GODMONSTER OF INDIAN FLATS is one of those last-ditch monster flicks made during the 1970s which were throwbacks to the genre circa 1955. There were a few of these rural oddities made during the decade, with flicks like NIGHT OF THE LEPUS and CREATURE FROM BLACK LAKE failing to build up much in the way of a head of steam as it seemed they were made and released some twenty years too late. I do have a soft spot for them despite their shortcomings, and GODMONSTER has plenty of shortcomings. It's a film chock full of po-faced seriousness yet which has a ridiculously storyline about a mutant sheep roaming the countryside and butchering innocent townsfolk. The production values are rock bottom but the effect is one of mild amusement rather than outright boredom.

Before he made his first movie - Troika - in 1969, Frederic Hobbs was an artist who went from the traditional to a whole way of presenting art, creating parade sculptures that took art from the museum to the people. That's when he figured it out - to get the people to see something as art, you should hide it in a film. He also created the films Roseland and Alabama's Ghost before this one. And honestly, nothing can prepare you for this.

Imagine if David Lynch made a 1950's nuclear warning monster film. But before you go see it, you get in a car crash and suffer a really bad concussion. Cool. Then, someone spikes your Icee with a dose of LSD that would cripple Owsley "Bear" Stanley. You now have a very, very small idea of just how crazy things are about to get.

There are two stories happening here: a scientist is trying to crack the code on a mysterious sheep-like creature while a conservative landowner fights being bought out by prospectors. All in Virginia City, Nevada, which was once the richest city in America after the silver and gold rush. The mines went dry, the people went away and the only people left are tourists staring at a dead husk.

I have to tell you, you've never quite seen a creature quite like the Godmonster. At once it appears to be the most real and yet fakest creature ever seen on the silver screen. It very well could be one of Lovecraft's ancient ones for all I know, as it saunters and stumbles and falters across the frame, scaring children at birthday parties and blowing up gas stations.

There's also a subplot with a fake dog funeral. Don't ask me how any of this ties together, because all of it has blown my mind sky high, like a Jigsaw song from 1975.

Imagine a movie where the creature doesn't do a single thing until more than one hour into the run time of a movie under ninety minutes, all while the nonprofessional actors can't act and the professional ones chew scenery like they're the godmonsters of the fringe festival.

I get real down sometimes when I think the world could be a better place than it is. The Godmonster of Indian Flats proves to me that somewhere out there, at some time, in some corner of the cosmos - let's say a drive-in that smells like skunk weed and MD40 - some brave souls had no idea what they were getting into when it started playing. That fact makes me happy, imagining people driving away before the movie even ends, telling their friends and family that they suffered their way through a movie where a lamb emitted smoke and gave his life so that an entire town could die. There aren't enough stars in the galaxy and every reality ever to properly review this movie. I'll have to go back to college to invent some kind of formula so that my fragile mind can try and quantify it.

I have often wondered about the effect of hazardous waste and nuclear radiation on our farm animals. Most of my questions were answered with "Prophecy" and the incredible melting grizzly bear but I wondered how all this would affect say, oh I don't know, our sheep population. If you have every awaken in the middle of the night wondering if there were any films out there with blood-thirsty killer sheep in them, you can sleep soundly now. You'll stare at your TV with mouth agape with the pure horror of a seven foot killer sheep, I don't even think it's a ram so there goes my whole testosterone driven killing spree theory. It wanders around the country-side, with it's legs of many lengths, and eats people. I was not fully prepared for the walking on hind legs, fun fur with the mange looking monster. Don't let anyone fool you, there is no way to adequately describe this movie. Rent it, gather the family together and gaze deeply into they mind numbing terror of the seven foot killer sheep. I give this a thumbs up!