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Rana: The Legend of Shadow Lake (1981) / Bog (1979)




First up in my lake monsters double feature was this early 80's horror about a half-human, half-frog creature. The horror title fits it nicely, though not for the reason you would think.











The plot begins with this guy and his girl in a cabin. He's telling her the story of something that happened to him as a young boy. This is where the story kicks in. The main character, Kelly, is living on a lake with his Dad. Some trackers are there as well, attempting to get some gold that's alleged to be somewhere in the lake. The other characters are some old timer named Charlie who keeps harassing the trackers by shooting at them, and babbling about something that's lurking around, and a paleontologist and her niece, who are there to study fossils of an old creature that were found in the area. Anyway, the monster that lives in the lake, Rana, was worshipped by the native American ancestors who lived on that island, and it begins to attack people who go into the water.














This is one of those flicks where you don't get any good glimpses of the monster, just mostly shadows and quick cuts, and it doesn't actually have much screen time until the big climax at the end. This would have been acceptable if the rest of the film was interesting or fun, but between the atrocious acting, the many dull characters, none of whom you give a crap about, and the slow pace and uniteresting story, it's mostly a borefest. The entire time I was watching, I kept thinking that this movie would be perfect for Mystery Science Theatre 3000, it was that bad (though I should note some pretty good, fun movies have also gotten the MST3K treatment). I kept clicking the pause button to see how much time was left of this atrocity as it was straining to keep my interest. Had this movie gone all out with the cheese and made the characters say and do more outrageous things, it might have been fun. You may require the assistance of some alcoholic drinks to get through this one. I streamed this on Tubi.

















The next one was 1979’s Bog, about a small community being terrorized by a strange creature that lives in the local lake. This one is also available on Tubi (and YouTube as well).





The film begins with two couples who come to the lake to camp and fish. The guys are determined to spend the weekend drinking beer, fishing and having fun. The wives both get attacked and taken by an unseen creature, and so the husbands go to the sheriff to report them missing. During the search for them, they find the dead bodies of both women, drained of blood, so Sheriff Neal starts working with Dr. Brad (Marshall Thompson, who's been in quite a few 50's horror and sci-fi flicks, including It! The Terror From Beyond Space and Fiend Without A Face), and Ginny, a pathologist. They eventually figure out that the deaths were caused by a monster that lives in the bog waters of the lake, and all the townspeople get together to try to kill it.















This flick is also low budget and doesn't show the monster clearly, mostly lurking behind trees and bushes, or in multiple quick cuts and close-ups. He also doesn't fully appear until the last half of the film. However, unlike Rana, this movie is hilarious and fun, keeping you entertained with the many colorful characters, their silly dialogue, the ridiculous science, and even an awful, romantic theme song called Walk With Me sung by Pat Hopkins that plays at the opening credits and during a cheesy romantic love scene between Brad and Ginny. The few glimpses of the creature are laughable, with his goofy bulging eyes and cheap appearance. I can see why they didn't show it too often, as it would make the audience either roll their eyes or howl with laughter. The Bog monster definitely belongs in the company of some of the goofier cinematic monster suits from the 1950's, such as Creature From The Haunted Sea, and the turnip thing from It Conquered The World. If you enjoy silly z-grade cinema, then Bog is sure to give you a few chuckles.















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