Dina Meyer is Dr. Sheila Casper, a bat expert who ends up called in when a situation gets out of control. Some people have been attacked by bats, and that could just be the tip of the iceberg as the creatures get ready to swarm and attack a small town. Teaming up with Sheriff Emmett Kimsey (Lou Diamond Phillips) and Dr. Alexander McCabe, a man who can be suspected of having some kind of hidden agenda, simply due to the fact that he's played by Bob Gunton, it's a race against the clock to stop the killer bats from further spreading their leathery wings of death.
Writer John Logan has quite the varied filmography, and this was one of his earlier works, but he certainly shows here that he knows the beats needing hit as things move along briskly enough from start to finish. You get an opening attack, heroes filled in on the situation, a major set-piece in the first half of the film that stands out as the highlight of the whole thing, a misguided "villain, and an attempt to resolve things before the proper resolution in the big finale. It marks everything off the checklist you would expect.
Director Louis Morneau has plenty of experience with the kind of thriller/horror fun that would not necessarily aim for a theatrical release (although this somehow did manage that) and he does well with the resources at his disposal. The bats aren't necessarily realistic, in terms of their movement and behaviour, but the puppets are well made, most of the shots work well when showing the bats looking cunning and dangerous, and it's surprising just how easy viewers may find it to stop picking apart the lack of logic and simply enjoy it for the fun it is. The pacing also helps, as does the cast.
Meyer adds another plucky female lead to her filmography, and she's good in the role, while Phillips doesn't play his small town Sheriff with a small town attitude. Another pleasant surprise here, in fact, is the way in which everyone immediately proceeds in the knowledge that there's no big mystery, no misdirecting coincidences as people die. It's the bats, they're killing people and need to be stopped. Gunton gives good Gunton, and Leon (yeah, no idea who he is either, but he's famous enough to perform under just the one name a la Madonna) tries to be a bit of fun as Jimmy Sands, general assistant to Dr. Casper, but the script doesn't treat him well at all, with one of his first witty comments being so misjudged that it immediately puts you off him.
It may not be any kind of classic, not even within the creature feature subgenre, but Bats deserves credit for some fine practical FX work, lead performers getting the tone just right, and one or two big sequences that show where a lot of the budget went.
6/10
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