THE BAT PEOPLE (1974)

[The Burgomaster]

I had high hopes that this would be another fun, AIP drive-in movie from the '70s.  Not so.

First of all, it was directed by Jerry Jameson, who later went on to direct more crappy movies including AIRPORT '77 and the infamous RAISE THE TITANIC.  Need I say more?  Probably not, but I will anyway.

Here's the story:  A guy and his wife decide to sneak away from a tour group inside a cave so they can have sex.  The wife falls down a hole and the husband, trying to rescue his wife, gets bit by a bat.  He goes to the hospital and begins treatment for rabies.  However, before long, he starts mutating into a man-sized bat.

Basically, this is just a werewolf movie except the guy turns into a bat instead of a wolf.  The make-up effects by Stanley (Stan) Winston make the guy look like a cross between Eddie Munster and a character from PLANET OF THE APES (see photo below) . . . but you don't get to see the bat-man's face very much.  They make you wait until near the end of the movie (in the tradition of all those 1950s horror and sci-fi movies where you hardly see the creature until the final reel).



If you still want to see this, it is on the Midnite Movies double feature disk with THE BEAST WITHIN.

[WingedSerpent]

I remember seeing this movie on MST3K.  Its been a while so I don't remember much about the episode.  I just really remember thinking a good sequel would have been the bat peson fighting the lizard monster from Track of the Moon Beast.

since both monsters are present only at night a good final scene would be the two creatures waking up a dawn after the long fight and looking at each other in their human forms

Bat Person:  Wait you mean your...
Lizard Man:  And you mean to tell me that your...

and at that they both start laughing and laughing.

[Andrew]

I reviewed this one a while back.  That he looked like a poor extra from "Planet of the Apes" occurred to me as well.

http://www.badmovies.org/capsules/b/batpeople/

[Raffine]

There was a glut of monsters in the 70's that looked like variations on John Chamber's ape makeup. I'm guessing it was folks copying the whole latex appliance technique.

Check out Kerwin Mathews' apish werewolf from THE BOY WHO CRIED WEREWOLF.


"Why do silver bullets kill me? It's APE LAW, naturally."