Prime Time: Frogs (1972)

Some days you want to head to your local cinema to see the latest horror genre releases, some days you are browsing titles available online and see a thumbnail image for Frogs. I am not saying the latter is a good turn of events, but it’s how I ended up deciding to watch this movie. I knew nothing about it, aside from the title, but I was ready to be bemused and delighted. Well . . . I was certainly bemused.

I don’t even know where to begin with the plot summary for this. You may think you know the central plot idea, frogs gone wild, and it’s certainly part of the experience, but there are actually various creatures turning deadly here (including snakes and spiders). The main characters are a wildlife photographer, played by a discomfortingly bare-faced Sam Elliott, and a large family, headed up by patriarch Ray Milland, who live in the middle of a swamp area that is about to become much more dangerous to humans.

Directed by George McCowan, calling this balderdash is actually overselling it. McCowan doesn’t do much to help the material, the visuals are ugly and there’s not one bit of energy in any of the moments you might call set-pieces, and the script, written by Robert Hutchison and Robert Blees, isn’t even awful enough to laugh at. It’s just dull, with no characters to feel invested in and no real feeling of proper threat.

Elliott tries hard to be a solid central figure, even without the power of his moustache to help boost his screen presence, but he cannot overcome the weak material he has to work with. Milland is equally powerless, although he has one or two fun moments that allow him to grandstand in front of people who are forced to stay in his company. The rest of the cast includes Joan Van Ark, Judy Pace, Mae Mercer, Lynn Borden, Adam Roarke, and David Gilliam, none of whom really stand out. And numerous unidentified frogs, of course.

If you want a silly animal attack movie that is actually fun, but still quite awful, then I recommend Night Of The Lepus (the infamous “giant rabbit” movie). In fact, I recommend almost anything over this one, which is poorly-made and, worst of all, consistently dull. This would have been a very different film if directed by William Grefé, I know that much, and I think I will wash this one out of my brain by revisiting my Grefé boxset. 

Awful stuff, and not just because they missed the opportunity to use the tagline “Frogs . . . everybody croaks.”

2/10

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