The Legend of McCullough's Mountain

"The Legend of McCullough's Mountain", a.k.a "Monster Mountain" is a genuine collector's item, ...as long as it remains unseen in the box! Probably only cult-movie collectors will understand the above statement, and the sentiment I'm about to describe. They undoubtedly know the feeling, when snooping around on a flea-market or in the basement of a former video store gone bankrupt, of suddenly stumbling on a dusty old VHS-tape of a movie that is extremely obscure and totally unknown to the rest of the world. You're ecstatic, because very few people will have a copy of the film in question in their cupboard. But, at the same time and somewhere deep inside, you also realize the actual film will be terrible. After all, most obscure movies are obscure for a good reason.

This 70s flick apparently is the same as a 60s flick called "The Legend of Blood Mountain", but with extra footage added. Well, whatever footage they added, it surely didn't make the film any better or more interesting. It's a dreadfully dull pseudo-documentary about a godforsaken mountain community in redneck-Georgia, where every couple of full moons a Bigfoot-creature is spotted and linked to unresolved disappearances. The clumsy wannabe journalist Bestoink Dooley sees the urban legend as his big breakthrough nationwide, and travels to Georgia to cover the story. George Ellis, the actor/comedian depicting Bestoink (what kind of name is that, anyway?) is a sort of fusion between Lou Costello, Oliver Hardy and Marty Feldman, but he lacks the talent and the charisma of any of them. Don't get your hopes up on seeing much monster footage, neither. I've seen my share of lousy Sasquatch movies (remember "The Legend of Boggy Creek", "Sasqua", "Night of the Demon") but this one takes the cake.

This is, essentially, the same movie as "Legend Of Blood Mountain". A new producer bought the rights to this movie, added some new footage of the monster and some gore to please 1970s audiences, and re-released it 10 years after the fact.

It's a real shame that, because of this movie's history, it is almost impossible to find it in it's original form. "Demon Hunter" is a badly spliced mess, and this has added footage and a new monster.

Okay, "Legend Of Blood Mountain" is never going to rank on anyone's list of best movie, but still, it would be nice if the original were available more widely.