Sometimes we just need a stupid movie. MST3000 built a whole cult around reviews of genre films, the more ridiculous, the better. Chupacabra Territory never made it onto the roster, but it definitely falls into the category of “so bad it’s hard to even say if it’s good.” It has a 14% Rotten Tomatoes score. It is, in its own weird way, surprisingly entertaining.
It’s an unabashed knockoff of The Blair Witch Project. Mock documentary, found footage allegedly retained by the FBI. College kids on a beer-fueled road trip into CHUPACABRA TERRITORY. There are signs and everything.
It’s set in California because that’s where the movies live, but in an obscure area, the Pinewood Forest near Lake Emerald. Three guys and a relentlessly perky girl are all excited about tracking down the monster that slaughtered four campers, leaving behind an assortment of random body parts and a strange hand-written book liberally stained with blood. It’s so cool! Let’s find old Chup (which rhymes with Soup)! Let’s get naked and have wild sex! Let’s party!
Perky Amber is the ringleader. She’s a self-professed witch and psychic, and she’s bubbling with glee about the book and the rituals and how she’s going to summon the chupacabra. It clearly has not dawned on her that if the monster shredded four previous campers, it’s probably not going to be all cuddly and cute and nice to her, either.
Her guy friends are mostly there for the beer and the sex. There’s her boytoy Joe, token skeptic Morgan, and camera guy Dave. Dave shoots most of the film, but they all end up wearing cameras, for extra-special bonus shakycam footage.
For further extra bonus points, they come across another party of clueless youth, with two hot girls and a guy and another camera. They’ve lost their number four (four seems to be the statutory number of campers in this park), and are roaming around calling for him. This is on top of the One-Eyed Yokel at the gas station on the way in, who intones dire warnings about the beast and the darkness, and the Clueless Guy in Uniform who tries to keep them out of the park, and the Coyote Biologist in camo with a big gun.
The script operates on the principle of throwing a bunch of ideas at the wall and not caring if any of them stick. There’s a heaping helping of gore on top of the bouncing boobs and the booze-and-sex gags. And raccoon pee. And toilet paper. Never forget the toilet paper.
The chupacabra lore is as random as the rest of the plot. Matt McWilliams’ script may owe a distant debt to the Princeton timeline of the chupacabra, with its references to livestock mutilations. The animals supposedly killed by the cryptid, including a coyote and a deer, are extensively (and bloodily) torn up, with two signature wounds: paired punctures in the neck, and lingeringly filmed and described removal of the genitals.
That’s not too far off the standard accounts, but McWilliams has more to add. This chupacabra can be summoned by arcane rituals or, like Bigfoot, by hooting, howling calls. Its own roars and howls fill the woods at night.
But that’s not all. The chupacabra can take over a human’s mind and turn them into a kind of zombie, with effects that may wear off, or may not, depending on whether the victim is a main character or a bit player. It exudes a weird sticky “residue” that causes a severe allergic reaction and eventually eats away the skin. Like a demon, it is repelled by salt; a circle of that keeps it away, as long as no one is stupid enough to break the circle.
It’s not clear what these additions to the lore are for, except to up the grue factor and provide an excuse for a scene in which Amber masturbates at length under a tree. See above re: ideas thrown at wall. Some of them are stickier than others.
We never get a clear view of the actual cryptid. Even the blurry, pixelated ones don’t show up until quite late. We see what it does to animals and humans, we hear it roaring and howling and rampaging around the woods. When we finally get a glimpse, it’s basically Gollum. Weird, skinny, grey, big head, pointy ears. That’s the Latin American version rather than the canine subspecies supposedly found in Texas: more X-Files than Monsterquest.
McWilliams’ Pinewood Forest is full of chupacabras, happily devastating the wildlife and tearing up camps and campers. We’re not supposed to wonder how it gets there from Mexico and points south and east, and we certainly won’t be asking how it sustains a population. We’re here for the gore and the girls, and we know how it has to end. Blair Witch points the way. We have no choice but to follow.
