Gator Bait (1974)

Review by Mari Lynne Rupp



This film, barely passable as Grindhouse, stars Claudia Jennings as Desiree Thibodeaux, a cajun beauty who makes her living poaching alligators in the Louisiana swampland.
Douglas Dirkson and Clyde Ventura are the redneck and deputy's son who get into trouble trying to pursue Desiree for prurient ends, and end up in a massive backwoods mess of revenge and dirty secrets. The film seems to try and use the stereotypes of people from the south as its strength and even then, it's not very interesting. I got rather tired of horny hillbillies trying to jump at anything female that moved, siblings included, and hearing "Coonass" being thrown around like the writer had just discovered the word, was very wearing. Even Claudia's weak attempt at a cajun accent couldn't save this disaster. I'm pretty openminded. When you review Grindhouse and exploitation, you pretty much have to be. But this film unfortunately fell sadly short of the mark.
3/10