So I- somehow, God help me- found myself watching Grizzly, a mid-70s monster-horror featuring a giant grizzly bear. The promotional posters for Grizzly featured the tagline 18 feet of gut-crunching, man-eating terror. Well, it was grizzly, all right, but I doubt it was the kind of grizzly the producers were aiming for.

Someone *recommended* this film to me. Suffice to say we are no longer on speaking terms.

The film opened with some promise as one of the main characters, Don/NamMan, helicopters some sightseers over the unnamed national park which serves as the films setting. We get some beautiful shots of tree-clad mountains and valleys which NamMan claims are virgin and untouched since before Europeans came to America. Im thinking Hey, maybe weve got an environmental message!, and the long shots in the title sequence  along with the recommendation of a previously trusted friend  make me think Grizzly was headed to be something more than just a monster movie.

Then we got into Act 1, which soundly dispelled those naive notions.

After some confusion with who the hell the protagonist is, we find out its Michael Kelly. Ill be calling him Chiseljaw, though, since thats all he is: a beautiful jawline meant to attract reluctant female movie-goers. Chiseljaw runs Unnamed Park as the direct supervisor of its many inept park-rangers, and were led to believe the majority of his job involves babysitting hikers and making sure they don't go about setting wildfires or getting themselves lost. He has a romantic interest whos cast as the Strong Female, but theres no point in even assigning her a nickname, since shes completely irrelevant to the plot. As a matter of fact, there isn't a single female in Grizzly who exists for any reasons besides as fodder for aforementioned giant bear. Oh, and cleavage/midriff, which I suppose passed for racy back in the 70s.

The only characters who matter  as much as any character can matter in this sort of film, anyways  are Chiseljaw, NamMan (Don, the obligatory Vietnam veteran who I thought was the protagonist when he flew us over the forest), and BearDude, whose name I forget but was maybe Scott but doesnt freaking matter because all you need to know is that hes a naturalist and likes to cosplay as a bear, or deer, or something.

I dunno. Hes got a massive fur cape, and he digs bears. So today hes BearDude.

Anyways, some sexy ladies get merced by the bear, which sets off an investigation and a killing spree of approximately nine-thousand people. Plot juice, but its cheap plot juice. Seriously, its like they figured out they only had thirty minutes of actual film, and the director just said Oh, its cool, sprinkle in a bear-murder between every scene until weve got a movie.

And Im not using murder flippantly, either. This is basically a serial-killer movie, only the serial-killer is a big dumb animal lacking the psychologically twisted aspect of a good serial-killer villain, and instead of cops, the good guys are park rangers. We even get the obligatory gun-and-badge scene we by now expect from that sort of cop movie, where Chiseljaw begs his Chief (or park supervisor, whatever) Let me do my job, to which the Chief responds Youre in over your head and threatens to fire him. Not those literal words, but you get my drift. I found myself wondering whether the writer didn't simply deconstruct the worst murder-spree movie ever and rewrite everything with a bear-centric focus, and to be honest Im unconvinced he didn't do exactly that.

The irony there is that its not even a good monster movie. I was unsurprised to discover Grizzly released hot on the tails of Jaws, which I suppose was the kind of movie they wanted to emulate. Knowing that, the blatant ripoff was pretty obvious. But it still felt closer to a dozen cop movies Ive seen than to Jaws.

Trudging right along, Chiseljaw, BearDude and NamMan form the least effective power-trio in cinema history. Later on I started to like NamMan, who probably would have made a better protagonist than wet-blanket Chiseljaw, and BearDude was ok too in the lovable-weirdo sense, but we all know the best buddies are only there so they can die late in the game anyways. Their bumbling is only offset by the Chief, who (were guided to believe) is playing politics by bringing press to the park and hoping to attract more visitors, or a cushy job offer for himself, by highlighting the fact that two million and counting visitors have been viciously mauled and devoured by a ginormous prehistoric bear.

You cant see me, but just know Im rolling my eyes.

The worst aspect of Grizzly, though, is ironically the freakin grizzly. Many of the shots of its feet (before the not-so-big reveal) are cearly a black bear. At one point an adult black bear is trotted onto the set and a bunch of hunters think its the grizzlys cub, which ends in some hilarious bear-on-bear violence. When the grizzly attacks, it never once bites its victims: its killing move, as far as I can tell, is split between either a lethal bear hug and a swing of its mighty claws, which at one point literally decapitates a horse in a single swipe.

I wish I had something good to say. I wish I could post a review that wasn't entirely comprised of ridicule and mockery. But the unfortunate fact is that ridicule and mockery are more than Grizzly deserves.

It should have languished in ignominy, forgotten in the dusty halls of crappy films. It doesnt deserve a Wikipedia page. It should have withered and died on the vine anonymously, unreleased, and  barring that  nobody should have been talking about it one year later, much less forty.

Instead my idiot friend recommended it to me, which is the only reason this review exists. To me, the real lesson in Grizzly is Be Careful Who You Trust. Oh, and if you're going to make a bear movie, you should know something about bears.
So I- somehow, God help me- found myself watching Grizzly, a mid-70s monster-horror featuring a giant grizzly bear. The promotional posters for Grizzly featured the tagline 18 feet of gut-crunching, man-eating terror. Well, it was grizzly, all right, but I doubt it was the kind of grizzly the producers were aiming for. Someone *recommended* this film to me. Suffice to say we are no longer on speaking terms. The film opened with some promise as one of the main characters, Don/NamMan, helicopters some sightseers over the unnamed national park which serves as the films setting. We get some beautiful shots of tree-clad mountains and valleys which NamMan claims are virgin and untouched since before Europeans came to America. Im thinking Hey, maybe weve got an environmental message! , and the long shots in the title sequence  along with the recommendation of a previously trusted friend  make me think Grizzly was headed to be something more than just a monster movie. Then we got into Act 1, which soundly dispelled those naive notions. After some confusion with who the hell the protagonist is, we find out its Michael Kelly. Ill be calling him Chiseljaw, though, since thats all he is: a beautiful jawline meant to attract reluctant female movie-goers. Chiseljaw runs Unnamed Park as the direct supervisor of its many inept park-rangers, and were led to believe the majority of his job involves babysitting hikers and making sure they don't go about setting wildfires or getting themselves lost. He has a romantic interest whos cast as the Strong Female, but theres no point in even assigning her a nickname, since shes completely irrelevant to the plot. As a matter of fact, there isn't a single female in Grizzly who exists for any reasons besides as fodder for aforementioned giant bear. Oh, and cleavage/midriff, which I suppose passed for racy back in the 70s. The only characters who matter  as much as any character can matter in this sort of film, anyways  are Chiseljaw, NamMan (Don, the obligatory Vietnam veteran who I thought was the protagonist when he flew us over the forest), and BearDude, whose name I forget but was maybe Scott but doesnt freaking matter because all you need to know is that hes a naturalist and likes to cosplay as a bear, or deer, or something. I dunno. Hes got a massive fur cape, and he digs bears. So today hes BearDude. Anyways, some sexy ladies get merced by the bear, which sets off an investigation and a killing spree of approximately nine-thousand people. Plot juice, but its cheap plot juice. Seriously, its like they figured out they only had thirty minutes of actual film, and the director just said Oh, its cool, sprinkle in a bear-murder between every scene until weve got a movie. And Im not using murder flippantly, either. This is basically a serial-killer movie, only the serial-killer is a big dumb animal lacking the psychologically twisted aspect of a good serial-killer villain, and instead of cops, the good guys are park rangers. We even get the obligatory gun-and-badge scene we by now expect from that sort of cop movie, where Chiseljaw begs his Chief (or park supervisor, whatever) Let me do my job, to which the Chief responds Youre in over your head and threatens to fire him. Not those literal words, but you get my drift. I found myself wondering whether the writer didn't simply deconstruct the worst murder-spree movie ever and rewrite everything with a bear-centric focus, and to be honest Im unconvinced he didn't do exactly that. The irony there is that its not even a good monster movie. I was unsurprised to discover Grizzly released hot on the tails of Jaws, which I suppose was the kind of movie they wanted to emulate. Knowing that, the blatant ripoff was pretty obvious. But it still felt closer to a dozen cop movies Ive seen than to Jaws. Trudging right along, Chiseljaw, BearDude and NamMan form the least effective power-trio in cinema history. Later on I started to like NamMan, who probably would have made a better protagonist than wet-blanket Chiseljaw, and BearDude was ok too in the lovable-weirdo sense, but we all know the best buddies are only there so they can die late in the game anyways. Their bumbling is only offset by the Chief, who (were guided to believe) is playing politics by bringing press to the park and hoping to attract more visitors, or a cushy job offer for himself, by highlighting the fact that two million and counting visitors have been viciously mauled and devoured by a ginormous prehistoric bear. You cant see me, but just know Im rolling my eyes. The worst aspect of Grizzly, though, is ironically the freakin grizzly. Many of the shots of its feet (before the not-so-big reveal) are cearly a black bear. At one point an adult black bear is trotted onto the set and a bunch of hunters think its the grizzlys cub, which ends in some hilarious bear-on-bear violence. When the grizzly attacks, it never once bites its victims: its killing move, as far as I can tell, is split between either a lethal bear hug and a swing of its mighty claws, which at one point literally decapitates a horse in a single swipe. I wish I had something good to say. I wish I could post a review that wasn't entirely comprised of ridicule and mockery. But the unfortunate fact is that ridicule and mockery are more than Grizzly deserves. It should have languished in ignominy, forgotten in the dusty halls of crappy films. It doesnt deserve a Wikipedia page. It should have withered and died on the vine anonymously, unreleased, and  barring that  nobody should have been talking about it one year later, much less forty. Instead my idiot friend recommended it to me, which is the only reason this review exists. To me, the real lesson in Grizzly is Be Careful Who You Trust. Oh, and if you're going to make a bear movie, you should know something about bears.