Eaten Alive!

EATEN ALIVE-1977-This was director Tobe Hooper’s follow up movie after THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE. It was written by the same screenwriter, Kim Henkel and features one of it‘s stars. It didn’t get too wide of a release and was not nearly as well known as it’s predecessor. The first scene features Robert Englund as a john wanting anal sex. Not the best way to start off a movie…

Neville Brand stars a Jed, a mumbling drug addict with a fake leg who owns a motel/crocodile farm. After his attempted rape of a runaway whore (Crystin Sinclair) fails, he stabs her with a rake and feeds her to his “crocs”. A weird couple (William Finley and Marilyn Burns) and their daughter stay in a room after their dog is eaten. They argue a lot and act strange. After Jed kills the father and ties the mother to a bed he terrorizes the daughter with a scythe (she hides under the house to escape him). Meanwhile Mel Ferrer searches for his missing daughter (the first victim) and a hick sheriff (Stuart Whitman) investigates. Carolyn Jones is almost unrecognizable as Miss Matty, the owner of the local whorehouse. Jed feels nearly everyone to his crocs.

Despite Brand’s manic performance and a pretty whacked out climax EATEN ALIVE it isn’t that good! It’s drawn out and cheap looking but the excellent lighting and music help.

After this Hooper’s career kind of took an unfortunate nosedive, as he was replaced on two movies (THE DARK and VENOM) and although he has the director’s credit on POLTERGEIST it’s considered that Steven Spielberg directed most of it. He did manage to make a decent TV adaptation of Stephen King’s ’SALEM’S LOT but this was followed by disappointing features like THE FUNHOUSE, LIFEFORCE, a remake of INVADERS FROM MARS and finally TCSM-2. Lately he’s done TV episodes and another remake, THE TOOLBOX MURDERS. As for this writing he’s suppose direct a version of another King novel, FROM A BUICK 8.

Thanks for reading!