Monster

Monstroid is a 1980 American monster movie produced and directed by Kenneth Herts (as Kenneth Hartford), co-written with Herbert L. Strock, and starring James Mitchum and John Carradine. Strock later claimed he co-directed the film uncredited. It was originally to be titled Monster when the film was first announced in 1975, and again in 1977, and suffered numerous cast changes (Keenan Wynn was still billed on some of the early video releases). The film was eventually released in 1980 as Monstroid, and is also known as Monstroid: It Came from the Lake (American DVD box title) and The Toxic Horror (American alternative title). A novelization written by Peter Crowcroft was released concurrently with the film. Hartford had his own children (Glen and Andrea) play the two teenagers in the film. The film billed itself as being based on a true story that took place in "Chimayo, Colombia", in 1971. However, the film was actually shot in Chimayo, New Mexico, and Ambalema, Colombia. Some of the film was also shot in the Santuario de Chimayo, with John Carradine playing a priest. Plot One night in the fishing village of Chimayo, Colombia, María Reyes witnesses a monster devouring her husband José. Some years later, the American cement manufacturer Durado Cement dispatches troubleshooter Bill Travis to Chimayo to restore order to their manufacturing plant there: an anticorporate activist named Víctor Sánchez has been exploiting the villagers' fear of the monster to stir up hostility against Durado, which has been polluting their fishing waters in Lake Chimayo. In the process, María has become ostracized from the villagers; a group led by a man named Carlos calls her la bruja ("the witch"). In addition, Travis must silence an American TV reporter named Patty Clark, who has been exposing the pollution of the lake. In Chimayo, children Andrea and Glen Anderson observe strange ripples in the lake. Glen claims they belong to an animal he has been sighting in the lake for some time. Their father Pete, administrator of the Durado plant, is introduced to Mayor Montero and his daughter, helicopter pilot Juanita. Sánchez meets with Carlos in a church, and together they plot to drive out the Americans, and the monster he thinks was created by the pollution of the lake. When María goes to visit José's grave, Carlos's men attack her.