Intensity: 🩸🩸🩸out of 🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸 for copious comic gore
Directed by Mike Hermosa
Written by Johnny Wickham and Mike Capes
The Invisible Raptor is a crowd-pleaser, plain and simple. This spoof of Jurassic Park flips the script on the behemoth tentpole franchise by not trying to do digital dinosaurs at all. Instead, The team behind The Invisible Raptor did the monster movie without the monster, and it worked brilliantly. This is a meta-movie for the Easter Egg enthusiasts, but be warned, there is so much blood and shit in this movie that it isn’t for the squeamish or the kiddos! (Though the twelve-year-old me would LOVE this movie.)
When the Portland Horror Film Festival’s festival director informed me that there was a wacky dinosaur movie spoof, I was skeptical. It sounded so outrageous that it ventured into Sharktopus territory. She convinced me that it was really funny and highly inappropriate and that they would bring action figures to the audience! YES! I was sold when she showed me what these “action figures” were. This team had the comic chops to pull this off.
The Invisible Raptor is a movie that feels like it was tailor-made for me. I realize that dinosaurs capture the imagination of millions of children… but I am the O.G. dinosaur kid. No joke! I grew up learning how to read by reading dinosaur books. Not the ones for kids, mind you, but scientific texts! I learned about geological timetables when I was five. I knew my swift Ornithischian dinosaurs from the plodding Saurischian beasts. Jurassic Park was perhaps the best movie date I ever had, with the prettiest woman I knew, a dinosaur geek as well. I own an extensive collection of fossils, including a very small dinosaur. And, I love potty humor. All boxes checked! I am on board with this. So, at least you know where I’m coming from.
This doesn’t come without risks, though! There are plenty of would-be great dinosaur movies that fail—A Sound of Thunder, 65, Carnosaur, and cheap mockbusters ready for your local landfill. So it is with great relief that this movie threaded the needle of being cheeky, fun, and dinotastic!
The Cast
- Mike Capes plays Dr. Grant Walker, a paleontologist exiled to Dinoworld, a budget theme park in little Spielburgh County. He dresses like “A Lego Figurine” version of a field scientist and laments his fall from prominence.
- David Shackelford plays Deniel “Denny” Denielson, a sad sack security guard at Dinoworld who jumps at the opportunity of an adventure with his new best friend, Grant. It is a one-way friendship, but Denny doesn’t know that.
- Caitlin McHugh Stamos plays Amber, an old flame of Dr. Walker who is newly single and is willing to carry a torch for Grant for a little while longer, even though he dumped her.
- Sandy Martin plays Henrietta McCluckskey, a conspiracy theory-driven chicken rancher with a potty mouth on her.
- Bobby Gilchrist plays John Sykes, one of the scientists who cared for and trained “Chance” the invisible raptor.
- Sean Astin plays Willie Walsh, Bobby’s research partner, who gets the Drew Barrymore Scream treatment as the one big celebrity you recognize.
- Richard Riehle plays Sheriff Grimley, who naturally does not take the story of an invisible dinosaur running amok seriously.
- Dave Theune is Deputy Carlyle, Deniel’s antagonist, and a big fan of EDM music.
- Luke Speakman is Elliot Kintner, a lonely kid who hangs out at Dinoworld, and tries to befriend the invisible raptor.
- J.J. Nolan is Debra Kintner, Luke’s lackadaisical mom.
- Layla and Emelia Golfieri played Hannah, Amber’s custodial child from her failed marriage. Amber isn’t very dialed into Hannay’s needs. (Itchy!)
Caitlyn McHugh Stamos and Mike Capes in The Invisible Raptor
A Short Plot Synopsis (minor spoilers from the first act.)
Bumbling scientists Willie and John are testing “Chance the Raptor” with intelligence experiments. Chance is invisible and probably smarter than either of the two researchers in the lab with him. The raptor uses the retina scanner to escape from the lab (I’ll give you one guess how) and hitches a ride atop John’s sedan as he goes to Dinoworld to get his son a birthday present.
Dr. Grant Walker is at Dinoworld, teaching the children about raptors and their claws at the theme park. Yes, it’s very much like THAT speech, but his heart is only half in it. What gets Grant enthusiastic is coprolites, a.k.a. fossilized dino poop. His greatest professional moment was the discovery of an intact fossilized dinosaur anus, which we eventually will learn was the perfect means to extract dinosaur DNA. Who knew? This discovery was stolen from him, and he has been in dinosaur purgatory ever since. Grant and a mascot costumed Denny perform a very awkwardly bad hip-hop song and dance routine that shills for the gift shop. Dr. Walker has hit a new professional low, particularly as his old flame is there to witness the cringe-worthy routine.
Unbeknownst to anyone in the park, mostly because nobody expects an INVISIBLE living dinosaur to be there, there is a Chance encounter with Mr. Beagle, Denny’s security dog. (Not actually a beagle, but a German Shepherd). The friend-deprived Elliot is picked up by his cruel mother, and the raptor hops into the back of the truck. Elliot eventually discovers the invisible dinosaur, and does the E.T. making friends with candy move. It has dramatically different results.
The next morning all that is left of Elliot and Mr. Beagle is a big pile of shit. With a retainer in it. And a dog collar. Denny and Grant somehow manage to piece together that shit pile that could only be the deposit of a living dinosaur. Of course! The search is on, and the odd partnership of Denny and Grant try recruiting others in their crazy schemes to capture, kill, or somehow stop this beast from killing anyone else. The difficulty, of course, is that you can’t see this creature.
Of course… this is just the beginning of the killing spree. And all you have to do is follow the trail of severed heads.
If we destroy this, we are eliminating an entire species… again. I can’t morally be the second meteor.
Dr. Grant Walker refusing to kill Chance the Raptor
Evaluation of The Invisible Raptor
This movie is better than it has any right to be. At first blush, you would assume that this movie opted not to show the dinosaur to save on the special effects. In actuality, this decision led to many wonderful practical effects that led from one great visual gag to another. This movie is far funnier and more interesting without seeing the dinosaur. The pantomime and sheer ridiculousness are bolstered by seeing objects react by the invisible critter.
Meta is an understatement for this film. This movie is filled not with Easter Eggs, but with Easter Onions. There are direct “out loud” homages and tributes to the works of Spielberg, but it is so much more than that. There are deep-cut references that will require multiple viewings to see all of them.
If there is an issue with this film, it is that it runs a bit long at 1 hr. 53 minutes. For a horror comedy, the jokes must keep coming, and that’s a long time to sustain the silliness. This movie is in the proud tradition of a Zucker Brothers or a Farrelly Brothers comedy. It’s a broad comedy, and it is filled with great humor. If one joke didn’t land for you, maybe the next one will. The packed audience at the Hollywood Theater was roaring with laughter early and often.
Like Airplane! or The Naked Gun, the subtle background work done by the supporting cast filled in the comic gaps well. While the main story thread humor is doing its thing, there will be a visual gag out of the corner of your eye or a perfectly timed quip or expression. I particularly enjoyed the work of the Golfieri twins, Layla and Emelia, who played Amber’s charge. Their performances highlight the subtle and quiet secondary humor that this movie was sneaky good with. Many of the great Raptor kill scenes are one-off gags with characters who show up just for the gags. Could these scenes have been edited for a tighter run time? Sure… but these are the scenes that people will be talking about after the credits roll.
Denny: Listen, Henrietta what he means to say was that we’re trying to capture a giant six foot mutant ninja chicken, that the government made in order to put small farmers like yourself out of business. So we need you to kindly get off your ass and help us!
Henrietta: I knew it! I fucking knew it! I’ll get my shit together.
Concluding Thoughts for The Invisible Raptor:
Was I based on this review? I hope not. Opinionated? Hell yeah! Having stated that, my interview with Mike Capes and Johnny Wickham was a real treat. They are charismatic and charming. Seeing the creative thinkers in person certainly influences some of my thoughts, but this is where the medium hit the target market (me) spot-on. However, I know that I was not alone in this thinking. This won, and perhaps by a wide margin, the Audience Choice Award at the Portland Horror Film Festival. It deservedly holds an IMDb rating of 8.0 at the time of this writing.
For a movie on a modest budget, these filmmakers utilized all their available tools: Masterful practical effects, copious gore, great set gags (My favorite involves a bunch of cats “disappearing” one at a time), and a cast and crew that were synergistically locked in. Is this an Oscar-worthy film? No. But, as someone who went in expecting a mockbuster, this blew me away by comparison.
As the film reaches the end of its festival circuit run, a distribution deal appears to be in the works. This film would certainly earn an R-rating for gore, potty language, and potty humor. When a wide-release or streaming issuance is announced, we will let you know. Also, as soon as a trailer becomes available, this post will be updated to include it. There is definitely a sequel planned, and I for one, will line up to see it.
The Interview:
Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed
Grant: Alright, here’s the plan, Henrietta, we’re going to need to use your truck. Does your P.A. system still work?
Henrietta: Does Dolly Parton sleep on her back?
Grant: That means yes around here.”
