2011 independent horror film, Boggy Creek, made an attempt to turn Bigfoot into a terrifying horror villain, but missed the mark completely.
While the concept of Bigfoot, who is sometimes known as Sasquatch, is not new, there are many different ways to apply the creature’s legend. Bigfoot is sometimes seen as a fantasy beast similar to something on The Witcher or even a more primitive, extinct species like dinosaurs in Jurassic Park; to others, Bigfoot is just as realistic as sharks, alligators, and other large reptiles. Creature feature horror is a very broad sub-genre in general because it can go in so many different directions, choosing to err toward fantasy or realism depending on its story. Both ways have the potential to be scary, but Boggy Creek ended up being too melodramatic for no apparent reason, barely gave audiences any payoff with creature violence, and failed to capitalize on all the best elements of Bigfoot’s story.
Boggy Creek isn’t the first movie to try to bring Bigfoot and its legend to the big screen - or even the small screen - and it won’t be the last, but as this movie is one of the most recent to attempt to make the creature into a formidable horror villain, it’s a shame it didn’t pay off.
Boggy Creek Failed Its Attempt At Bigfoot Horror
From director Bryan T. Jaynes, Boggy Creek released at Texas Frightmare Weekend in 2011. The film wasn’t widely reviewed, but earned low ratings from Dread Central and Shock Till You Drop, among others. Though certainly an indie film with little in the way of marketing and a direct to DVD/Blu-Ray release, Boggy Creek could have carved out a niche for itself with some rampaging Bigfoot violence. However, it didn’t. Its choice to focus more on a loose legend about creatures that seemed like rip-offs of Bigfoot was only part of the problem. The largest issue was that Boggy Creek put barely any focus on the creatures at all, and hardly felt any traditional elements of a horror movie beyond a preternatural premise.
Boggy Creek has been connected to other films with similar titles that are about Bigfoot, but isn’t directly related. However, films like 1972’s The Legend of Boggy Creek, which attempted to pose as a documentary - one of the earlier styles of found footage - focused on the creature as well. There were sequels and other films that attempted to continue The Legend of Boggy Creek’s story of the Fouke Monster, from local folklore in Arkansas. While the original movie was a major accomplishment, in that it aided in the birth of what modern found footage movies are today, the projects that succeeded it weren’t as well-executed. Bigfoot movies have gone the way of other realistic-creature based monster movies, such as Sharknado and Anaconda vs. Lake Placid have gone. Films like Primal Rage, Abominable, and Valley of the Sasquatch have tried to fit within this overly CGI-laden, “B” movie format, and some have even gone on to be featured on parody shows like Mystery Science Theatre 3000.
While a Bigfoot movie could properly be done, or even transition to horror television with shows like American Horror Story, Boggy Creek’s attempt to turn a creature feature into a soapy melodrama wasn’t a good look for either the horror genre or monster movies.
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