The Beast of Hollow Mountain

Poster tagline: ONE DAY AFTER A MILLION YEARS IT COME OF OUT HIDING TO... KILL, KILL, KILL!!! I'm astonished. A catchy title, and enticing advertising campaign and posters, but the monster itself plays only second or third fiddle. I really don’t like it when filmmakers make fools out of viewers. That said, in terms of filmmaking, there is nothing much to complain about. Despite the genre classification, this is no cheap B-movie at first glance – expensive, lavish sets with stacked herds of buffalo, multiple extras and impressive Mexican realism, all shot in widescreen cinemascope, only the monster has wandered off somewhere. In the 80-minute runtime, it appears for the first time after a full hour, and until then it’s not even mentioned in the slightest. On the contrary, they deal over and over again with a love triangle, the main character's problems with finding a herd of cattle, all with rustling eavesdropped dialogues. Granted, the last twenty minutes, when the stop-motion animated dinosaur doesn't leave the screen, improves the impression with its appealing action concept, but overall it's not a hit. If you want to experience a really impressive unusual crossover of prehistoric fauna vs. dirty Mexicans, choose The Valley of Gwangi, still alive thanks to Harryhausen's effects, while this film by Rodríguez is deservedly gathering dust. (23.02.2013)