So much average

How sad is this?

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

It's a race to the bottom between New MST (Carnival Magic) and Old MST (this film) in the race to which can feature the worst carnival-themed movie. Whereas Carnival Magic's carnival was a land of grimy, dirt-poor rural desperation, Strange Creatures takes place in the most hideous looking part of urban seaside SoCal imaginable. There's a layer of dirt, offal, and broken dreams covering everything in this movie, from the hideous animatronic ticket chimp to the Twirl N Hurl to the strip "nightclub"....Oh, you were interested in PLOT!?! Wait, I think we have one of those somewhere buried under all the depressing filth. Turns out hideous subhuman demi-Nicholas Cage "Jerry" and his vaguely Eastern European roommate are escaping the fact that "the world's in a state of depression" by going off to the disgusting carnival to take a break from their hard life of doing nothing. They hang out with Jerry's "rich" girlfriend (in that she lives in a slightly less gross looking house) and reward her love by watching a bunch of "C" looking women take their clothes off. Jerry's girlfriend gets irritated by this and leaves, allowing Jerry to be seduced and mesmerized by the evil gypsies that run the carnival. Jerry becomes zombified and used as a pawn to murder the gypsies' enemies. While this is going on the audience is assaulted by hideous musical numbers and the terrible comedic styling of some guy who looks like Greg Gumbel. Some zombies finally show up VERY late in the game, but alas can't save the game for the home team in the fourth quarter, and everything goes to hell. Worst of all the Greg Gumbel guy survives all this, allowing him to reduce his audiences to murderous zombies with that horrible "Iron and Steel" joke. Luckily the disgusting carnival was torn down about 10 years after this was filmed, preventing "Mixed up Zombie Legacy: MADISON vs Greg Gumbel" from being greenlighted.

There are so many terrible things about this movie that I might not get to them all but I will try.First of all, the title doesn't make any sense.They were normal humans who never stopped living, they just had acid thrown in their faces.But I've come to expect these old movies to lie in the title so I shouldn't be surprised.So it's about some "teens" and some dancers.Of course the teens are all well over forty.The main teen even sports a comb over that would embarrass a seventy year old.Even though he looks elderly, they try hard to make us believe he's a bad boy.He refuses to work or go to school but has no problem having a house and car.His best friend, and several others, have weird eastern European accents even though the movie clearly takes place in southern California.So old man teen becomes one of these zombies and stabs a bunch of dancers in the face while they were performing on stage.Then he just goes home and goes to bed and the cops have no leads.Weak.The worst part is that more than half of the movie is footage of empty carnival rides and people singing and dancing.They literally perform a dozen full songs that have absolutely nothing to do with the story.Did I mention they have some fool introducing all the acts and even when he holds his microphone at waist height, his voice is always the same volume?This could have been an OK thirty minute short but instead it's a terrible reminder of why people shouldn't try to make movies when they have no clue.Never see this.

Here is a truly awful film by anyone's standards that manages somehow to be entertaining. A dumpy, old drunk resists Mme. Estrella's sexual advances, so naturally she throws acid in his face and dumps him in a dungeon-type room with her other "little pets". There is absolutely no motivation shown as to why she has done this to countless others except to say that she is one crazy bitch. The acting in all departments is what one would expect from a film like this. Really bad. There are some wild musical numbers inserted into the proceedings. One had a woman wearing a costume which made it look like a huge pubic bush had sprung from between her legs! Really hilarious! There are a few pluses. The photography is surprisingly good, especially in the carnival sequences. The print was a decent wide-screen job. Pretty clear although a bit scratchy, with amazingly well-preserved color. This was Eastman color, which is notorious for fading. The sound, on the other hand was terrible for the most part, with entire sides of dialogue being unintelligible. A fun time-waster.

I saw this movie after it featured on MST3K, and the "Mystery Science Theater 3000: 10 Worst Movies They Riffed" made it sound every bit as bad as it was made out to be on the show(the episode was entertaining of course but not one of their best for me). Actually, I have seen far worse movies than The Incredibly Strange Creatures..., it is a bad movie but one of the worst ever made? Not for me. I actually thought the photography and editing were quite good and the make-up likewise. The Incredibly Strange Creatures...is also unique for the longest movie title ever(though also giving an indication of what you're in for), that I know of anyhow, and I loved Angela's hair. There is not much else though that is good though. I found very little to remember about the music itself, other than that it sounded like bad scratchy saxophone playing. The choreography is clumsy and it looks awkward too, and the musical numbers go on for too long and with no momentum. The script has a very ramshackle structure, with confused and crass at best dialogue. The story, one that is so paper-thin you can do it in 20 minutes easily, is just weird(the weirdest movie I've seen possibly, though I knew even from the title it was going to be), goes along at a snail's pace and doesn't make any sense, concluding with an ending that is rather pointless and will make you go "what?" The last act is the most eventful it gets, but in a way that doesn't gel with the rest of the movie and it has no kind of tension and such whatsoever. The zombies don't even appear until only the last act, they're alright-looking enough but don't do anything of note and their screen-time is short-lived. The acting is enough to make anybody cringe, Brett O'Hara in particular chews the scenery to pieces in the worst of ways. The actresses for Carmelita and Madison suffer from the fact that their characters don't seem to have any point in the story. To conclude, bad and brings the word weird to a whole new level, but I've seen worse. 3/10 Bethany Cox