It’s amazing that Noel Marshall’s Roar exists at all as an edited, finished film. What’s more amazing is that no one died in the process.
A car-crash of a cinematic experience similar to an animal-centric snuff remake of THE ROOM, ROAR is certainly a unique 1980s studio venture and infamously one of the biggest box-office flops in American film. Dug up from B-movie history by Drafthouse Films, who are fast becoming the saviours of so-bad-it’s-good cinema for cult film addicts, having previously saved baffling ninja pacifism film MIAMI CONNECTION from obscurity back in 2012.
Fans of similar well-loved B-movie fare such as TROLL 2 will feel right at home here. Hank (Noel Marshall) lives in his home out in Africa with a large quantity of dangerous wild animals, including lions, tigers and elephants. When his wife, Madeleine (Tippi Hedren), and their children Melanie, Jerry and John (played by Hedren’s real-life daughter Melanie Griffith and Marshall’s real-life sons, Jerry and John) come to visit him, knowing nothing of his unusual living arrangements, they suddenly find themselves placed in serious danger.
The cast and crew themselves were also placed in serious danger, as the menagerie of beasts that makes up the rest of ROAR’s cast are entirely untrained. Famed for being possibly the most ‘dangerous’ film of all time, over 70 of the cast and crew were injured during production. The animals went completely unharmed, and Marshall feels their contribution so vital that, as the opening text informs us, they are credited as writers and directors.
“Whether or not you find ROAR amusing depends on how much entertainment you derive from seeing other people get seriously injured by animals”
The unpredictability of the animals’ actions certainly shapes the direction scenes take, to the point that the film takes on a dangerously improvisational quality. It is never entirely clear if the distress the characters express is part of Marshall’s cheesy script or genuine, in the moment, fear. The performances are dire, but understandably so when the performers are attempting to act in such singularly life-threatening conditions. Whether you find these moments amusing or not depends on how much entertainment you derive from seeing other people get injured by animals, and as the nature of the action becomes increasingly repetitive it could become tedious and grueling for cinephiles who do not have the very specific sense of humour this unintentionally amusing film relies upon.
That said, the corny nature of the script makes this just as quotable as the aforementioned THE ROOM and TROLL 2, and ROAR is likely to become even more of a cult midnight movie favourite in the wake of Drafthouse’s re-release. It’s a cinematic oddity, not a masterpiece or even a particularly competent film, and is more likely to be appreciated in the context of its troubled and painful creation. Whether your stomach hurts from laughter or revulsion it’s hard not to agree with Noel Marshall’s musing early on in the film that almost feels like a knowing wink to whatever audience will someday sit through his incomprehensible feat of filmmaking: ‘It’s just like life, you get the funny with the tragic.’
ROAR screens again on 12th September at 22.30 at the Light Cinema
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kqwl7_npAE