Terrore nella foresta

This movie has a lot going for it. The plot is simple: a psychotic mountain man kidnaps a young woman while she is out on her morning jog. The problem is the director came up short. Most of the time, the movie tries to focus in on the intensity and insane look in the kidnapper's eyes. There are also a lot of chase scenes in the Canadian rockies. Not much else.

There are some good points. Dan Haggerty plays the madman's father and does a good acting job, but I kept flashing back to his TV series "Grizzly Adams". I half-expected Ben the bear to come trotting out of the bushes at any time. Roberta Weiss at the start of the movie played the role of the damsel-in-distress rather lamely, however she did seem to improve once the madman's cabin had been reached.

The problem is that this movie was not what you'd come to expect from this genre. The danger of sexual assault was there every time Vern got close. However, for a guy that had been out in the woods for two years without a woman, you'd think he could have gotten past the bra. Give this same script to David Cronenberg and you'd have a successful NC-17 movie and a better ending where the hunted becomes the hunter. As is, it is barely PG and not worth renting.

When it comes on Showtime or TNT, take a look if you like Dan Haggerty, as long as nothing else is on.

This is a strange and unedifying twist on the damsel in distress theme. A teenage girl out for a run in the Canadian wilderness is abducted by a deranged mountain man who drags her off to his isolated log cabin telling her that she belongs to him now, and she had better do as he says, or else.

Rather than simply rape her he embarks on a rather bizarre courtship ritual, but before he can win her heart - fat chance - salvation appears in the form of his father. Apparently the old man has long realised his son is three sandwiches short of a picnic, and has chosen this austere existence as an alternative to dumping him in the local booby hatch. The old man convinces his son to see reason and take the captive back to civilisation. Unfortunately, he doesn't see reason for long, and after a helicopter appears out of nowhere - tourists poaching a rare mountain sheep - things take a really tragic twist. The end is fairly predictable, but unless you are into mindless thuggery or the great outdoors, this one is probably not for you.

I was pleasantly surprised by this movie. It turned out to be better than I expected. It comes across like a Lifetime movie (which is why my wife liked it). Those who rent this movie hoping for your typical exploitation "crazy mountain-man kidnaps innocent girl" movie will be disappointed. There is no nudity, a little adult language, and some mild violence.

What I liked about this movie is that it was better than it had to be. The "villain" actually had some depth to his character, as did the character played by Dan Hagerty. The acting by the female lead could have been better, but isn't so awful that it makes the film unwatchable. The scenes between the female and Dan Hagerty are nice and sometimes rather touching.

I recommend this movie for rising above its genre. Its nice these days to be pleased and suprised by a movie, rather than disappointed.

Pretty young jogger is abducted by crazy mountain man. That pretty much sums up the whole plot. Those expecting some exploitation fare will be disappointed. There is no nudity, though Roberta Weiss does look cute in her sweat suit and she spends the climax of the film in her panties. Speaking of Weiss, she's certainly one of the most attractive actresses of the '80s. I only know of her from two other things: a small part in The Dead Zone and an episode of Tales From the Darkside. A good episode, though. Anyway, back to the movie. The location shooting is nice. Weiss, as I said, is pretty and does a fine job with her performance. Lawrence King-Phillips is good as the psycho mountain man. Dan Haggerty, the reason most people will even see this, is enjoyable essentially playing the Grizzly Adams type of character we all expect. It's not the worst thing I've ever seen but it's pretty pointless. If it was a little seedier it might have more of a cult following, whatever that says about us.

I will be damned if Dan Haggerty, TV's own "Grizzly Adams", does not actually take his role in this no-budget, cheap exploitation flick seriously and truly do his best to act in this film. You are in the middle of watching what has got to be one of the most amateurishly acted and atrociously bad crazy-mountain-man-abducts-sweet-young-thing movies, and all of a sudden, the big burly blonde Haggerty shows up and seems to actually think he is in something by Strindberg.

This movie apparently had something of a following, although I can't imagine why, so repugnantly does it violate the natural order, even of exploitation films, and it even generated a sequel, which I have thankfully been spared having to watch.

I am all for chicks-in-distress films, and I was hoping to see a lot of torn clothing, bared breasts, some good rolling around in the dirt and some real rope bondage in lush outdoor settings. This movie sadly disappoints on all counts, even in the bondage area, and I never saw a mountain guy with more rope than Vern, our psychotic kidnapper. Renee, the hapless victim, played by a young woman who seems to be somewhere between unconscious and dead, is so laughably inept at doing anything but standing still that part of me was hoping she would end up as Mrs. Vern, despite her whining that she was unhappy being kidnapped and wanted to go home. The character of Vern, played with twisted fiendish glee, still basically makes no sense and the actor's performance falls flat, despite his enthusiasm. Only Haggerty's genuine attempts at delivering a performance of some substance save this from being a complete catastrophe from start to finish.

In the genre of kidnapped-girl-in-the-hands-of-a-madman movies, this is about as lame as you can get. Nice Canadian landscape, though.