Ruptured Review: Rat Man

Country of origin- Italy
Year of release- 1988
Director-  Giuliano Carnimeo           
Stars- David Warbeck, Janet Agren, Eva Grimaldi 

 
The film begins in one of the dingiest looking rooms I have ever seen; as the camera pans around the room we hear the voiceover of Doctor Olman telling us that he has created a hybrid creature. It is half rat and half monkey, and for some insane reason the Doctor has given it poisoned teeth and claws, because why not? Doctor Olman created the creature in order to present it to the ‘International Genetics Congress’, how the Doctor plans to ship his hideous creation from the remote Caribbean island he is on I have no clue, I highly doubt that thing would get a pet passport. Unfortunately that night the Rat Man escapes his cage, and begins his flesh ripping rampage.  

The film then cuts to a swimsuit photo shoot on the beach of the same Caribbean island, already you can probably guess where the film is going from here. The photographer of the shoot (Mark) has brought three models out to the island with him to get some ‘unique shots’. After the shoot one of the models (Peggy) decides to catch a cab to a party that evening, but unfortunately the cab breaks down and she has to walk the rest of the way alone, at night, in a ‘slum’. It’s not long before Peggy is seen by the only genuinely creepy character in the film, and is chased by a faceless knife wielding lunatic into an abandoned building, where instead of finding safety, she finds the Rat Man! Soon after this the sister of one of the other models arrives on the island to see if her sister is ok, and inexplicably teams up with a writer called Fred who is played by the late great David Warbeck. The two of them decide to find out who, or what is killing the scantly clad residents of the island, but little do they know their investigations will lead them to a lot more than just a knife wielding lunatic. 

 

As a big fan of low budget, grimy, sleazy and often ridicules Italian horror of this period I went into this one with my expectations held higher than Hunter S Thomson on holiday. That was a mistake. Don’t get me wrong I didn’t dislike this film; I just didn’t fall head over heels for it. Despite the fact the film delivers buckets of cheesy horror goodness in the form of; brilliantly terrible dubbing, academy award level over acting and of course a half rat half monkey mutant ripping the throats out of all who are unlucky enough to meet it, I found myself  a little bored. Unfortunately the hilarious little Rat man just wasn’t enough to counteract the very contrived and often uninteresting plot, which meandered around like a drunken sloth. Despite the film coming in at under 80 minutes the pacing made it feel much longer, and pretty drawn out.
However, the film is not without its good points the biggest of which are the excellent Nelson de la Rosa who plays the Rat Man, and seems to spend the entire film either in a toilet, or being thrown at somebody. And the other being the laugh out loud conclusion to the film that was at the same time brilliant, and rubbish, but in a good way. Overall this film was a decent little oddity, and if it sparks your interest I would recommend it. I am giving this one a 5/10.  

The film is available to buy on DVD from Shameless Screen Entertainment