Crew
Directors – Richard Bansbach & Robert E. Pierson, Screenplay – Chuck D. Keen & Brian Russell, Producer/Photography – Chuck D. Keen, Music – Gene Kaver & Douglas Lackey. Production Company – Alaska Pictures.
Cast
Jason Evers (Jason Monroe), Leon Ames (Commissioner Ben Chase), Clara Layton (Chris Monroe), Anthony Caruso (Henry), Glenn Sipes (Howard Lockhart), Buck Young (Pilot Madden), Myron Healey (Sheriff), Buck Monroe (Buck Monroe), Wayne Lonacre (Gil Evans), Bill Ratcliffe (Marshal)
Plot
In the woods near Admiralty, Alaska, hunters shoot a grizzly bear but fail to kill it. Jason Monroe’s truck breaks down on the way down Devil’s Paw Mountain and he is forced to hike into town to get gas, only to be attacked by the bear. Jason recovers in hospital, although his arm is left badly scarred. His obsession with the bear causes a rift between he and wife Chris who moves in with teacher Howard, taking their son Buck with her. Over the next five years, there are bear attacks all around the mountain and the legend grows that it is the devil bear of Native American myth. Howard leads a troupe of Boy Scouts out into the wilderness, only for them to be attacked by the bear and Buck badly mauled. Jason leads a team of hunters up onto the mountain determined to kill the bear.
The 1970s was the period of Animals Amok genre that emerged following the success of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds (1963) and other hits such as Willard (1971). The runaway hit of the genre was Steven Spielberg’s Jaws (1975), which became the then most successful film of all time. Jaws produced a great many imitators, not just shark and aquatic films but ones that took place on land. Indeed, Claws was the second of the imitators to transpose the basics into the woods with hunters up against a grizzly bear following Grizzly (1976). (I have a more detailed list of these in my essay Animals Attack Films).
Claws is one of the earliest Mockbusters – there is the obvious soundalike assonance of titles that goes from Jaws to Claws. The film has essentially the same plot as Jaws, albeit translated to the Alaskan wilderness instead of the Atlantic coast and with a grizzly bear instead of a shark. There are all the near-identical scenes with the initial attacks; the hunters authorised to go out and kill the bear; before one man forms a posse determined to go out in the wilds and hunt the bear on their own. All that is missing is an equivalent of the mayor wanting to keep the beaches open. One interesting addition is where Roy Scheider’s police chief is replaced by Jason Evers who hunts the bear in revenge for being mauled by it. It turns Claws in effect into the equivalent of a Moby Dick (1851) with Jason Evers cast in the role of Captain Ahab.
Claws is a largely routine film. The plot quickly falls into the formula established by these Jaws copies. The direction and the choice of camera set-ups is wholly by the book and with nothing exceptional to them. The devil bear is tied to American Indian legends on several occasions, although noting particularly interesting is made of this. The film does get itself together for a reasonable showdown between Jason Evers and the bear.
The film has an okay cast. There are solid performances from Leon Ames and in particular the grizzled Jason Evers. Among these, Anthony Caruso has a fairly racist role as the local American Indian, drinking whiskey and talking with no articles. Although Robert E. Pierson had directed two films prior to this, neither of the two directors ever made any other films subsequently. Claws has never been released in the dvd or digital era.
Full film available here