Horror Film Friday Returns with Gargoyles

It's been a while since I posted a ridiculous horror movie review because I usually watch them with glee and am too lazy to take any notes and then I forget everything the next morning. Anyhow, here's my recent experience with a childhood favorite written at 1am when I couldn't sleep - when I do all my best writing haha. Have you seen it?

Gargoyles 1972 Directed by Bill L. Norton

Synopsis

WATCH OUT! THE GARGOYLES ARE HERE

After receiving word about a mysterious carcass/skeleton unearthed in the Arizona desert, a father and his daughter decide to remove it from the burial grounds for further study. Once they do so, they, as well as the town, are besieged by a colony of gargoyles living in some nearby caverns.

My Two Cents for Free!

“Bones. I smell old bones.” Mmmmm

When I was a weird little kid this movie used to play on Creature Double Feature and my sister and I would run around with the other bratty neighborhood kids and pretend we were Gargoyles every time they played it. We'd screech like weirdos and flap our arms while jumping off the stone walls and hopping fences and stomping around like little lunatics. We didn’t have any $ so left to our own devices we became wild things. I think realizing I’d never become a sexy gargoyle and maybe grow some wings like some of these guys was one of my earliest disappointments. Anyhow, this is a movie that I should’ve left in my memory. The gargoyles in their cute little gargoyle suits are still pretty sexy, not gonna lie, but all the rest was a bit of a mess. Sooo here’s some of what happens in the second person because I feel like it.

You unwisely decide to visit Uncle Willie’s dried-up tourist trap and he gives ya a beer and shows you his very special bone effigy while forcing you to listen to his long-winded story about some ritual of manhood but things go awry, as they do, so you and your daughter will never get to hear the ending after sitting through all that rambling (damn it all). On the way out you stupidly grab the horned skull off the bone monster because you’re some sort of idiot uh demonologist scientist and why wouldn’t you? Then you hightail it out of there like your ass is on fire but oh shit oh fuck you have been SEEN by a creature with the stolen 💀 and it now wants you dead! You then hook up with some coppers chasing a gang of “dirt riders” who end up taking the fall for the thing you ran from because you’re a bit of an opportunistic dick who probably deserves to get eaten or "whatever" by a sexy gargoyle. Whew what a freaking day, ey? But it ain’t nearly over yet. Things escalate, lots of screaming ensues and your daughter finds herself in need of a fainting couch. Fortunately, the gargoyles are there for her because you keep getting konked in the noggin and are totally useless. She's a little afraid but don’t stress because they have a cute little cubby filled with stolen books so I think she’ll be just fine reading books to her gargoyle loves who only want to learn. Your future grandkids might look a little funny though but that’s on you. You could’ve simply stayed home and minded your own business instead of dragging your grown daughter into this shit to take pictures for your book you selfish bastard 🤷‍♀️️ But, if you’re asking me, if it all ended here I think she wins.

And I’ll end this review here because this is where I’m pretending the movie ended 😆

How the heck do I rate a film like this? 2.5/3ish I don't know. It's a truly terrible made for tv production but I kind of loved it. I definitely don't regret the rewatch and it reminded me of the fact that I have always loved monsters more than most people so I guess I'm going with a three today.

You can rent it at Amazon or maybe catch it on a Svengoolie rerun like I did.

⭐⭐⭐