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OF UNKNOWN ORIGIN
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| Rated R
| | Copyright 1983 Canadian Film Development Corp.
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Reviewed by Andrew Borntreger on 24 April 2008
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Bart (Peter Weller) is just another human rat, scurrying through the halls of his office building and climbing his way to the top of the corporate ladder. His pride and joy is the brownstone house that he personally renovated into a luxurious abode, and indeed it is a castle.
Usually, Bart would be the kind of guy that I dislike. Mergers and acquisitions are in his blood, which is always a warning sign to me. However, he is also a fastidious individual, a neat freak if you will, and he maintains a level of pride in his family's self-reliance. When the wife and son go away to visit the grandparents for a while, Bart has the opportunity to show his true colors. The boss gives him a big project to manage. All that Bart has to do is focus on the task at hand.
One little problem pops up in Bart's tidy little life: a rat. Not just any rat; this thing is the grandmother of all homeowner nightmares. The massive vermin scurries through the home, squealing like a wild pig and destroying anything it puts its teeth to. It is more like a ferocious nutria than a rat. For somebody like Bart, the rat is probably the single worst distraction in the world.
Seeking help in dealing with the pest exponentially increases his panic, because the men who provide Bart with the most help are demented (in the way that only inner city dwellers can be). One of them provides him with several steel-jawed traps that are positively vicious, like little bear traps. I would not want one of those in my house, because I would be afraid of stepping on it in the middle of the night and losing some toes.
Well, the traps do not work, poison does not work, and even bringing home a stray cat fails to stop the giant vermin. The rat is eating away at Bart's mind, along with the house (and the cat). Watching Peter Weller's character slowly descend into exhausted madness is a treat, because Mr. Weller has always been very good in this type of role. It is even better when he has finally had enough. Bart creates a spike-studded "rat bat" to face the monster one-on-one. As an implement of destruction it is awe-inspiring. I even nicknamed the improvised weapon Justice, as in "Bart, armed with the rat bat Justice, sallied forth to challenge the foul lapdog of Satan." The final battle between man and rat is total war, mutual assured destruction, tooth, claw, and rat bat, and the house is a disaster area when a winner finally emerges from the basement.
A parting thought I have is that Bart's adopted kitty was completely outmatched. The darn thing looked like a sissy house pet. He needed a big old tomcat like we had on the farm. I bet that Scatterbush (who was found as a kitten in the Chesapeake brickyard and might have been part cougar) could have taken on that rat. Dogs were afraid of Scatterbush. Heck, my father was scared of Scatterbush.
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| Things I Learned From This Show: | |
|  | Toasters are just like convex security mirrors, except they also make toast.
| | | Hell hath no fury greater than an indignant rodent mother.
| | | Marital infidelity is inversely proportional to the local rat population.
| | | Blindly feeling around for the steel-jawed trap that you lost track of is just asking for trouble.
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| | | 1 min - And introducing Shannon Tweed's... RANDOM GRATUITOUS BREAST SHOT!
| | | 26 mins - "You are saying that we should buy controlling interest in a pest control company, right?"
| | | 51 mins - If that is what you use them for, just buy one copy of "War and Peace."
| | | 85 mins - RANDOM ACT OF VIOLENCE AGAINST A VASE!
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