A group of students from the Rio Grande University, led by Maria, head out to find the truth about the supposed Chupacabra attacks that occurred in the summer of ‘96. It’s something of a personal vendetta, as Maria’s uncle was one of the victims.

First on the tour is Mr. Jackson’s farm, where there was an animal mutilation just the night before. An old crone shows up, shakes some bones at them, and tells them to leave. She won’t speak any more about the evil that haunts the area. The camera follows the crone into the barn, where she finds some unidentified sludge. Meanwhile, Maria is arguing about how her uncle died with some local cops who’ve arrived. Back in the barn, an unexpected and ferocious daytime attack by the Chupacabra wounds the crone and Armistad, and disembowels one of the cops, and here we get our first glimpse of the monster. It’s an impressive beast, something like the Brundlefly on steroids.

Here we also get the first of many interludes of scientists arguing and discussing what the monster is. The hypothetical origins range from government experiment, to enraged demon, to prehistoric throwback. I won’t be covering these interludes. If you’ve ever watched the Discovery Channel, you know what they look like.

Armistad regains consciousness and begins to plan a trap to catch the creature with tranquilizer darts. That night in the goat pen, they lay in wait for the monster to show up. It attacks, and in the confusion one of the farmhands gets his head blown off. The rest of the crew escape to their van and lock themselves in. In one of the most brilliant and unexpected plot twists in cinematic history, the damn stubborn thing won’t start!!! The group then runs to the farmhouse to barricade themselves in until morning. Maria reveals that in the attack, she was bitten. The crone and one of the farmhands instruct them to visit the local witches, Teresa and Sara, at the cantina in the morning.

The next day, the witches take the students and what’s left of the ranchers to see a man who’d been bitten recently much like Maria. The creature’s venom dissolves you from the inside out, and the only way to stop it is to kill the monster that bit you. The students shell out $50 for the witches to take them to the monster’s lair.

On the way to the creature’s nest, the group find several corpses, sucked dry. Teresa performs a ceremony over one of the bodies, sees her fate to be killed by the monster, and snaps. She pulls a knife and forces them to leave her there. The rest push on, leaving Teresa to her fate, and eventually reach their destination. Once they arrive, Sara leaves them. Maria is beginning to develop a fever from the bite. They discover a rusted cage at the site, left by the last group of ill-fated people who tried to kill the beast. The reinforce the cage, and Armistad and one of the cameramen plan to climb inside that night to shoot the thing from safety.

Before the plan is put to the test, Teresa returns just after dark, in a trance with two huge fang holes in her back, screaming for Sara to be with her when she dies so she won’t be alone. It’s a truly chilling scene that stands up well to multiple viewings.

The cage plan works, and Army successfully tranqs the monster. He’s a complete moron, however, and goes in for another closer shot. Bad idea. He gets eaten, and Mr. Jackson shoots it point-blank in the face. They drag it into the cage, and Mr. Jackson plans to blow it up with a Molotov cocktail, but it misfires and burns him badly and the monster escapes. While they’re running to find a place to hide, Maria falls into a nest of eggs, which she for some odd reason decides NOT to destroy. Well, you can’t win ‘em all, I guess.

They eventually find an old shack inhabited by some immigrants, who they manage to convince after a while that they’re not the border patrol. The monster rips off the deputy’s arm while they’re trying to board up the window, and the immigrants run into the night and get eaten. The creature rips through the door, and Maria shoves a big ol’ knife into its throat, killing it. They transport the corpse back to the U of RG and perform an autopsy, where they find, among other interesting things, a barcode on its arm. There’s that funny conspiracy odor again.

We close with some footage of a flying Chupacabra creature attacking some young farmers in a goat pen, and the legend continues. Sorta like the Legend of Boggy Creek continued, except evil.

The people that made The Blair Witch Project could learn a lot from this movie. Mainly, how to create an entertaining and occasionally frightening hour and twenty minutes instead of an hour and twenty minutes of some stupid city kids’ poorly-planned camping trip with one good scene at the very end. It’s a sign of the sad state things are in when intelligent and well-done indie horror like Legend of the Chupacabra has to be released into obscurity by Troma while cookie cutter bullshit like Valentine is burning up valuable space on the rental shelves that would be better off filled with a steaming pile of goat intestines. Here’s hoping the Chupacabra pays a little visit to Kevin Williamson.

Rock on, Troma, for another great release. As you all know, I love monster movies, and this is one of the better I've seen. It crushed all the expectations I had, and the first time we see the Chupacabra, it actually scared me enough to jump and utter a stifled "AAAGH!" Kick ass. 4.5 for being able to scare me.