Shaun Watson reviews�

�Part Four of the Jimmie Rodgers Collection

Movie poster from the Internet Movie Database Food of the Gods - Part II dir: Damian Lee Paul Coufos as Prof. Neil Hamilton Lisa Schrage as Alex Reed R�al Andrews as Mark Stuart Hughes as Al Karen Hines as Angie Frank Pellegrino as Joshua Jackie Burroughs as Dr. Kate Treger Colin Fox as Prof. Edmund Delhurst David B. Nichols as Dean White Michael Copeman as Lt. Wetzel and Sean Mitchell as Bobby David Koyle as Zeke the janitor

I remember when my mom used to make ambrosia. The sweet food was a mixture of marshmallows, coconut shavings, white grapes, oranges and any other fruit you could get your hands on. I used to eat the stuff, not knowing it was named after the food of the Greek gods. It didn't sound like something Greek gods would eat. It not only sounded gross, but the completed mixture looked horrible. Despite this, it still tasted great.
I have found a movie that embodies the spirit of ambrosia. The fourth movie in the Jimmie Rodgers Collection is the aptly named Food of the Gods - Part 2(aka Gnaw), sequel to The Food of the Gods(1976). The predecessor to the movie being reviewed, it was based on the H.G. Wells book of the same name.

Our movie starts out with animal rights activists protesting their university's animal testing to find a cure for cancer. The lead activist, Mark(R�al Andrews, Simon Says, Wild Thing) is wearing a cow mask when he confronts Professor Delhurst(Colin Fox, Tommy Boy, Scanners III: the Takeover) about his activities. The professor scolds him and the other activists Al(Stuart Hughes, Moonshine Highway), Angie(Karen Hines, Hedwig and the Angry Inch) and Alex(Lisa Schrage, Prom Night II). He then storms into the lab, which triggers�a second movie! Such a phenomenon has not been seen since The Princess Blade--and so early in the movie, too!
Prof. Neil Hamilton(Paul Coufos, Chopping Mall, Dragonfight) is working with his former teacher Dr. Kate Treger(Jackie Burroughs, Bleeders, Willard) to help sickly children with his growth formula which had only been tested on plants. Unfortunately, the formula has side effects when used on mammals: normal animals grow proportionally larger and become more violent in their behavior. This is proven when Neil and Kate find Bobby(Sean Mitchell) grown to 7 feet tall, still proportioned like a boy(No, not yet! we'll get to the penis jokes soon enough!) and cussing like a grown man. Prof. Hamilton returns to his lab, determined to help people with the testing needed to perfect his growth formula. He needs support from his pet white rat(if only to mark it as different or better than the others), his lab assistant Joshua(Frank Pellegrino, Alive, voices on "Cadillacs & Dinosaurs"[TV]), the janitor Zeke(David Koyle) and his loving girlfriend, animal activist Alex. He gets help from all of them, if only in mutually beneficial ways.

"I've seen this before," said the veteran cop. "Death by violent skull-fucking."

The white rat gets her attention and love, Alex gets her dicking-down, Zeke doesn't have to clean up that much rat poop and Joshua wants to make money by injecting growth hormone into animals--which doesn't go over well with Prof. Hamilton. In the interim, Prof. Delhurst is pestering Neil to give up his research, since their research is so closely related(Neil's trying to help sick kids, Delhurst wants to find a cure for baldness). Neil is very against animal testing, so how could their research be related? Easy: Joshua disobeyed Neil and injected one of twenty rats brought in a cage with the formula. Somehow, the other nineteen got their hands on a heavily dosed tomato plant and also grew. Well, they're no real danger: after all, they are caged, right?
Actually, no. Damn animal rights activists break into Neil's lab and set the rats free. While caged, the rats became more aggresive and got a hankering for human flesh. As a result, Mark's neck was ripped open and his eye was eaten out of his head. Now the rats have killed, and Lieutenant Wetzel(Michael Copeman, Death to Smoochy, Canadian Bacon, Abraxas: Guardian of the Universe) of the local police force has gotten involved. Everyone wants him there, except the university's dean White(David B. Nichols, Street Justice). The new athletics complex is opening tomorrow and doesn't want anyone to know what's going on, for fear of losing funding. As a result, several deaths preceed the opening of the sports complex, which does not go off without a hitch. Please note that when I say "a hitch", I mean "nasty-ass giant carnivorous rats in the pool during the sychronized swimming competiton".

This movie might have been trying to channel Ben(1972) or Willard(1971), but they were still bound by the ideas set in the preceeding movie. Giant rats needed to be in this movie--and lots of them. The taste for human flesh also factors in, I think to keep in step with the book. Some of the trick photography made me laugh, where there would be scale models of the area where the giant rats would rampage. In a few cases, the scale models would be combined with blue-screen effects to truly give the sense of scale. It shows how much work went into this movie to make it suck really, really bad.

Let me go on Like a blister in the sun Let me go on-- Big hands I know you're the one�

• I know where PETA got their idea for Moopheus in the Meatrix from�
• The scene where Neil and Alex are making love, interspersed with cuts back to the rats eating growth hormone-injected tomatoes. I have no idea what that was supposed to convey.
• The leader of the animal activists, Mark, has horrible hair. Jeezus, no wonder the 90's was weird. Hairstyles like this got people laid.
• The rat exterminator armed with a flamethrower could have been an interesting character, if only they had kept him in the movie.
• Is it just me, or does Neil look like a miniature Lou Ferrigno?
• To some people, dropping your flashlight and screaming like an idiot while running from a giant rat in a dark-ass sewer is completely logical.
• Ain't it just like a suit to hide the truth, even if it kills people? I'm looking at you, Dean White!
• Lt. Wetzel has to be the dumbest cop portrayed on film yet. How dare he ask what the dean wants to do! That dean is putting lives at risk and�and I don't know why I'm complaining, because it's in the script.
• The ending scene where Kate calls up Neil and tells him Bobby's situation. It's really funny, because midway thru the conversation, Bobby rolls up and crushes her skull. Then he escapes thru the wall, leaving a frantic Neil screaming into the phone.
• FUNNIEST SCENE EVER: Neil dreams that he injects himself with the growth formula. As he finishes, a female student who's been hounding him for affection shows up and wants sex. Neil gives it to her, but the growth formula begins to take effect. He fondles her boobs with gigantic hands and proceeds to grow as he's INSIDE her! What makes it funny is that we all know what's gonna happen next as we realize that he's gonna KEEP GROWING�

"Edmund? You look horrible."

"This formula is like a license to print money!"

"Don't shoot wild! DON'T SHOOT WILD!"