Killer Animals

They run, fly, crawl, and pounce... and they're totally pissed at people. We're obviously talking about movies featuring killer animals, a crowded sub-genre of horror movies where rampaging creatures - often biologically mutated ones - pose a deadly threat to humankind. The causes of this role reversal - casting erstwhile prey as newly minted hunters - vary from film to film, often proving rather obscure, but in a good number of cases, the blame rests squarely on human shoulders. In fact, some classic explanations include: environmental pollution, the wholesale destruction of ecosystems, reckless or insane lab experiments, and other less-than-edifying activities carried out by us human beings.

Despite the striking volume of stories featuring "the revolt of nature", the concept is mainly a contemporary one. With the exception of a few preliminary hints from H.G. Wells and one well-known Arthur Machen novel, the literary world - which generally serves as a trailblazer - only began to seriously examine the theme in the latter half of the 20th century. Turning to the genre's depiction in the Seventh Art, what first comes to mind is the 1950's, when American sci-fi ushered in a big-screen "era of the invertebrate". Spiders, scorpions, ants, praying mantises - all sorts of bugs suddenly became a lethal menace thanks to their colossal proportions (as was the case in "Them!" from 1954) or sheer numbers (the 1954 adventure film "The Naked Jungle" comes to mind). For more information, see the "Arthropods" Tag.

Next up, two undeniably meritorious cinematic milestones were key to the genre's explosion. First was Alfred Hitchcock's "The Birds" (1963), which adapted a short story by Daphne du Maurier and in the process became a virtual instruction manual for the fledgling genre. Then came the 1975 film adaptation of Peter Benchley's "Jaws" (1974) by a young Steven Spielberg, and its historic success opened the floodgates of "eco-vengeance" films once and for all. For more information, see the "Ecology" Tag. After that, it was off to the races when it came to choosing new animals to feature in natural horror movies, with increasingly improbable and ridiculous species popping up on the silver screen. Listing them all would be exhausting and pointless - let's just say that practically every animal that an average moviegoer could name has been the subject of at least one feature film. Turning to the offerings of the new millennium, we can't help but mention the brash Z movies churned out by The Asylum, an American independent (and ultra-low-budget) film company with a penchant for destructive, man-eating beasts.

P.S. This Tag also includes species thought to be extinct. On the other hand, it does not include any potential extraterrestrial life forms.