NIGHT
FRIGHT (1967)
Directed by James A. Sullivan
Alpha DVD
Reviewed 06.20.04
Review by Joseph A. Ziemba
THE FILM
Yeah, Night Fright is a bit of a gip, but it’s
a more enjoyable cheat than the
similarly themed and nausea-inducing
Monster A-Go-Go. That’s
got to count for something, right?
Let’s take a survey. Which
makes for better bad film fodder
-- Bigfoot or a furry space alien?
If you didn’t say Bigfoot,
bury your head between your hands
and hope that no one heard you.
Next: what’s better -- a film
haphazardly shot by the legendary
Larry Buchanan, or a masquerade
film featuring many of Buchanan’s
Azalea Pictures crew (like this
one)? Don’t answer that. It’s
pretty obvious that imaginations
were running on empty when it came
time to poop out Night Fright.
So in order to fully enjoy the routine
thrills and mega-padding on display,
use YOUR imagination. Let’s
pretend Larry Buchanan took a break
while filming Mars Needs
Women and made a dive into
the Bigfoot subgenre of trash films.
Suddenly, it’s all a little
more tolerable...
In typical fashion, a government
space craft crashes, spawns a hairy
monster, and baffles the local sheriff
(John Agar). A few 40 year old teenagers
show up to peev off Agar and do
the twist. But there’s a real
twist. Instead of sharing the meat
of the film (read: action) with
the patient viewer, Night
Fright avoids the hassle
by having actors discuss things
that we don’t get to see.
So instead of grisly monster attacks,
we get loads of padding, a scientist
contemplating the monster’s
Bigfoot-esque footprint, and dorky
“teens” telling bad
jokes. The monster (who shows up
around the forty-five minute mark)
looks just like Ro-Man from Robot
Monster, but exchanges the
deep sea diving helmet for a plastic
gargoyle head. To top it off, the
day-for-night monster scenes are
dark as pitch and hard to make out,
which didn’t help matters.
‘Cause after all that waiting,
I didn’t even get a decent
look at this poor man’s Bigfoot.
Despite the obvious shortcomings,
I didn’t completely dislike
Night Fright. The
presence of Agar, the color photography,
and the regional Texas obscurity
factor kept me somewhat alert. Just
don’t expect a classic. Or
even a semi-classic.
AUDIO AND VIDEO
For a budget release, this film
looks pretty darn good. The expected
noise and speckles pop around once
in awhile, but the print is nice
and crisp, albeit a bit dark in
spots. There’s also a barely
visible horizontal line pattern
running throughout the film, but
it’s not distracting at all.
Also, the film runs 76 minutes,
not 66, as listed on the back cover.
EXTRAS
An Alpha cover gallery and chapter
stops will exercise your remote
fingers.
FINAL THOUGHTS
In order to fully enjoy the allures
of Night Fright, I
had to suspend my disbelief and
imagine I was watching something
that I wasn’t. That said,
this one’s for die hard midnighters
only. |
Silly girls
Get night-frighted
Pushin' coke
Agar wins
|
