BMAF Goes Into the Grizzly Maze

The BMAF as we have mentioned previously are very fond of a creature feature and this week we went down in the woods for a great surpirse, a film described as ‘Jaws with Claws’The formerly titled ‘Red Machine’ but now the much more threatening ‘Into the Grizzly Maze’ was a cut above your usual B movie film due to its impressive cast, James Marsden from the ‘X Men movies’, no stranger to a creature movie as he is one of the BMAF’s favourites ‘Deep Blue Sea’ star Thomas Jane, our favourite ‘Coyote’ and probably yours too, Piper Perabo and in the hunter role Billy Bob Thornton

No stranger to a film of this genre is also the director David (Saw V) Hackl, the story is simple enough, James plays Rowan an Ex Con who returns to his home town which is under attack from a grizzly (played by Bart the Bear, who made his acting debut in Dr Dolittle 2 and as he has grown up on screen, appeared in Evan Almighty, Zookeeper, Without a Paddle and We Brought a Zoo amongst others, you could say he’s the Samuel L Jackson of bears for amount of films he has been in =)

Trying to put a stop to it is Thomas Jane as the town’s deputy sheriff Beckett under the orders of  ‘Silence of the Lambs’ actor Scott Glenn as sheriff Sully.

But Beckett’s main concern is his ecologist wife Michelle who is out on the trail and taking pictures, Beckett teams up with Rowan who is his estranged brother to rescue her and stop the grizzly destroying and eating anyone or thing that gets in its path

The film does play like Jaws, Beckett the Brody cop hero, Michelle is Hooper & in the Quint role is Billy Bob as Douglass, a sub plot of Sully working with poachers is even a bit like Mayor Vaughn. The film does suffer in that bears don’t have the killer rep that say Sharks do and to be honest the grizzly in this is quite cute. The film though is a good watch if you take it for what it is, the final third is full of thrills, spills & plenty of gore as man v beast takes place

Some great set ups too, a scene where Michelle is separated from the rest in fog, her character is deaf (quite refreshing to see a disability on screen)  so we hear from her perspective and you therefore don’t know if the bear is around or not. With Rowan being an ex con, you also get the feeling his character could be expendable so you do not know who will live or die

Also in light of recent real life events, some of the earlier scenes which see poachers killed off by the bear see the tables fully turned. So if you’re after a good B movie you can enjoy with friends or a beer you could do a lot worse than enter the grizzly maze

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