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A
twenty foot tall, two thousand pound, man-eating grizzly bear
with a bloodlust is on the loose in a state park. The park ranger
is trying to stop the beast while the park official is trying
to cover it up. As the body count rises and the scenic green forest
begins to turn blood red, our ranger hero, Michael Kelly turns
to his friend and naturalist Arthur Scott for help. With Scott's
wisdom and a rocket launcher, Ranger Kelly will stop the grizzly's
path of rage!
Where
as the 1966 movie Night
of the Grizzly, may have inspired some of the ideas in
Jaws, this 1976 film, a year after
Jaws, is an honest-to-god rip off, nearly scene for scene.
The
story is exactly the same, large critter goes on a rampage for
some reason and kills everything in sight, local law official
with help from a scientist try and stop the shark, er bear, while
corrupt mayor, I mean park official hides the facts from the public
to keep his beach, damn it, campground open over the holiday weekend.
Well I guess if I look back, Grizzly doesn't rip off Jaws
that much, oops I forgot to mention, get this, that the first
victim to get ripped apart by the bear is Susan Backline, yup
she is the blonde actress who plays the first victim in Jaws,
I know they same that imitation is flattery, but c'mon. I mean
why not just stick a fin on the back of the bear for great white's
sake.
They
even mentioned Jaws in two of the taglines for this flick:
Not since JAWS has the terror been like this! and The most
dangerous jaws on land!
All
the copying aside, they even steal the tree effect from the
King Kong remake, you know where they show Kong coming
through the woods? Grizzly does have one thing going for it, BLOOD!
This film is full of some great kills, well maybe not great but
at least brutal. I mean the bear knocks the heads off horses and
in a scene that really surprised me, the bear kills an entire
family! They don't show the little kid dying, but they do show
his severed leg, if ya wanna get the audience to hate the villain
kill the kid or the family dog, it works every time.
Grizzly
is definitely Jaws with claws, but it is still an excellent
animal flick and the effects are pretty good, even when it is
just a man in a bear suit, good flick to watch while camping if
you can't find a copy of Deliverance, know what I mean, Payne?
Also the ending just has to be seen to believed.
5/10
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