Originally from Latvia, Ito Rebane, later renamed Bill Rebane, became a staple of cult cinema in the 60s and 70s. After working with producer Adalbert Baltes, Rebane sold his first independent production, the short Twist Craze, to American International Pictures. In 1961, Rebane decided to try his hand at feature filmmaking and started shooting Terror at Halfday in 1963. Unfortunately, he ran out of money and sold his footage to Herschell Gordon Lewis, creating the notorious Monster A Go-Go. In the later 1960s, Rebane purchased a ranch in Gleason, Wisconsin, which became his new studio, The Shooting Ranch. He shot numerous low-budget sci-fi/horror films there, most notably 1975’s The Giant Spider Invasion and 1987’s Blood Harvest. Rebane also made Rana: The Legend of Shadow Lake in 1975, but that film wouldn’t be released until 1981. The film was retitled Croaked: Frog Monster from Hell and eventually sold to Troma.
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Synopsis
Kelly Morgan (Glenn Scherer) and his girlfriend Chris (Doreen Moze) go to his childhood home at Shadow Lake. While there, he tells her about how a strange creature attacked him and his family when he was 11. We flashback to young Kelly Morgan (Brad Ellingson) at the homestead with his dad John (Alan Ross). At the lake, they meet a paleontologist named Elli (Karen McDiarmid) and her niece Susan (Julie Wheaton). Kelly brings them a strange bone he found, and Elli deduces that it came from a type of fish creature. Little do they know that said fish creature, locally known as “Rana,” is lurking around the surrounding woods. Rana attacks and kills a couple of sleazy loggers before making his way to Kelly and company. Now an adult, Kelly wants to find the creature’s lair to get revenge, but he’s unprepared for what he’ll find.
Review
Croaked: Frog Monster from Hell is one of many movies where the cover art is better than the actual movie. You look at the cover and its title, and it sounds like something akin to Humanoids from the Deep. Sadly, we get nothing nearly as gruesome and sleazy as Roger Corman’s movie about human-fish monsters running amok. Sure, some of the acting isn’t half bad, and there are some fun kill scenes, but it’s mostly boring. Much of the screen time is just dialogue, and most of it is either exposition or inane banter. Even when something menacing happens, no one seems to react or even care what’s happening. Granted, things do pick up once the creature shows up and starts killing people, but it doesn’t improve things much. Plus, the framing device ruins any suspense the movie might’ve otherwise had since we know that Kelly survives.
Given the previous work of Bill Rebane, the fact that the movie looks so cheap shouldn’t come as a surprise. That said, there are plenty of cheaply-made B-movies whose low budget adds to their charm, such as Nightbeast. Sure, the middle act was slow, but the first and third acts were so ridiculous that they compensated for it. In this movie, the few kill scenes with the creature don’t make up for the slow parts. It doesn’t help that many of these scenes are so darkly lit that it’s hard to see what’s happening. Even at 86 minutes, it feels like the movie is dragging its feet to try and reach feature length. While there are certainly worse creature features, this is a dull affair best enjoyed with some substances. Overall, Croaked: Frog Monster from Hell isn’t one of the worst movies ever, but it’s not the best.
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