies, who never disappoints, and David Keith, who has perfected the hard-bitten man-of-the-world character and puts it to good use here. And although the novelty of having the Mad Scientist be a woman was already somewhat spoiled by my having seen the same thing in the far-superior DinoCroc, imagine how much worse it got when I discovered that Missy Fat-Lips, the villainess from the execrable Puppet Master vs Demonic Toys, was playing said scientist. She wasn't quite as horrifyingly awful here as she was during my first encounter with her...well, I'm feeling a bit generous today, so let's call them acting talents, shall we? - but she's still pretty much Johnny One-Note when it comes to portraying a character, and the one note here was what I like to call Science Run Amok Disorder. You know the scenario: Scientist wants to create some revolutionary new creature or bacterium or whatever, dreaming of how many prizes he/she will win and how his/her name will go down in the history books, and completely oblivious to the fact that the creation is nothing but e-vil.
But the very worst thing about Sabretooth is its eponymous monster, or more specifically, the CGI rendering of the beastie. Yes, it's a TV movie, and yes, even though CGI monsters are cheaper to create than animatronic ones, there's still a chunk of change needed to make even halfway-decent ones, much less good ones. But man; this kitty must've cost all of $1.98 to make and been the class project for a group of bright six-year-olds. This is such an obviously fake beastie that I had to fight to stifle the chuckles every time it was on-screen. The filmmakers did themselves no favors by revealing the entire cat fairly early in the film, either; even though the brief-glimpse gambit still showed this was pretty god-awful CGI, at least being spared a complete view of the kitty for as long as possible might have helped the film.
On second thought, no; not showing the sabretooth in all its lack-of-glory too early wouldn't have helped this film. Nothing would have helped this film, save for a rewrite of the script and an almost-total re-cast.
Oh, yeah; and there was no fake ending. You just cannot have an AEP without the fake ending. Omitying it is just criminal stupidity right there.
Webs
Yet another Sci-Fi Original Picture that supports the idea of grading these things on a serious bell curve. This one again had a pretty cool premise: Some city electrical engineers in Chicago come across some sort of old lab hidden in the basement of a condemned building and accidentally turn on a device that opens a portal to a parallel universe in which the Earth is ruled by giant, man-eating spiders that turn the humans they don't feed on into half-spider/half-human things which then help to hunt down the last remnants of humanity. Again, I was drawn to this one by the presence of an actor I enjoy, in this case Colin Fox, who played Anton on the series Psi Factor. But whilst he and the majority of the cast acquitted themselves admirably, the whole last-humans-on-Earth thing just wasn't well thought out here, and played as pretty boring; it's as though the scripters said, "Hey, we've got giant, man-eating spiders and half-breed spider/human mutants; what more do we need?" Oh, gee; I don't know. How about...a story? An interesting story? Just a thought.
And Richard Grieco - who must be looking to find the folks who convinced him he was going to be the breakout star on 21 Jump Street so he can beat them severely about the head and shoulders for steering him wrong - really dragged down the proceedings as the main engineer from our-universe Chicago.
By the time the film plods through its interminable two-hours-less-commercials and finally ends, I was kinda rooting for the spiders, because the remnants of humanity were deadly dull. The only bright spots were the spider queen, which should be an object lesson to all who employ CGI beasties that you don't have to sacrifice believability even if you're making it on the cheap; and the makeup on the mutants, which were made to look like a lot like vampires, but with Freddy Krueger knifes on their hands and no bumpy faces.
This list is by no means a complete cataloguing of worthwhile AEPs or of AEPs to avoid like that proverbial plague. For instance, Bats, Bug Buster, Bugs and They Nest are all good viewing bets, whereas Frogs and Empire of the Ants are lackluster turkeys that are good only as soporifics. But if you're looking for a good Animals Eating People flicks primer, these movies will give you a great jumping-off point for your exploration of one of the classic sub-genres in horror.
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