10 Monster Movies That Totally Screw With Your Brain

From the same year as Humanoids From The Deep, and ‘blessed’ with the same aesthetic and casually exploitative perspective, Night Of The Demon isn’t quite as offensive, but remains far more of an oddity instead, and ranks as one of the infamous ‘video nasties’ of the early 1980s.

Framed by the babbling of the only survivor, the story itself begins in flashback when anthropology profession Dr. Nugent takes several of his students into the wilderness in search of the infamous cryptid Bigfoot.

In this case, it’s the psychotic serial killer version of the mythical ape-like creature. Here, Bigfoot murders people by ripping off genitalia, stabbing them with pitchforks, hacking at them with axes; impaling them, eviscerating them and, most memorably, bashing two knife-wielding girl scouts together like dusty dishcloths, causing them to inadvertently hack each other to death.

Because this is a lurid piece of nonsense from the low budget end of late seventies/early eighties horror, they have to throw in Bigfoot rape and pagan sex rituals too, of course. It’s never explained why this maniacal version of the sasquatch is so obsessed with running around leaping out at people and ripping their bits off so gleefully, but as representations of the unchecked id go, it’s a doozy.

The film is horrible, silly and dumber than a bucket of hammers… but unlike Humanoids From The Deep, Night Of The Demon tries really hard to entertain the niche market it’s aiming for, and its murderous set pieces predate the inventive nonsense of Jason Voorhees and Freddy Krueger in by some years.