Bats (1999)

In the world of cinema there are many films made with frankly ludicrous premises. This is especially true in the genre of sci-fi themed monster movies, a genre filled mostly of films whose only qualities are bad ones. Even in that particular there can be few films with as fundamentally silly a premise as this one. Unfortunately, it’s not just the film’s concept that’s a bad idea here, this is a terrible film on every possible level.

The basic idea is that an insane scientist has been trying to create the Ultimate Warrior. So far, it's a typical B-movie premise, however instead of trying to breed dinosaurs or use alien DNA he decides the best way to breed an ultimate warrior is by using genetic engineering on the normally peaceful species of Fruit Bats.

Surprisingly he is reasonably successful, leading me to wonder just how scary a monster he could have produced if he'd started from a species that wasn't a small, vegetarian flying rodent.

Inevitably, they escape and start killing people in a small Texas village out in the middle of nowhere. The local sheriff (Lou Diamond Phillips) and the obligatory love interest (Dina Meyer) must somehow stop the evil creatures before they destroy the world. Although, since they don't like cold climates it's not entirely clear how they are meant to conquer the globe – but this doesn't stop the computer simulation showing them invading the Arctic.

The basic idea is very, very silly and it’s quite impressive that the script (by Oscar nominated “Gladiator” writer John Logan) manages to make the film even sillier. Absurdities abound from the Mad Scientist trying to communicate with the supposedly telepathic bats, to the “Bat radar” which can somehow detect individual bats several miles away using the powers of poorly-thought-out science. Nowhere in the movie does it explain why the scientist wanted to create invincible genetically modified fruit bats.

The acting is terrible, even by b-movie standards. The script isn’t just absurd it also fails totally to include interesting dialogue and apart from the amusing last scene, there is no real (deliberate) humour here either. The special effects are as bad as would be expected in a film of this calibre and the action scenes are sometimes so badly shot they’re incomprehensible.

This is a terrible movie, with no real redeeming features. The only possible reason to watch this is to marvel at how a film can go so horribly wrong. Ultimately the scariest thing here is that the movie made over $10 million at the US box office, making a comfortable profit. This raises the horrifying prospect of a sequel, fortunately after 3 years there’s still no sign of one.

Rating : 2 / 10

All content ©2003 William Marnoch.

Comments? Agree/Disagree with the Reviews? Suggestions? Random Ramblings? Whatever you might want to say, feel free to e-mail me at william@wmarnoch.freeserve.co.uk .