Abominable (2006)

With all the great reviews this flick has been getting, I had to check it out for myself. For an independent creature feature, Abominable succeeds in telling a suspenseful Bigfoot story with enough humor, gore and T 'n' A to keep most horror fans happy.

After a tragic climbing accident that killed his wife and left him in a wheelchair, Preston Rogers returns to his isolated cabin retreat with his physical therapist, Otis (a real asshole), to hopefully help heal his emotional wounds. As soon as they are barely settled in, Otis runs back into town to fetch Preston his soy milk. While he is gone, Preston is trapped inside the house, only able to gaze out the windows. Soon, a group of giggly girls shows up for a fun weekend in the adjacent cabin. While Preston is looking outside through a window, he spies a downed phone line. He grabs his binoculars to get a closer look and sees two evil red eyes in the forest that appear to be staring into the girls' cabin! He tries to get the attention of the girls, but only succeeds in getting called a pervert. When one of the girls ventures out of the cabin to try and get better cell reception, he sees his chance...but not before something abducts the girl into the woods. When Otis finally returns, he doesn't believe Preston's story. Stuck in his wheelchair, Preston can only watch in horror as one by one each of the girls is attacked by what appears to be Bigfoot! Can he get help before it is too late or will he be the creature's next meal?

Abominable is a fun ride and horror fans will love seeing such genre greats as Jeffrey Combs, Lance Henriksen, Rex Linn, Dee Wallace-Stone and Tiffany Shepis. Though their screen time is short, Combs and Henriksen's characters are hilarious and easily steal the show. Matt McCoy's performance as Preston is equally strong but played with more of a straight face. My only complaint is the lack of character development with the girls. Sure, most of them die quickly, but a little character development would have made me care a whole lot more about their wicked demises.

This movie has a very cool Rear Window feel to it which adds to the feelings of helplessness and isolation already created by the middle-of-nowhere forest setting. You sure as heck won't find me in the middle of a forest anytime soon! There are also clever nods to other creature movies tucked away in the movie which will delight horror fans.

As for the creature, it is nice to see something that hasn't been CGI'ed to death. No, this creature is an actual man in a monster suit like the good ol' days. Sure, Bigfoot's eyes looked a little cross-eyed at times, but I'll take a man in a flawed monster suit over crappy CGI anyday. Bigfoot's glowing red eyes are also very creepy, especially when Preston first spies him hiding in the forest. That scene definitely gave me a little pleasant shock. I also enjoyed how we were only given small glimpses of Bigfoot at the beginning of the film, but toward the end we got complete full frontal of the beast!

The gore is decent, if a little fake looking, but who cares when the front of a guy's face gets bitten clean off?! It's definitely Bigfoot gone wild in this flick, as he stomps, crushes, bends and rips open enough people to satisfy you goremongers out there. Also, for all of those who care about T & A, you get a shower scene that showcases Tiffany Shepis, in case you haven't seen enough of her.

All in all, a fun, B-movie romp through the creature films of yesterday, though with a bit more gore and nudity. You can do a lot worse than this movie, and if you want to satisfy your Bigfoot cravings, this is probably one of the best flicks to do it.

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