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Customer Reviews of Eaten Alive

Tobe Hooper takes a big step backwards after TCM
I remember believing, once upon a time, that director Tobe Hooper parlayed the success of his cult horror film "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" into the chance to direct "Poltergeist." Now we know that Steven Spielberg had his handprints all over the latter film and that this 1976 bomb was Hooper's real follow-up to his cult classic. The plot is, pardon the expression, rather bare boned: Judd (Neville Brand) owns a dilapidated hotel out in the bayou called the Starlight Hotel. Not only is Judd psychotic, he has a hungry alligator as a pet who gets to feed on the unruly guests. Hmmm. So this is a film where innocent passersby are slaughtered by a crazy person; no new ground for Hooper here unless you think a pitchfork is significantly different from a chainsaw. Besides, the guests at this hotel might be innocent, but they are also stupid. If you daughter's dog was eaten by a giant alligator would you console her by booking a room at the nearby hotel? Judd has been back there in the bayou killing people for years apparently, but now he makes the mistake of killing the wrong person and her family comes looking for her. Hmmm. Somebody looking for their dead sister at a horror hotel; gee, that sure sounds familiar.

Somehow Carolyn Jones, Mortitia on "The Addams Family," managed to be conned into this film to play the madam at the local brothel. Marilyn Burns from "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" is back to teach the new people how to scream in the film's one decent performance and you will no doubt recognize Robert Englund in the minor role of Buckthe redneck at the start of the film. The script never even addresses the question of why Judd is totally insane, which only proves that no excuse at all is worse than a really lame excuse. Even a DVD version presenting the film in the letterboxed format and including the theatrical trailer does not raise this bomb to worthy status. The fact that Hooper directed this film actually hurts it in my mind because we sure would have expected better from him. Instead he ends up being a one hit wonder. "Eaten Alive" was also passed off as "Horror Hotel," "Horror Hotel Massacre," "Murder on the Bayou," "Legend of the Bayou," "Starlight Slaughter," and, in the United Kingdom, as "Death Trap" (But, a bomb by any other name...). If you are looking for Tobe Hooper's second best film, then check out "The Funhouse" instead of this one.

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A Geek And His Gator
Known under several names (DEATH TRAP, HORROR HOTEL, LEGEND OF THE BAYOU etc), EATEN ALIVE is Tobe Hooper's follow up to TCM also featuring Marilyn Burns, this bombed when released.
The movie begins with a young Robert "Freddy Krueger" Englund trying to rape a platinum blond hooker, who is then thrown out of her brothel and seeks refuge at a hotel run by a deranged pervert named Judd (Neville Brand); who looks like a Manson family reject, and who obviously has no experience with women... so in order to ease his sexual frustration Judd feeds his guests to a crocodile that lives in his yard after dismembering them with his trusty ax, just like any normal person would do, right? (Note to the dim: this is a rhetorical question). Marilyn Burns gets to do more of her famous screaming while Nerdy Nev chases her little girl around his property with a scythe.
Unsurprisingly years ago the SPCS tried to ban this; you know, in case any New Zealanders who had croocdiles living in their basements (Or rabid sheep. Haha) got ideas placed in their heads.
When will they get a life?

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Competent follow-up to "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre"
Marilyn Burns again teams with Tobe Hooper in his follow-up to "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre." This time the setting is a isolated motel in the Louisiana bayou, run by yet another group of strange characters. With a swamp full of famished crocodiles, one can only guess what happens to a lot of the guests. Sheriff Stuart Whitman is about to find out. This overlooked Hooper shocker is worth a second look. Like "Texas", it gets sweat-inducing with a lot of screaming. Also stars Neville Brand, Mel Ferrer, and Carolyn Jones. Horror fans note: Robert Englund appears as a sleazy john, as does Kyle Richards, who played "Lindsay" in "Halloween" two years later. William Finley, who later had a small role in Hooper's "The Funhouse", plays a hapless motel guest here. Marilyn Burns can still scream.