Watch The Bat People For Free

Sadly Over-hyped

As Good As It Gets

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Cheap and badly made modern day vampire picture of sorts from American International pictures. A young couple is spelunking when the husband is bitten by a bat, then rather quickly turns into a man-bat with a need to murder and drink blood. Besides the man-bat attacks, there are also a fair amount of attacks by regular old bats, tapping into the nature-gone-wild film craze of the 1970s (i.e. "Food of the Gods," "Frogs," "Night of the Lepus," etc.). This film represents the inauspicious debut of renowned special effects make-up artist Stan Winston, but even his solid make-up and special effects work can't save this film. However, this film is one that can absolutely be enjoyed on a campy it's-so-bad-it's-good level of entertainment, so if that's your thing, you might check out this turkey.

Sure, this isn't a good movie but I've seen a heckuva lot worse. The prosthetic hand Stewart Moss wears looks good but his face makeup after his transformation makes him look less like a bat and more like the ugliest extra in the PLANET OF THE APES. The "Bat Man" doesn't even have wings. This movie would have been much better had they used a monster that looked something like those creepy bat people on the Marc Singer BEASTMASTER film.This movie centers on married couple Stewart Moss and Marianne McAndrew, who are married in real life. Stewart is a scientist who plans on taking a side trip to a cave before he and the wife hit the slopes. When the old carnal desires strike a chord in Marianne, she sneaks her hubby off in the cavern for a little Neanderthal necking, but she slips down a hole and her hubby has to rescue her. In the midst of his rescue, he is bitten by a bat. The good scientist spends the rest of the film writhing about in hospital beds and motel rooms, and killing an occasional person here and there.THE STORY: $$ (The story is far too formulaic and fails to give us any sympathetic characters. Marriane McAndrew is the closest thing to a sympathetic character we have in this film but she is brash at times, referring to her husband and a doctor she hardly knows as "children" to their faces. Also, she complains to Dr. Kipling (Paul Carr) about her husband's new violent streak after his bat attack but the script fails to deliver in that regard. His "violent streak" consists of him telling his wife, in a rather laid-back fashion, to stay away from him while he suffers throes of agony in a hot tub).ACTING: $$ (Michael Pataki is the standout as the slimy Sgt. Ward who takes a great interest in the case. He is always on Stewart Moss' heels but is he more interesting in stopping a killer or bedding a distraught Miss McAndrew? Arthur Space as the drunk gives a very good performance and had me laughing. Marianne McAndrew does a fine job as the wife of a monster but Stewart Moss isn't all that convincing in his role as the main character).NUDITY: $ (Marianne McAndrew is naked under the sheets but you don't see anything from her. The sex scene is one the strangest in cinema history. Near the end of the film, Marianne is getting busy with her man when he changes into his bat form midway through the Barry White ballad).

I didn't think this was as absolutely horrible as some people apparently do. It passes as one of those cheesy horror movies you might waste time with in the middle of the night when you can't sleep, although admittedly it's no better quality than that. It's true that the acting isn't great - I thought Marianne McAndrew as Cathy Beck, for example, came across as completely passionless - but the main problem is that several aspects of the plot didn't really make sense to me. The Becks are on a trip described by John (Stewart Moss) as part work and partly the honeymoon they never had (now that's romantic!) The work part has something to do with touring caves, which in itself sounds strange (how does being part of a tour group through a cave relate to anyone's work?) but it gets stranger when we find out that he's a doctor doing research in the area of preventative medicine (huh? That connection completely lost me.) Bitten by a bat while he's in the cave, he begins to transform into what I guess was supposed to be a human-bat hybrid (although when we finally see him in makeup he looks a lot more like an ape-man of some sort) and a killing spree starts. Here's another problem. The first killing is a nurse in a hospital. At first, everyone thinks her death was an accident. The second murder is of a young girl, who is described as having her throat ripped out. The sheriff (Michael Pataki) then tells us that her death was similar to the nurse's (meaning throat ripped out? - How could anyone think that was an accident?) And what's with the sheriff? He seems pretty no-nonsense until the scene in Cathy's hotel room when he takes a swig of liquor and then almost rapes her, after which everything seems to go back to normal. It's saddled with an ending that left almost everything unresolved, and also with one of the most irritating theme songs I've ever heard in a movie. Even for all that, there was something here that kept me watching. Sometimes pure cheesiness can get you through an hour and a half. Pretty bad, yeah - but not as awful as some people say.

"The Bat People" is a proud resident of the IMDb Bottom 100. Every once and a while the movie suddenly vanishes from the infamous list, depending on whether there are new movies with Paris Hilton in the lead or documentaries about American Idol stars, but it always reliably returns sooner or later. And why? Because, unlike the majority of crap in that list, "The Bat People" is a legitimate bad film and it deserves to be on there regardless of any media influences or internet buzz! This nearly isn't the worst film ever made, since the basic concept definitely has a certain charm and ingenuity, but it's still indescribably difficult to sit through the whole thing. The script is incredibly boring, with absolutely unnecessary padding footage and gigantic gaps in continuity, and yet the main characters still remain total strangers throughout the entire film. Other than a sensible screenplay, the film also lacks spectacular killing sequences and the make-up effects – although courtesy of a young Stan Winston – are ludicrously inept and remain largely unseen until the end of the film. The film's title is inaccurate, as "people" refers to a number in plural whereas the story actually just revolves on one Bat Person. Much more than Bruce Wayne, the real Batman plays in this movie and he as well has a genuine Bat-cave and a Bat-mobile (a stolen ambulance)! The plot introduces a young couple on their honeymoon-weekend exploring caves. They wander off from a guided tour group and he gets bitten by a bat whilst trying to protect his wife from the animal's vicious attack. Worried that he might be infected with rabies, he undergoes an intense treatment at the local hospital, but still this doesn't prevent him from slowly transforming into a bloodthirsty bat creature. He kills random people at night and toys around with the suspicious police sergeant whilst his loving wife is still vastly convinced the awkward behavior is exclusively due to allergic reactions to the rabies treatment. Sure, honey! The script never explains why a bat would attack people and how come John always changes back into a normal human being at the dawn of a new day instead of gradually turning into a permanent state of bat-guano. So basically, "The Bat People" is a variation on the good old werewolf-theme, but obviously not a very interesting one. The concept showed a lot of potential, but somehow the sub plots center on whiny drunks and perverted Sheriffs instead of on ghastly monsters. Some of the settings and exterior filming locations look impressive, the misfit song playing during the credits is strangely catchy, there's a nice bit of gore during the climax (finally!) and main actress Marianne McAndrew is ravishing to look at (though not to listen to). This truly bad and boring film's current listing in the bottom 100 is spot number 80, and personally I hope it sticks somewhere in that region. The list simply wouldn't feel and traditional without "The Bat People".