Loch Ness Horror (1981)

A while ago I was pondering as to whether Insane Clown Posse's faux Blaxploitation film Big Money Hustlas (2000) might fall into the definition of 'cultural appropriation', featuring, as it does, the white rappers behaving the way they clearly think black performers acted in the aforementioned genre.  The resulting film consequently plays out as a caricature of, rather than a homage to, Blaxploitation.  I was reminded of the issue again today, while watching Larry Buchanan's 1981 schlock-fest Loch Ness Horror.  The caricature of Scotland presented here is quite alarming.  Far more so than 'Nessie' herself, who is represented by what appears to be a large rubber inflatable with smoke emanating from its mouth.  Look, I know this was a low budget film, but damn it, you can see the seam in the monster's neck where the sections of the inflatable were stuck together.  She doesn't so much as bite her victims as nudge them to death with her head, (obviously, those rubber teeth wouldn't penetrate anything, let alone flesh and bone).  When she moves through the forest, all you see is her head and neck because, presumably, they didn't have the budget to make the rest of her - in the water, the head and neck are followed by an inflated hump to suggest a body.  (I actually remember this film getting a bit of press coverage in the UK when it was in pre-production, with Buchanan promising that 'Nessie' would be represented by a sophisticated, life size fire breathing mechanical model, mush as Dino de Laurentis promised that his King Kong would be some kind of forty foot tall robot.  At least in the Kong remake we got a man in a monkey suit rather than an outsize and barely animated beach inflatable).

But to get back to the point, the film's depiction of Scotland seems to be derived entirely from 1940s Hollywood depictions of the country and its culture - all kilts, whisky and castles.  Which is quite apt, as it was all filmed in California, with Lake Tahoe unconvincingly standing in for Loch Ness.  As for the depiction of the Scottish themselves, well, I'm not sure if it constitutes racism, but they are all twee young girls, whisky soaked eccentric patriarchs and earnest professors.  Those depicting them seem to think that excessively rolling one's Rs constitutes a 'Scottish' accent.  It really shouldn't be allowed.  But what else should we expect from a Larry Buchanan film?  He obviously thought that a 'Nessie' film was a good idea, (Hammer had tried to get such a film off the ground in association with Toho back in the seventies - there was lots of publicity, but nothing ever materialised), but had no idea how to pad it out to feature length.  Consequently, we have multiple sub-plots punctuating the various 'Nessie' attacks: an American scientist searching for proof of the monster, a crazy Scottish scientist stealing the monster's egg and a conspiracy plot involving the British government trying to locate and destroy a crashed German bomber in the Loch in order to cover up the wartime misdemeanors of an MP.  The latter plot line barely makes sense and only really ties into the main plot by dint of the fact that the crashed bomber is located at the mouth of the creature's lair and that the crusty old patriarch cum 'Nessie' fancier, witnessed what really happened to it back in the war.  Production values are threadbare - the 'British Army' seems to consist of four men and a Land Rover and all wear World War Two era uniforms, for instance, while the German bomber, when seen in flight, is stock footage of a JU52 transport taken from Where Eagles Dare.

Utterly dreadful, Loch Ness Horror nonetheless exerts a peculiar fascination while it is playing - it really is hard to believe what you are seeing, from the inflatable 'Nessie' to the 'Scottish' accents guaranteed to make the ears of any real Scot bleed profusely.  Nevertheless, despite all of its shortcomings, it is still better than Beneath Loch Ness (2001), another US-filmed but Scottish set 'Nessie' movie.  Its 'Scottish' setting is even less believable than that of Loch Ness Horror and the accents worse.  If you want to know why Patrick Bergin thought that appearing in EastEnders was a step up career-wise, just watch Beneath Loch Ness.  If, on the other hand, you want to be alternately entertained and horrified (by the accents, not 'Nessie'), then watch Loch Ness Horror instead.