The Food of the Gods

I first saw this movie at the local drive-in theater when I was about 13yrs old. It scared the you-know-what out of me back then. I just rented the DVD and sitting there on my sofa, in my mid 40s I enjoyed it all over again! Sure, it's silly....very "B-rated" type film....but if you just accept that going into it, you won't be disappointed. In this day of Computer Generated garbage, it's refreshing to see REAL special effects. The rats are still scary some 30 years later!

Rent it, enjoy it for what it is: a campy, silly scary movie. I just love it! It saddens me to see that it's made it's way onto several "worst movie" lists. Relax people, enjoy it!

I've gotta go....I think I hear rats coming.....

A group of people, somehow associated with a football team, go to an island for a getaway. Well, they picked the wrong time for vacation because someone on the island has developed a new kind of food that causes the animals to grow to gigantic sizes. Great if you're raising cattle, not so great when the rats find it.

Inspired by H. G. Wells, directed by B-movie legend Bert Gordon, and starring a young pre-Dante Belinda Balaski, this film is pretty much exactly what you might expect it is. There have been plenty of large animal horror or sci-fi films, both before and after this one. Is this one of the better ones? Who is to say?

The film is good for what it is: people fighting large rats. Sure, it is silly and kind of cheesy, but is that not what you expect from sci-fi films of the time period, especially the giant animal variety? I cannot say this movie had anything special about it, but it sure was not terrible, either.

For what it is worth, Gordon calls this film the one he had the most fun making, due to the cast and crew being on a Canadian island far from the studio. He also had the pleasure of writing the script on the fly when an unexpected snowstorm prevented the original plan!

Paul Corupe says this film has "the most fearsome creatures of any Gordon film", but that seems highly contentious.

If you are a Pamela Franklin fan, this is a must! Campy, schlocky, and plain bizarre are words too weak to describe this movie. Check your brain at the door and enjoy Ms. Franklin in her last cult appearance.

Wasps, worms, chickens, and rats feed off of an icky, gooey substance that causes them to grow to gigantic proportions, then terrorize the occupants of a remote mountain cabin. This trashy adaptation of the classic H.G. Wells story isn't just any ordinary bad movie. It's a movie that starts off so bad that you are compelled to actually keep watching it to see how much worse it can possibly get, and you have one heck of a good time in the process. Surprisingly, the film does have some fine points. The special effects are really quite acceptable, considering the era and the film's limited budget. And, amazingly, some of the performers manage to retain their dignity. Pamela Franklin as a sassy lady scientist and Ida Lupino as a bible-spouting farmer's wife come off best. This movie was a remake of the 1965 release VILLAGE OF THE GIANTS, also filmed by Bert I. Gordon.

In this adaptation of a portion of H.G. Wells's "The Food of the Gods", a strange substance bubbles up out of the Earth and causes giantism in forms of animal life including wasps, chickens, worms, and rats. Among the unlucky people caught up in this invasion of plus- sized critters are football player Morgan (Marjoe Gortner), his teams' P.R. man Brian (Jon Cypher), expectant couple Thomas (Tom Stovall) and Rita (Belinda Balaski), pathologically greedy opportunist Bensington (Ralph Meeker) and his associate Lorna (Pamela Franklin), and farm woman Mrs. Skinner (Ida Lupino).

You gotta love him; veteran film director Bert I. Gordon was *still* relying on his favourite movie theme of large menaces at this point in time. This effort is ultimately dumb, silly, and sloppy, but just like many bad B movies, it's not without appeal, especially when it comes to supposed shock scenes (that chicken attack scene early on in the movie is a riot). The special effects, as one will expect, are for the most part none too convincing. The acting is variable; Gortner is likable as always as the hero. Veterans Lupino and Meeker had certainly been in much better films, but they're as solid as ever. Meeker is particularly funny in a very one note and sleazy portrayal. The lovely Ms. Balaski does well as the young mother to be who feels no need to marry the father of her baby. Gordon does generate some atmosphere from the surroundings; this was filmed on location in the Canadian province of British Columbia.

One thing's for sure: this will rub many animal rights activists the wrong way.

Six out of 10.