Rating: 3.5/5
Hooptober X | 31/34 | Tobe Hooper
Buck (Robert Englund) wants to fuck, so he goes to Miss Hattie’s. But the sex worker he purchased, Clara (Roberta Collins), isn’t up for the job and runs away to The Starlight, a rundown hotel in the swamp.
There ain't no such word as "no"
The hotel owner, Judd (Neville Brand), has an odd energy and keeps an African crocodile penned up in the swamp waters. He accommodates Clara until he figures that she came from Miss Hattie’s. So, he kills her and throws her to the crocodile.
A family rolls up — mother Faye, father Roy, young daughter Angie, and a little dog named Snoopy. Faye and Roy are fighting and discussing divorce, and Snoopy is barking at the crocodile. His little dog ego can’t take it, and he has to go in against the crocodile, and the crocodile eats him.
Ain't nothing nobody can do about it. It's all according to the instincts
To prove his worth, Roy goes to the car to grab a shotgun and kill the crocodile. But Judd won’t let him. He cuts Roy down with a scythe and throws him to the crocodile. Judd then tries to proposition Faye in his confused way — by walking in while she’s starting a shower. When she rejects him, he beats her and ties her up. Angie escapes underneath the house.
Also, Harvey and his daughter Libby drive up. They’re looking for Harvey’s missing daughter, Clara. Judd claims not to know her, saying she must be one of Miss Hattie’s girls, sending Harvey and Libby on the hunt.
Judd’s world is closing in on him. His thoughts won’t leave him alone, no matter how loud he turns up the music. So when Buck drives up, everything begins to unravel.
If I had seen this a year ago, I would’ve dismissed it as a cheap bummer of a follow-up to one of the most horrifying movies ever made. While this is no Texas Chainsaw Massacre, its contained reality strikes closer to the America beneath your nose.
Overwrought Analysis for Fun and Profit (Spoilers Ahead):
Judd is a sort of anti-Norman Bates. His mental illness is well-known, but like Miss Hattie’s, everyone ignores it as long as it remains on the periphery. But as his core is repression that can only sublimate through feeding people to his crocodile, cutting them down with a reaper scythe, separating the wheat from the chaff
When he sought the comfort of someone to talk to with sex workers, they sent him away — they prefer to reward the Buck’s who want to fuck like a “normal” red-blooded country boy. Even when Buck is violent, his motives make sense to them
And it makes sense why Judd hates Buck and why Judd kills more men than he does women. In part, it’s because male machismo doesn’t recognize a threat when it’s in their face — like Buck doing a rooster impersonation, they stand their ground, assuming they have what the right people want.
I think Judd is a latent bisexual, if not homosexual. He doesn’t want Miss Hattie’s girls. He wants Buck but could never have him. The final scene is Judd’s wooden leg floating in the water with bisexual lighting.
Similarly, the women who understand their role to these men are left alive. When they cry and resist, that’s when the violence comes. When they smoke a cigarette and roll their eyes, that’s when the violence comes.
But since Faye isn’t a sex worker, Judd doesn’t know how to respond to her. He has her in his grasp, but he doesn’t want to kill her, and he doesn’t want to fuck her either. So he ties her up, putting her on pause so that he has some sense of domination.