Don't go to the Starlight Hotel cos you'll be Eaten Alive!
Me (and probably you) consider Tobe Hooper a great director when it comes to horror flicks, and Eaten Alive is most definitely his second finest film to date, with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre of course being at the top of the list. Now this movie throws this great feeling right at you at frame one where we're introduced to Robert Englund who plays Buck, a yokel with a thing for prostitutes. The film starts out with him wanting to get nasty with this girl in a brothel but she starts screaming and in comes the hostess of the brothel offering Buck TWO ladies to make it up to him, which of course puts a smile on his face, and then the hostess tells the unwilling girl off. Maybe it's just me but it's a sweet start and it just keeps getting better as we go along.
The girl quickly quits the job she was not meant for and heads for the Starlight Hotel that's located close by. Once there she's greeted by this man who's semi-weird at first but quickly becomes super weird, or rather psychotic for real. Not gonna tell you how it goes but this old timer named Judd has a big croc in a pond next to the hotel and this croc is always hungry and Judd always seem willing to feed it with whatever, or rather WHOEVER passes by.
 
Neville Brand stars as weird dude Judd and he pulls off one helluva good performance with his character. The cool thing about Judd is that even though he's one messed up Inn keeper indeed who do terrible things to people, it's very hard to hate the guy and at times you almost feel sorry for him. He's mumbling a lot throughout the flick and says a lot of weird things but that's just part of the charm that this savage little piece of cinema has to it.
I first saw this movie back when I was a kid. I got it as a worn-out copy on VHS but didn't appreciate the movie half as much back then as I did now when I re-watched the whole thing. But back then you wanted zombies and all kinds of monsters and ghouls, not a simple gator... I mean hell, I could go to the zoo if I wanted to see a gator. Watching it now though it had a different feel to it and while it may be simple (and even a tad bit stupid to some), I believe it's a horror film done right. I love movies from the 70's, the very look they all have and the raw tone a lot of them have compared to films that came out later on during the 80's and what not.
Not to be confused with Umberto Lenzi's Eaten Alive (Eaten Alive by the Cannibals). Also, the film carries some great tunes, not that I'm a fan of country music normally but here it sure fits just fine. In some corners of the world the exact same film is entitled Death Trap and not Eaten Alive if that should ring a bell.
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ALTERNATIVE TITLE: Death Trap, Horror Hotel, Horror Hotel Massacre, Legend of the Bayou, Murder on the Bayou, Starlight Slaughter
MOVIE YEAR: 1977
DIRECTOR: Tobe Hooper
WRITING CREDITS: Alvin L. Fast, Kim Henkel
GENRE: Horror
CAST: Neville Brand, Marilyn Burns, Robert Englund
COUNTRY: USA
RUNTIME: 91 min
RATING: 7/10
Eaten Alive Website/IMDB Click here
Eaten Alive Trailer Click here
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