The Yeti
review by Bobby Blakey
There is nothing better than an old school man in suit creature feature. We don’t get enough of them these days with everything rushing to use CGI, but every so often one comes along trying to capture that fun. The latest, The Yeti takes on the task and stars Brittany Allen, Eric Nelsen, Corbin Bernsen, Jim Cummings, Christina Bennett Lind, and William Sadler from directors William Pisciotta and Gene Gallerano. Could this old school flick do the legend justice, or will it get lost in the woods?
The Yeti follows an oil tycoon and a famous adventurer who vanishes into the harsh winter of remote northern Alaska, sending a hand-picked rescue team to attempt to bring them home. What they don’t know is that they are trespassing on Yeti’s territory, and the elements are the least of their worries.
We don’t get enough films focused on the yeti and bigfoot like we should. They are the perfect subject for the horror genre, so I was excited to see it brought to life here. The film is a lower budget which often is better for a film like this as it forces the filmmakers to get clever with their camera work and lighting to make it work. This film does a great job with that using fog and lighting to make it feel more real as opposed to the usual Hollywood lighting. It adds great ambiance to the rest of the film and allows them to do some fun visuals with the creature itself.
The man in suit and practical effects is great and helps to deliver one of the better in the genre, but not a complete knock out of the park it could have been. The creature design is decent enough and when kept the shadows, silhouettes and close angles is perfect but they do get a little to much out of the darkness
that exposes some of the not so strong designs. That doesn’t ruin the creature by any means, just worked better in the shadows to create the bigger threat. The blood and gore that is here is well executed and shows no signs of the lower budget it is working with.
The cast are fine with some like Sadler underused, but they do a decent enough job of bringing some depth to their characters even if they often feel generic. The film limps along at times in the story kind of all over the place trying to overcomplicate it when unnecessary and taking us out of the threat of the yeti which should have been the sole focus. They try to put a spin on it that was a disappointing trope that is too often used in these types of creature features and made it kind of silly. It doesn’t ruin the movie and at least gave it a purpose to explain the killings even though it would have worked fine just with a rampaging yeti doing its thing just because.
I have to admit that I was let down a bit in what I thought I was going to get, but at the same time still gave me some of the fun I wanted in this kind of film. There is a tone that made it feel like one of those old serials which I think was perfect here but just wish they had leaned into the terror of the yeti more as opposed to bad decision making and coincidental moments to make it work easier.
Decide for yourself and check out The Yeti available now on digital and then on Blu-ray and DVD from Well Go USA.