Night Fright (1967)

Fright Night
The Extraterrestrial Nasty

Cast:

John "What do you say about a man best known for boffing Shirley Temple?" Agar is Sheriff Clint Crawford
Ralph Baker Jr. is Chris
Dorothy Davis is Judy
Bill Thurman is Deputy Ben Whitfield
Roger Ready is Professor Alan Clayton

What the box says:

When two young lovers are viciously attacked by a hideous monster. Police Sheriff Clint Crawford finds a rocket has mysteriously crashed. Soon, the sheriff realizes that there may be a connection, but it's too late for Crawford's partner who becomes yet another victim. It's now human wit versus monster instincts as Sheriff Crawford devises a plan to rid of the creature and save the town.

Plot:

A teen couple is parked in the woods. A radio announcer interrupts the typical make-out music to announce an object has crashed near town.

Something heads to the car. Something happens, and the girl screams.

Later, blonde is talking with Judy when Judy�s boyfriend arrives. Apparently, all women love Chris.

In the car, Judy reveals she�s not too happy with him since he was talking to the girl, Annie, he had dated previously. Relationship fu ensues. They drive off into the country.

Chris ponders the complexities of physics, aliens, etc� A carload of lunchmeat drives up and is going to have a dance at the beach.

Chris and Judy walk and frolic about. Later, Judy screams.

The credits roll. Cops are on their way. Sheriff Clint Crawford and Deputy Ben talk about how the federal government men found the rocket and won�t let them near it to investigate. Professor Alan is supposed to meet the government agents.

Sheriff Clint and deputy Ben head to the murder site. The coroner has loaded the girl�s body. The boy is severely wounded but still alive. Wes, the reporter drives up. Sheriff, deputy and Wes search for clues. Cheap scare just some hogs. Sheriff called by the others. Some very strange tracks have been found. Deputy is sent to trace the tracks.

Lunchmeat is on the dirt road and almost run over Sheriff Clint. He tells them to go back to town.

Deputy catches back up with the Sheriff. The tracks seem to lead near where the rocket was found. However, the sheriff is sure there is no connection. They learn the boy died from his injuries. Deputy Ben is to guard the dirt road.

At the local hangout, the lunchmeat are raging about how the Sheriff mistreated them and ruined their weekend.

Sheriff Clint meets with nurse, his girlfriend, who is the sister of Darlene one of the lunchmeat.

The lunchmeat will wait until dark and sneak out to the cabin. One of the girls had dated Chris which angers the mighty Rex Lunchmeat.

One of the girls overhears Chris calling Judy.

At the Sheriff�s office, Clint is raging that the state troopers haven�t gotten around here to helping with the murder. Wes wants to know when he can publish his article. The Sheriff, king of this police state, has him hold off for a couple of days. Clint calls Professor Clayton to meet again.

Night, Chris and Judy go for another drive. At the local hangout, they learn that the lunchmeat snuck back to the beach for their party. Judy is afraid that they will get hurt if they sneak past the cops.

The lunchmeat get to the beach. Let the revelry begin.

Chris can�t get a hold of the Sheriff. They decide to head to the beach to warn those idiots.

Back at the beach, pseudo-twisting ensues and is too dark to see anything.

Sheriff shows the foot impression to the good Professor.

Nurse, Joan, gets home and finds a note from her sister who went to the lake. She calls the police station and gets one of the deputies.

Sheriff Clint talks about the animal track more to Clayton and has to leave.

While Clayton studies the impression. Joan calls looking for Sheriff Clint.

Too dark to see, the beach party ensues.

The monster attacks a car. The police officer calls the station for help. No help when the dispatcher is enjoying a damn fine cup of coffee.

Twist party won�t ever end. Chris and Judy arrive. Rex ignores Chris�s warning to leave. So, the mighty Rex Lunchmeat battles Chris who whoops the arrogant little health-hole. Chris warns everyone to leave but not why. Everyone heads off leaving Rex and Darlene to stay.

The monster is watching and then attacks the mighty Rex. Something happens but is still too dark to see.

Joan gets out to the lake, and the monster goes after her. Police open fire. It chases the deputy through the woods and gets him.

Chris and Judy drive on. The sheriff told them not to mention what they saw. They spot the Sheriff�s car. Stopping, Chris finds the dead Deputy Ben. Sheriff shows up then. Everybody heads to town.

Sheriff Clint finally gets the state troopers to bring some extra men. Apparently, Darlene is still alive. Clint sends Wes on some sort of errand. Professor Alan arrives and finally reveals what he knows about the creature. It involved top secret space research. Operation Noah�s Ark was to study the effects of radiation on animal life. The rocket went beyond the lunar orbit but crashed outside of town. The space radiation turned the animals into mutants.

Sheriff sends Chris to get some construction supplies. They need a decoy.

In the woods, everyone meets. The supplies are ready. Chris stays with Judy. Several of the cars head out.

Sheriff Clint and Wes wait. The troopers are scattered nearby. The Monster approaches Chris�s car.

Chris and Judy run through the woods with the Thing in hot pursuit. Huuuuhhh-coooo-cooooooooo-coooooooooooo�. (Sorry, Dukes of Hazzard reference has been invoked.

Sheriff and Wes set something up. Chris warns them of the Monster behind him. The troopers open fire on it.

The Monster is still lumbering on towards what looks like Joan the nurse when the Sheriff blows it up. Everyone get out from cover�

Sheriff used a mannequin to lure the creature to it so he could blow it up.

Joan and Sheriff Clint swap spit. The end�

What I say:

Awww, Night Flight. I'm sure everyone didn't know the show from late nights on USA Friday and Saturday nights..Wait, sorry, I'm getting confused. Who knew the Roddy McDowell movie from the mid 80s?...Wait, that was Fright Night. I am desperately tring to think of anything to write about besides this movie. Well, I've delayed long enough...

I've tried to develop a list of warning signs for ways to tell that movie will suck from the very beginning like if you can tell the scene is a nightmare or if a bit of nudity is flashed in the first 47 seconds just to keep you awake like in Beast of Yucca Flats. However, there are far more signs than those 2. What do you say about a movie that is barely over an hour long but still doesn't have its opening credits until 11:30 minutes into it? The correct answer would be add it to the lst of movie warning signs.

Not killer aliens but hideously mutated animals sent into space for research. I'm sure that Peta approved that project. By 1967, killer aliens had been done to death and and ressurrected to be done to death again. Freaky necromancing necrophiliacs. Anyways, some of the worst sci-fi movies about killer from space involved mutants like Monster A-Go-Go. A movie so bad itranks up there in the halls of the mighty Manos...

The 80s was known for quite a few number of movies with characters completely without any personalities or any redeemable qualities until the late 90s showed us that characters could be even more generic and interchangeable. The snotty college kids in this movie, you want the monster to eat them. In the 80s, the monster or killer would at least get rid of them and that would be something to make you cry out in joy.

Larry Buchanan was known as a regional filmmaker. Though he didn't have anything to do with this movie, Night Fright is another of regional filmmaking from Texas. Well regional filmmaking like that also gave us Charles B. Pierce with Legend of Boggy Creek. Buchanan is most known for remaking several of Roger Corman movies as TV-movies and had smaller budgets than the great and powerful Corman.

From a man that starred in 2 of the John Ford-John Wayne cavalry movies, how could he fall so low? Well, John Agar hit some bad times after divorcing Shirley Temple. For a while, all he could star in were B pictures and sank even lower into the realms of Larry Buchanan movies like Curse of the Swamp Creatures. While he did star in quite a few stinkers, he never seemed bitter about it like a lot of other actors would have been which is about the best thing that can be said about him.

Most of the movie is filmed at night so its too dark too see what is going on. Movies like this have the "day for night" shots that aren't done right which makes a short car trip stretch out into something that is days long. Look, it's night, day, night, day, night...How far did they drive? Do we really care to see monster attacks that are completely unable to see what is going on? We do if it keeps us from seeing the worst party this side of the House of the Dead rave.

I can't believe the lunchmeat gang wasn't beaten to death as children for their attitude problems. How they complain about how the police shouldn't interefere in their lives? Those are the people crying for help first...Take every single annoying characteristic from the people you know. Magnify them by 100 divide by e³, and you get a close approxiamation of how annoying the group is. They almost make the little deliquent kids from Ape seem like altar boys and not in the Stephen Lynch song version.

The monster is virtually impossible to see. From the few glimpses, it looked like a gorilla suit with some sort of halloween mask. A couple of shots hade the monster's face almost look like it was designed by H.R. Giger. The banana like head...I think accidentally insulting Giger by comparing one of the truly great movie monsters with one that is so lame is a stopping place.

Quotable Dialogue
"It came from the sky."
"We thought we'd find you in the boondocks."
"Girl chewed to pieces. Boy barely alive."
"Don't ever call me 'fuzz'!!!"
"The more people, the crazier the blast!"
Morals of the Story
Radio stations routinely interrupt into music for mysterious crtashing objects.
All professors must smoke pipes.
Attempted vehicular homicide is funny.
Coffee breaks can be fatal.
Dusk, night, and day occur withina 5 minute span.