Grizzly 1998 Horror Movie Review

A rather fun “nature strikes back” entry of the 70s.  It was directed by William Girdler, who also did the entertaining Day of the Animals, which also starred Christopher George and Richard Jaeckel.  The plot is simple-A hungry grizzly bear is on a rampage in the woods.  Christopher George is the park ranger who vows to take it out along with nature nut, Richard Jaeckel, and helicopter pilot Andrew Prine.  See the Jaws comparisons?  The owner of the campground refuses to close the park as it will affect business.  Sound more like Jaws now?

It all makes for a good and entertaining piece of ravenous animal nonsense.  In the first half of the film, the bear is shown only as a fake bear arm/paw swiping at folks.  This is actually more entertaining than the second half where the real bear is seen!  The shots of the actual bear intercut with the tiny bits of fake bear aren’t so bad considering this probably wasn’t a Schmuckheimer budgeted film.

It’s a tad bloody too for the PG rating.  One very amusing scene has the aforementioned fake bear arm whisking through the air and decapitating Richard Jaeckel’s horse!  The bear’s obviously seen The Godfather one too many times.

Good stuff if you dig flicks like Phase IV, Squirm, Kingdom of the Spiders, etc.