The guy on the left gets better dialog.
Having just finished watching Day of the Animals (1977), I’m a little speechless because it’s actually fairly hard to find anything good to say about this dogged bear of a story. We start off with a cautionary message concerning the hole in the ozone layer and how something might happen if we don’t fix it, and then off we go with a dude hiker group. Dropped off in the mountains by helicopter, they plan to hike back to civilization, sans weapons and only a little food, living off the land as they go.
But this time the land is fighting back, as they find mysteriously abandoned camping sites and forest land that seems changed. Eventually, the animals attack, and the bodies begin to stack up. A boy’s radio works intermittently, so they learn that the areas about 5000 feet in altitude are being abandoned because of frantic animal attacks. Then the group falls apart, some wanting to continue on, some to retreat to a known area. More bodies drop.
Soon you need a scorecard to figure out who’s left and who’s kibble. Little of it is memorable, but Leslie Nielsen trying to bear hug a, errr, bear did catch one’s imagination.
But with flat characters (the actors had little chance with this script), cliched dialog, bad sound, and video choices possibly influenced by the background introduction, but still very irritating, about the only constant source of pleasure were the wildlife shots. That, and guessing who’s the next to go down under a pile of pissed off fur & feathers.
Don’t waste your time on this one.
