Maneater is set in thew small US town of where a truck crashes late one night, the truck happened to be carrying a large Tiger in a wooden box. The box is smashed open & the huge Tiger is set free to roam the woods near the town. The next morning starts like any other for local Sheriff Grady Barnes (Gary Busey) but that soon changes when several missing persons report come in, investigating these reports Sheriff Barnes & his deputies discover several mutilated dead bodies in the woods surrounding . The local coroner says that the victims were killed by a large animal & it's not long before there are sightings of the Tiger as the body-count continues to grow. The national guard is called in but they can't handle the situation so English big game hunter Colonel Graham (Ian D Clark) volunteers his services to track down the Tiger & kill it...
Not to be confused with the monster film Maneater (2009) starring Dean Cain this made for television American & Canadian co-production was directed by Gary Yates, yet another in a very long line of killer creature feature flicks from the Sy-Fy Channel this is yet another truly terrible film that almost becomes painful to watch. To be honest there really isn't any sci-fi aspect here, the Tiger is just a normal escaped Tiger that starts to kill & eat the locals rather than some genetic experiment or mutation. In fact little background about the Tiger is given, there's some vague opening sequence as a truck crashes but where the truck came from or where it was going or what it was doing with a live Tiger in a wooden crate strapped to the back is anyone's guess. At almost 90 minutes long Maneater drags badly, the majority of the boring running time is just people wandering through th woods for various reasons (reporters reporting the story, people trying to hunt & kill the Tiger, various victims whose job it is to get killed) & little else, there's some crap about a boy who has some sort of link with the Tiger but is never explained in any great detail or to any satisfaction. Then there's the English hunter with a strange moustache & accent that pushes Maneater into the realms of camp even though it's script is deadly serious. Generally speaking I think I could organise a better hunt for the Tiger, the national guard just randomly walk through the woods looking for it rather than laying a trap with some bait for instance. The character's are awful, the dialogue is awful & the plot is awful. The whole film is awful.
Even the attack scenes are awful, we never really see the Tiger attack anyone because they couldn't afford decent special effects & all the attacks happen off-screen with lots of severed body parts & splattered blood left. Actually this was gorier than i thought it was going to be, while most of the gore is after the event mutilated body type stuff at least there's plenty of it here. The real Tiger the makers use during several shots is obviously tame & never bares it's teeth, never acts threatening & is obviously just playing as it rolls around with it's 'victim'.
Filmed in Manitoba in Canada this has decent production values but looks bland & lacks any visual style at all, the effects are alright I suppose & it's competently made. The acting is bad, Gary Busey looks really bad in this & can't even be bothered to button his jacket up properly let alone wear a proper uniform. Busey looks like he's slumming it here big time.
Maneater is a terrible Sy-Fy Channel creature feature that doesn't actually have any sci-fi or fantasy aspects, it's just a normal Tiger killing people. Boring. If you want to see a decent film about killer Tiger's/Lion's then watch The Ghost and the Darkness (1996) again instead.
Not to be confused with the monster film Maneater (2009) starring Dean Cain this made for television American & Canadian co-production was directed by Gary Yates, yet another in a very long line of killer creature feature flicks from the Sy-Fy Channel this is yet another truly terrible film that almost becomes painful to watch. To be honest there really isn't any sci-fi aspect here, the Tiger is just a normal escaped Tiger that starts to kill & eat the locals rather than some genetic experiment or mutation. In fact little background about the Tiger is given, there's some vague opening sequence as a truck crashes but where the truck came from or where it was going or what it was doing with a live Tiger in a wooden crate strapped to the back is anyone's guess. At almost 90 minutes long Maneater drags badly, the majority of the boring running time is just people wandering through th woods for various reasons (reporters reporting the story, people trying to hunt & kill the Tiger, various victims whose job it is to get killed) & little else, there's some crap about a boy who has some sort of link with the Tiger but is never explained in any great detail or to any satisfaction. Then there's the English hunter with a strange moustache & accent that pushes Maneater into the realms of camp even though it's script is deadly serious. Generally speaking I think I could organise a better hunt for the Tiger, the national guard just randomly walk through the woods looking for it rather than laying a trap with some bait for instance. The character's are awful, the dialogue is awful & the plot is awful. The whole film is awful.
Even the attack scenes are awful, we never really see the Tiger attack anyone because they couldn't afford decent special effects & all the attacks happen off-screen with lots of severed body parts & splattered blood left. Actually this was gorier than i thought it was going to be, while most of the gore is after the event mutilated body type stuff at least there's plenty of it here. The real Tiger the makers use during several shots is obviously tame & never bares it's teeth, never acts threatening & is obviously just playing as it rolls around with it's 'victim'.
Filmed in Manitoba in Canada this has decent production values but looks bland & lacks any visual style at all, the effects are alright I suppose & it's competently made. The acting is bad, Gary Busey looks really bad in this & can't even be bothered to button his jacket up properly let alone wear a proper uniform. Busey looks like he's slumming it here big time.
Maneater is a terrible Sy-Fy Channel creature feature that doesn't actually have any sci-fi or fantasy aspects, it's just a normal Tiger killing people. Boring. If you want to see a decent film about killer Tiger's/Lion's then watch The Ghost and the Darkness (1996) again instead.