Rating: D-
Dir: Richard Douglas Jensen
Star: Richard Douglas Jensen, Vanesa Tamayo, Saporah Bonnette, Michael V. Jordan
This is the kind of film which makes a good round of Would you rather? As in, would you rather watch Monster Grizzly, or be savaged by a monster grizzly? Having suffered the former, although not the latter, I would need to give the question careful consideration before being willing to commit to my answer. The bear attack genre is not one noted for quality, yet this still comes in at or very near the bottom of the barrel. The story, at least, has an elegant simplicity. A grizzly is attacking inhabitants of a remote Minnesota town. Which is particularly odd, since it’s the middle of winter, and all right-thinking ursines should be hibernating.
Investigating – for a very loose definition of the term – is local Sheriff Tom Dunson (Jensen) and his team. As is almost required for these movies, they bring in a Hooper, a scientist with specialist knowledge of the species. In this case, it’s Dr. Giuliana Ochoa (Tamayo). So you have all the pieces in place here for a potentially… Adequate? Yeah, most people would settle for an adequate entry in the genre. Those viewers are likely to be sorely disappointed. Personally, I had heard beforehand how terrible this was: indeed, it is how the film came onto my Tubi watchlist. On that basis, I can’t complain. My badmovie expectations were solidly met, and I discovered there may be worse things than a bear attack.
The most obvious stylistic feature here is Jensen’s love, to an obsessive level, of the fade to black. It’s something you normally see only in TV movies, to make a smooth transition into the advert break. Here, it feels almost like the only shot in the director’s locker. It would make for a good drinking game, although I recommend checking the fine print on your health coverage to make sure it includes self-inflicted alcohol poisoning. The first time we see this is before the grizzly claims its first victim, which is then depicted entirely by enthusiastic gnawing sounds [props to the foley artist, by the way]. Ok, they’re holding back on the proper attack footage for later. No, they’re not. They don’t have any, or even close.
All you get to see is very brief shots – which I think are repeated – of a clearly CGI bear roaring. I tried to get a screenshot, but it was just too dark and blurry, and there is absolutely nothing in the way of interaction with the human cast members. However, it’s still likely better than the scenes where the human characters interact with each other. Deputies Stony (Jordan) and Flower (Bonnette) are in a relationship. This upsets Flower’s aunt, who is native American and casually racist: “He’s a white boy. Don’t you wanna be with one of your own people?” But it’s alright, because Flower is too: “I can’t find a Blackfoot man who’s not on drugs. I will not be with someone who is a drug addict or an alcoholic, and all the men on the res are.” Okay.
This probably counts as bleeding-heart liberalism compared to the scene where Dr. Ochoa and Sheriff Dunson are having dinner. In dialogue freshly plucked from the depths of 4Chan, Ochoa goes on a rant about how “Masculine men are in short supply these days… Human males have begun to feminize in the past 30 years,” before calling Dunson an “apex dominant male”. This is in contrast to her university colleagues, who are “all vegan, sandal-wearing puffballs with man-buns.” Which is, according to the academic, why lesbians exist. Naturally, Ochoa is unable to resist her primeval hormonal impulses, and ends up in bed with Dunson. This is where I remind you: the actor playing the sheriff is also the director and wrote the script. ‘Nuff said, I trust.
The film staggers from misbegotten scene to misbegotten scene. For example, several minutes are spent interviewing a local to absolutely no purpose. The sheriff says, “I just came by here to see if anybody’s seen anything around here, but apparently nobody has.” SO WHY ARE WE HERE? I mean this both in the cinematic and existential senses, because I lost my will to live, on realizing the pointlessness of the entire sequence. Elsewhere? Obvious CGI snow for a film made in Minnesota. A random shot of guns on a wall. Dialogue which is overpowered by tinkly muzak on the soundtrack. An unappealing sex scene – I was, at least for once, grateful for the fade to black there. Exchanges like this:
– Can I help you?
– I was just-
– She was just.
– I was just.
– You were just?
This has all the hallmarks of a debut feature. When you’re doing this for the first time, like say, the director of Sophie and the Serial Killers, it’s inevitably a learning experience. Providing you do learn, and at least make different mistakes next time, that’s fine. [Though there’s a case to be made that no-one should be allowed to release a film for public consumption, without burying their first five attempts on a building site] However, this is already Jensen’s third movie, following in the footsteps of No Man’s Law and I am Mine Alone. The latter sounds like a Neil Breen film, while the former is apparently a sympathetic take on illegal immigration. Feels kinda at odds with the philosophies expressed by the characters here.
It is on Tubi, as is his latest, The Kiss of a Vampire. Might be a while before I get round to watching them. Especially since I am now fighting an overwhelming urge to go up to the Grand Canyon, strip naked, and cover my body in honey, in order to settle the whole “monster grizzly” argument. I have to say, it takes self-confidence to appear in two episodes of The Dukes of Hazzard, plus one of Manimal, then thirty-eight years later, decide to restart your career by writing, directing and starring in your own movies. But according to the IMDb, that’s what Jensen had done. Calling your production company “Poverty Row Pictures” does suggest a morsel of self-awareness. It’s just a shame this is not at all carried through into the resulting output.