Creature Film 2011
Karlotta Neifert
Creature is a 2011 American monster horror comedy film directed by Fred M. Andrews, based on a screenplay written by Andrews and Tracy Morse. The film is set in a Louisiana Bayou, where a group of friends discover a local legend and are in a fight for their survival. The film opened in theaters on September 9, 2011, in the United States and Canada. It stars Mehcad Brooks, Serinda Swan, Amanda Fuller, Dillon Casey, Lauren Schneider, Aaron Hill, Daniel Bernhardt, and Sid Haig.
A long time ago, Grimley Boutine and his sister Caroline were the last two remaining members of their clan. Incest was a part of their family and heritage, so it was no surprise that she was carrying his child and the two were madly in love and due to be married, but the day before their wedding, an albino alligator dragged Caroline off into the swamp. Grimley sought out the gator in the hopes that he would find her alive, but instead he came across her being devoured in a corpse-filled, half-flooded mine tunnel. Going insane with rage, Grimley killed the gator with his bare hands, before eating its flesh, then consuming the flesh of his sister, along with every other piece of flesh in the cave, slowly devolving, becoming half-man, half-alligator himself.
The others disbelieve the story, and they finally arrive at Grimley's house, unaware that they are being stalked by something in the swamp. They set up camp for the night near the Grimley house for an evening of drinking and having fun. Meanwhile, one of the shop patrons, Grover, is slaughtered by an unseen beast on the riverbank after ignoring warnings to not defy Grimley. Randy leaves the group to get more beer from the truck, returning just in time to interrupt Karen from taking advantage of a drunken Beth. Emily and Niles, having gone off on their own, admit their love and devotion to one another before making love, unaware that Oscar is secretly taking photos. Karen finds him, and masturbates him to climax as he continues to take photographs of the couple. When Oscar refuses to return the favor, however, she walks off and is knocked unconscious by Chopper, the owner of the store they'd come across. It is revealed that Oscar and Karen are both his children, and subservient to Lockjaw himself, he takes Karen away. Randy witnesses this and sees Lockjaw before running off into the woods. Oscar collapses on Emily and Niles, claiming that Randy had attacked him; Niles leaves Emily to treat Oscar's shock as he goes off in search of Randy. Randy and Niles both encounter Lockjaw and run, coming across a highway that they had supposedly gotten far off track from earlier; they return to look for Emily, only to be stopped by one of the shop workers who holds them at gunpoint. Niles is able to kill him, but Lockjaw gruesomely murders Randy.
Afterward, Beth awakens from her drunken unconsciousness, her tent having been moved into a deep dark cave. As she emerges from it she discovers Lockjaw eating one of his victims and lets out a horrified scream, being presumably killed by him. Karen, having been set up as a sacrifice to Lockjaw, has her feet cut off by her father to lure Lockjaw from the underground, saying that it must be done for the family. After he leaves, Lockjaw emerges from the cavern below the shack and seems to recognize her by the necklace Chopper put around her neck, the same one that belonged to his sister. Niles finds Karen dead when he comes across the cabin, and is attacked by Oscar but quickly dispatches him with a machete. Afterwards, he sneaks into Lockjaw's cave to save Emily, when they emerge they manage a brief escape before she is taken by Chopper and his followers, with Lockjaw throwing Niles into the river to drown or become food to the gators. Chopper says to Emily that Lockjaw has chosen her to become his next bride. Niles, who is alive, follows the party to a gathering ritual that will allow Grimley to impregnate Emily. During the ceremony, Niles attacks, and after receiving a brutal beating from the overpowering Lockjaw, he manages to knock him into a sinkhole to drown. He unties Emily but, as Niles is reviving her, Lockjaw attacks again, pulling Emily into the hole, with Niles following. Later, at dawn, Emily and Niles (who is holding the jaw of Lockjaw) emerge from the sink hole alive. They manage to make their way back to their truck and ride off into the rising sun.
Some time later, Chopper arrives at the refurbished Grimley cabin, which is hopping with family and friends in a huge celebration. It is revealed that Beth had survived her ordeals with Lockjaw and now has a baby, who Chopper seems sure is going to "grow up to be as strong as his daddy". It is shown that the baby's face is somewhat mutated and the screen goes dark.
Creature was initially going to be a graphic novel named Lockjaw. Paul Mason, an executive producer, suggested to Andrews that it might be better done as a film. Andrews, who had worked as a production designer, agreed to direct. The film's incest themes were influenced by H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos, in which rural, inbred cults worshiped inhuman creatures. More background on the creature was in the original script, but it did not make it into the film. The creature, which in the early stages was a serial killer in a slasher film, was eventually converted into more of a mutant.[2][3]
Also impressive is the way director Damien LeVeck succeeds at building tension early on. The first 30 minutes serve up a couple of good scares and make the most of the inherent claustrophobia associated with the core cast being trapped indoors during a blizzard. Unfortunately, the narrative becomes tragically overcomplicated in the second and third acts. More complexities are added in with each passing minute, making the proceedings feel muddled and unfocused.
If A Creature Was Stirring had stripped back all the added complications and gone for a more streamlined narrative, I think this film could have worked rather well. The cast is talented and the seasonal atmosphere is often inviting. But the narrative becomes far too ambitious in the back half and loses sight of what makes the opening act effective. What we are left with is unbridled chaos and a bad case of whiplash from a narrative that tries to do too much at once.
Two geological researchers for the American multinational corporation NTI find an ancient alien laboratory on Titan, the largest moon of Saturn. In the lab is an egg-like container which is keeping an alien creature alive. The creature emerges and kills the researchers. Two months later, the geologists' spaceship crashes into the space station Concorde in orbit around Earth's Moon, its pilot having died in his seat.
In the West German ship, they find the egg-like container and the dead bodies of the crew. The creature appears and kills Delambre when she lags behind the escaping group. Fennel goes into shock at the sight and Bryce sedates him. When they return to their own ship, the Americans find that one of the West Germans, Hans Rudy Hofner, has snuck aboard. He tells them his crew was slain by the creature, which was buried with other organisms as part of a galactic menagerie. He proposes returning to his ship to get explosives, but the crew are unwilling to risk it.
The creature's undead victims are controlled by the creature through parasites. Unsupervised in the medbay, Fennel sees the undead Delambre through a porthole and follows her outside. She strips naked, and he stands transfixed while she removes his helmet. He asphyxiates, and then she attaches an alien parasite to his head. Now under alien control, Fennel sends a transmission to his crewmates, inviting them over to the German ship. Hofner and Bryce are sent to get some air tanks for the Shenandoah and stand guard over it, while the rest of the crew go over to the Richter ship. Hofner and Bryce stop over at the menagerie on their way, and are attacked by Delambre. The rest of the crew find Fennel with a bandage on his head to conceal his parasite. Davison insists that medical officer Oliver examine his head, so Fennel has her accompany him to the engineering quarters to feed her to the creature. Davison and Perkins notice Fennel does not sweat and go check on them. They find Oliver has been decapitated by the creature. Perkins blows up Fennel's head with his pistol.
Sladen runs into an infected Hofner. She escapes the ship, and in her haste, only puts on her helmet after exiting. Perkins spots her outside and opens the airlock. Now unconscious, Sladen is carried in by Hofner to lure the others. They fight, and Davison defeats Hofner by ripping off his parasite. The three survivors formulate a plan to electrocute the creature with the ship's fusion modules, which can only be accessed by going through the engineering quarters.
Alarms sound as a creature makes its way through the ship, committing sabotage. Sladen and Davison construct the electrocution trap, while Perkins goes to the computer room to monitor the creature. The creature arrives, and they apparently electrocute it to death. However, when Davison leaves, it captures Sladen.
Davison and Perkins follow her screaming and find her locked inside engineering. Studying the ship's blueprints, they find another entrance to engineering. Perkins lures away the creature while Davison retrieves Sladen. On the way, Perkins locates one of the bombs Hofner mentioned. The creature jumps him. Dying, Perkins attaches the bomb to the creature and sets a countdown so Davison can jettison it through the airlock. It climbs back aboard, however, so Davison tackles it, throwing himself out the airlock. When the bomb fails to explode, Bryce appears and shoots it, which sets it off and kills the creature. She recovers Davison and reunites with Sladen, who dresses Davison's wounds. The trio leaves Titan aboard the West German ship.
In January 1984, William Malone tried to get another project going after working on Scared to Death.[1] Malone and his producer, Bill Dunn, met with a potential backer who wanted to produce a movie like Scared to Death with Malone pitching a detective story called Murder in the 21st Century but the backer didn't believe there were enough exploitative elements and asked for Malone to bring him whatever else he had by the following morning.[1] Malone went back through his files and came across a two-page story synopsis he had written in the late 70s called The Titan Find and after presenting it to the backer, impressing them, Malone was able to acquire the needed funds for the project.[1] Due to the tight budget and lack of lead time the crew wasn't able to secure a studio space, so they repurposed an abandoned industrial plant in Burbank, California with filming beginning in June 25 of that year.[1] Robert Skotak of the L.A. Effects Group handled the visual effects for the film.[1]
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