After he witnesses his wife being murdered by Bigfoot, Professor Cory Mathis (Les Stroud, Survivorman) goes public with his claim, losing much of his credibility. He becomes obsessed with getting revenge, assembling a team of misfits to help him track down and capture the mythical creature and clear his name. Cory’s team include his adult son Casey (Brian Kowalski), his top research assistant Gloria Teak (Tera Eckerle) and her smart young daughter Cassie (Elise Edwards), and crazy wild man/legendary Bigfoot hunter Fran Andersen (Stacy Brown Jr.)—who’s had his own encounters in the past with the creature—and his partner Lexi (A.J. Koehler). At the same time, by-the-book forest ranger, Billy Teal (Tom Green), has sworn an oath to protect the truth about the forest and the creatures that reside in it. Cory had once been Ranger Billy’s childhood friend, but now he’s his nemesis, and the ranger is also Gloria’s uncle, but he won’t let these facts stop him from doing his job. Ranger Billy also has a personal vendetta against Fran, who’s been sleeping with his sister Sissy (Lexi Street).
To complicate matters, National Geographic has offered a large bounty for the capture of the creature, which attracts many fortune hunters to the forest. This includes serial hoaxers such as Rick Dyer (as himself, Shooting Bigfoot), a pair of dimwitted hick brothers out to make a Bigfoot snuff film, and many other oddballs. There’s also a covert government agency (the Men in Green) who want the creature for themselves and look to Ranger Billy for help.
I’m generally a Tom Green fan, and I thought the premise of this film sounded like fun, but this movie was a slog to get through and I was ultimately disappointed. I suspect the film’s release on 4/20 was an indicator of its target demographic. Most of the time, I couldn’t tell if the filmmakers were matking i bad on purpose in a “it’s so bad it’s good” kind of effort, or if it was just genuinely bad. The majority of the cast does not have any acting experience, and it is evident right from the opening scene. Besides Tom Green, the cast is mainly comprised of non-actors or folks who have hosted documentaries or other reality shows. Overall, the film ends up feeling more like a low-budget film school project made with friends rather than a professional feature film. The young actress playing Cassie may be the best actor in the whole movie. I actually enjoyed most of her scenes, and she had some great one-liners.
Some things were definitely done on purpose to be funny, such when Cory’s wife smashes into a tree, and she wakes up with cartoon stars spinning around her head. Or when the ranger finds a dead racoon in an alleyway and claims that it’s a city racoon and not a forest raccoon, and then a close-up reveals a needle sticking out of its arm. However, other moments left me wondering if they were trying to be funny, or just had bad/lazy editing, or recast and ran out of money, such as in one scene when Cory is talking to his adult son in the car. The conversation switches back and forth between two angles on the actors, but in one of them, the actor playing the son is at least 10 years younger and obviously not the same person in the other angle, but it is just edited together like a single non-stop conversation with no acknowledgement of the strangeness. Similarly, there are several different actors playing Bigfoot, all different races and builds, and I couldn’t tell if they were supposed to be the same character, different characters, or what. Bigfoot is always seen wearing an orange prison jumpsuit, but the reason for this isn’t really explained.
The slapstick humor is so lowbrow and often crude just to be crude—the writers seem obsessed with bodily functions and trashy toilet humor. Jokes constantly revolve around farts, urinating, turds, underwear, hard-ons, etc. It’s mentioned several times how the ranger likes to wear his sister’s dirty underwear. There’s also a character named Pastor Evans (Jeff Evans) who’s constantly getting caught urinating on himself. And in another scene after two women urinate in the woods, they head to their tent where they light their farts on fire.
The title of the film comes from the fact that the professor is doing a series of video interviews with folks who claim to have had their own encounters with Bigfoot. These clips are edited in here and there, but mostly serve no purpose to continue the overall story. They serve more and “humorous” interstitials. Similarly, there is this guitar-playing troubadour who pops up every now and then between scenes, but her scenes also don’t really further the main story.
The story itself grows very confusing very quickly. Everyone in this town seems to be related to or is sleeping with someone else, and it’s difficult to keep track of who is who, or who is with whom. And once the government agency shows up, it starts to get really difficult to keep track of who is teaming up with who, and who wants to capture, kill or protect Bigfoot. We also start to get flashbacks and flashbacks-within-flashbacks for both Ranger Billy and Fran, making things even more complicated and confusing.
As for the positives, the film does have an entertaining, over-the-top action/fight sequence in the final act. Gunfire looks more like phasers than bullets, but it’s both exciting and humorous, even though I couldn’t quite keep track of what was going on. The effects themselves are actually pretty good, even if the acting and writing quality doesn’t match up.
The DVD picture quality is for the most part pretty decent, though a bit dull at times, especially in darker sequences. After watching the DVD, I checked out the HD digital copy on MovieSpree, and it looks so much cleaner and clearer. I appreciate situations like this where the digital copy is at least provided in HD even if the physical release is SD-only—it gives the folks who want to own the physical media the chance to still watch in HD. The audio track is quite impressive, making nice use of the stereo and surround channels to make the film feel more immersive. However, about an hour into the film, the audio seems to go out of sync for a minute, both on the DVD and the digital.
The DVD disc comes packed in a standard DVD keepcase, without a slipcover. The case also contains a digital copy code redeemable via MovieSpree.
What’s Included:
Film: (1:49:26)
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DVD:
- 480i / Anamorphic Widescreen 1.85:1
- Audio: English Dolby Digital 5.1
- Subtitles: English SDH
- HD digital copy redeemable via MovieSpree (NOT Movies Anywhere compatible)
- Trailer (2:01)
Digital (code may not be valid after 12/31/2022):
Extras:
Final Thoughts:
While I’m sure there’s an audience who will love this movie and find it hilarious, I was not not it. I really wanted to enjoy this movie, but ended up so disappointed. I suspect there is a reason this was originally released on 4/20 as it would most likely be enhanced and enjoyed by those who have partaken in some recreational substances ahead of time. The acting is poor, the humor trashy, and the story a bit convoluted and confusing. I would suggest a rental before a blind buy. Some may find this to be an extremely entertaining oddball B movie, even if it wasn’t to my liking. That said, the quality of the digital presentation is quite good.
