Creature from Black Lake (1976)

Brilliant and touching

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

Nostalgic / Retro value with this one. There we quite a few of these "Bigfoot" films that came out during the 1970s "Bigfoot" craze! This is one of the better one's that was produced during that decade - maybe not the best one made, but it is a fun watch.A couple of college kids from Chicago are interested in the bigfoot stories coming out of the south. They pack up and head down to Oil City, Louisiana hopped up to find the truth. They end up meeting a few rednecks that refuse to speak of the creature... but a couple of them opened up. I won't give away the ending but I will say - they do encounter the bigfoot.6/10

in a sentence, it really is the best of all time. a chilling film that keeps the viewer in suspense as to what the creature is and what it's motives are for terrorising the small town setting. the camera-work is stunning and some of the shots achieved herein have far more scare-effect than most horror films these days. i found this film genuinely more disturbing than saw in that it leaves the antagonist up to your own imagination, rather than filling the scenes with huge amounts of gore. the soundtrack is haunting, beautiful and suspenseful all in the right places and truly complements the film. a strong ending and a chilling storyline both contribute to this being a fantastic movie altogether.

Two college students go down South looking for bigfoot. The locals try to warn them off. They get into some mild trouble with local girls, one of whom is naturally the sheriff's daughter. But the real fun begins when bigfoot shows up.Many of us who were children in the 70's harbor a certain misbegotten affection for bigfoot movies. Many of these were actually "documentaries" or "docudramas" that are pretty hard to find these days. Another one, "Snowbeast", is a pretty decent TV movie. This may be the best, certainly one of the better at least, of the purely fictional, cinematic movies. It's pretty tame like most of these movies were (with the exception of the wonderfully gory "Night of the Demon" and the short-lived "bigfoot-rape" movies), but it has some pretty good suspense and likable characters (including the guy who played "Ponce de Leon in the 70's cult classic "Pretty Maids All in a Row"). It was a local production made in the South by a director with a great affection for the region, who for once doesn't treat small-town Southerners like a bunch of dumb hicks (OK, maybe they really ARE a bunch of dumb hicks, but its still refreshing).This movie kind of fell into the shadow of the similar but more successful "Legend of Boggy Creek", but I personally liked this one a lot better. Tragically it's not available in widescreen yet, but I'd still recommend it.

I saw this movie for the first time in the theaters when I was 11. It replaced Jaws as the scariest movie I'd ever seen. Jaws has since replaced it again, but having just watched it 25 years later, it still spooked me. It's shot in a sort of documentary-style graininess, with a menacing score, and an effective use of shadow, which almost always obscures glimpses of the creature. I'd say the performances were exceptional for such a low-budget pic. As lush and gracefully beautiful as the swamp looks, you're always apprehensive seeing it as a constant backdrop because of what lurks within it -- much like the graceful ocean always made you uneasy in Jaws. There are hokey moments of course, but let's face it, you don't want to see this movie before you go camping in Louisana. Thumbs up.