Lake Michigan Monster is a 2018 American adventure and comedy horror film written, produced and directed by Ryland Brickson Cole Tews. It stars Tews, Erick West, Beulah Peters, Daniel Long and Wayne Tews and centers on an eccentric alcoholic who assembles a team to track down and kill the titular monster to avenge the death of his father.
The film was developed by Tews and Mike Cheslik after a conversation about what would happen if a monster washed up on the shores of Lake Michigan. It was shot in black-and-white and influenced by British comedy group Monty Python, the earlier seasons of the The Simpsons, and the films of Guy Maddin. Its visual style was developed out of necessity in the low-budget and comedic style, as the only camera available only captured low-resolution footage. It was shot in Milwaukee and Muskegon, Michigan, over sixteen months.
The main protagonist, Seafield, is an eccentric, alcoholicsea captain, who lost his father to a lake monster. He assembles a team of specialists in what he calls the "Team of the Century". The team consists of weapons expert Sean Shaughnessy, sonar operator Nedge Pepsi, and former United States Navy Officer Dick Flynn. They arrive at Lighthouse Island in Lake Michigan, intending to kill it. Their first attempt fails, and the monster attacks Dick during the second attempt but he survives.
They meet with Seafield's brother Ashcroft to brainstorm a new plan. At night, they encounter the monster, who leaves them a note, saying it will see them in their dreams. While dreaming, Seafield witnesses Dick being sexually assaulted by the monster, and it later appears with an egg, which it calls a peace offering. In the morning, Seafield finds the egg and has Sean shoot it. During their third attempt, Dick throws the egg's pieces into the lake as bait after hearing voices calling out for the egg. The monster later kills Sean in a rage after finding the egg's remains.
During Sean's funeral, Dick is angered after discovering the monster's offspring was his unborn son and leaves the team. Back at base, Seafield tells Nedge the truth. He is neither a captain nor rich, as he previously claimed. Upset, Nedge leaves him. At night, Ashcroft tells Seafield that he is cursed; the only way to break the curse, he warns, is to kill the monster. Seafield attempts to reenlist Dick and Nedge, but they deny his offer. Seafield then encounters Sean's ghost, who pursues him to a boat headed for Lighthouse Island. During this time, Ashcroft is attacked and killed by the monster on Lighthouse Island.
Back on the boat, Seafield realizes the boat is heading backwards. He attempts to get it back on course, but the boat starts to malfunction. He fixes it and heads to Lighthouse Island. En route, he finds Ashcroft's severed head, who tells him the reason they didn't have a mother was because their father killed her. Arriving at the island, Seafield heads down into the catacombs and finds his father's ghost army. He asks them for help in killing the monster, which they accept. However, the monster defeats them, telling Seafield to fight it himself. Heading towards the entrance to the monster's lair, he again encounters Sean's ghost, who attacks him. Finding a sword that Dick lost during one of their failed attempts, he slices Sean in half, but Sean regenerates and continues pursuing him. He successfully avoids Sean and enters the monster's lair.
In the lair, Seafield encounters the monster, a female semi-humanoid creature, and attacks her. After a brief skirmish, the monster reveals that she and Seafield are siblings. Their father, a drunk, never knew their mother's true nature until one day when their father arrived at a Milwaukeeliquor store five minutes after closing. Sobering up, he was horrified by their mother's true form and killed her. Once the monster came of "killing age," she killed him in revenge. The monster admits that she wanted to put their violence behind them, impregnating a nearby naked man (Dick), as a peace offering to Seafield, but he rejected it by destroying the egg.
Seafeld seems to accept the monster's story and goes for a hug. Instead, he reaches for a pair of hidden knives and kills her. It is then revealed that the monster had lied about the entire story, as she had told Seafeld the wrong closing time at the liquor store. He celebrates his victory and then is harpooned in the eye by Sean's ghost, who thanks him and passes into the afterlife as the film ends.
Cast
Ryland Brickson Cole Tews as Seafield
Erick West as Sean Shaughnessy
Beulah Peters as Nedge Pepsi
Daniel Long as Dick Flynn
Wayne Tews as Ashcroft
Production
Development
The original concept was based on the idea of a mermaid being washed ashore in Lake Michigan, it was later changed into a lake monster.
Lake Michigan Monster was written, produced, and directed by Ryland Brickson Cole Tews, with development beginning in 2018. Inspiration came about after a conversation between Tews and his close friend Erick West. Tews, who was in the process of moving to Los Angeles at the time, was visiting Lake Michigan with West where the two jokingly struck up a conversation on what would happen if they were to witness a mermaid washing up on the shore of the lake. Believing the concept had potential as a film, Tews began to develop a screenplay, which became his feature film debut.[5][6][7] Concluding that the film would be a low-budget production, Tews developed the film's screenplay with his friend and fellow filmmaker Mike Cheslik,[8] writing sequences around specific locations where he knew he could film, with the intention that he (Tews) also starred in the film. According to Tews, the film's screenplay was influenced by the British comedy group Monty Python and the early seasons of the television series The Simpsons.[5][9][10][11] Tews other influences included the films of Guy Maddin, specifically Brand Upon the Brain (2006), and Sam Raimi's Evil Dead II (1987), for its humor and visual style.[6][9]
Early in development, the concept of a mermaid was recast as a lake monster, which they felt was "more attainable". Tews and co-writer and producer Cheslik came up with the idea to keep the film at a brisk pace, reasoning that its potential audience would see through the film's limited budget and lose interest. Dialogue and characters were deliberately structured around friends and family of Tews, whom he had in mind for certain roles. In an interview with Comic Book Resources, Tews stated, "They more or less play themselves in the movie, and because they're not classically trained actors... I kind of just wrote their characters as who they are in person".[10]
Principal photography began in March 2017,[12] and lasted for sixteen months, with shooting locations mostly around Milwaukee and Muskegon, Michigan.[10] The film was shot using an old DSLR camera owned by Tews's girlfriend, actress Beulah Peters, with low-resolution footage,[5][9][10] owing to the decision early on in production to shoot in black and white, which Tews later reflected helped the film to stand out among other productions at the time.[6][9][10] Tews earned the majority of the film's approximated $7,000 budget[10][11][13] from his side job as a pizza delivery man.[5] The cast and crew were mostly Tews' friends, all of whom worked in multiple roles. According to Tews, there was no real director of cinematography, with both cast and crew members operating the camera during production.[10]
As they had a limited budget, the cast and crew members were constantly devising economical production methods.[10] The underwater sequences proved to be the most difficult to shoot. Tews admitted in an interview with horror magazine Rue Morgue, that the camera operators had a limited supply of oxygen and could only shoot for a short amount of time before surfacing for air.[6]
Special effects
The title monster was designed by veteran special effects artist and director Joe Castro, with assistance from cast member Erick West, who designed the claws.[10] Castro had previously contributed to over fifty productions, including Evil Toons (1992), Campfire Tales (1997), Night of the Demons 3 (1997), and The Summer of Massacre (2012).[14] Working with Castro, Tews wanted the monster to be unique and "something you’d never seen before", also having the design resemble an (unmentioned) member of the film's cast.[10] The resulting design was described by one critic as resembling the early works of cinematic pioneer Georges Méliès.[15] While also serving as the film's editor, Cheslik contributed to the film's computer-generated imagery, working on over 300 effects shots depicted in the film.[9][10]
Lake Michigan Monster premiered at the Milwaukee Film Festival on October 24, 2018.[1][2] The film was screened extensively at various film festivals in 2019, starting on February 2, where it was screened at the Beloit International Film Festival, followed by a Q & A with Tews.[16] It was screened on March 9 at the MidWest WeirdFest in its official line-up.[17] The 10th Annual Door County Short Film Fest presented a special screening of the film on April 19.[18] From April 7 to June 28 it would have screenings at the Milwaukee Twisted Dreams Film Festival, and the Vidlings & Tapeheads Film Festival, respectively.[11][19][20] Its international premiere was held on July 25, at the Fantasia International Film Festival in Montreal.[21] It was a part of the official selection of films screened at the 6th annual FilmQuest film festival,[22] where it was screened on September 11.[23] The Bay City-based event Hell's Half Mile Film & Music Festival screened the film on September 27,[24] and was showcased at the Northeast Wisconsin Horror Film Festival on October 11.[25]
In 2023, the Milwaukee-based Lakefront Brewery hosted screenings of the film on May 20. This was followed by additional showings at the Avalon Theater from May 21 to May 27, with Tews in attendance for a Q & A. after each screening.[30] It was selected for inclusion into the 56th Sitges Film Festival, and was screened in the "Sitges Classics" section of the program in October 2023.[31][32] In Cleveland, 2024, it was released theatrically for one day by the Cleveland Institute of Art.[33]
Home media
On July 22, 2020, the video distribution company Arrow Films announced that they had acquired distribution rights for the film, with a home media release in August of that same year.[34] On July 31, the company hosted a 24-hour virtual premiere on the site AltaVOD. The premiere included supplementary interviews from the cast and crew.[35] It was released via the company's channel and video on demand on August 3,[35][36] and later on Blu-ray in the United Kingdom on November 3, 2020.[37]
Reception
Lake Michigan Monster received generally positive reviews from critics. On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, Lake Michigan Monster holds an approval rating of 86%, based on 21 reviews, and an average rating of 6.9/10.[38]
Critics praised the homage to earlier B movies. Writing for the The Austin Chronicle, Richard Whittaker praised its humor and throwback to the 1980s and 1960s low-budget cinema, calling it "a micro-budget, black-and-white whimsical voyage of wonderful waffling."[39] Other critics have similarly highlighted the film's retroactive style and humor. Referring to the film as "a gloriously weird mash-up of genres and decades that revels in its low-budget strangeness and offbeat humor". The Tampa Bay-based publication Creative Loafing praised the film as an "evolution and reinvention of every schlocky black-and-white monster movie from the 1950s that you used to watch on Saturday afternoon TV."[12] Rating the film 3.5 out of 5 stars, Drew Tinnin of Dread Central commented on the film's blend of various classic films, dreamlike quality, and idiotic charm, calling it "a unique blend of 50s sci-fi, superhero team-ups, and seafaring epics".[40] Online publication Film Threat's Joshua Speiser referred to it as "[a] love letter to B-grade 1950s monster movies", commending the humor and Ed Wood-style visual aesthetic.[41]
The film's practical and special effects were positively reviewed. Grant Hermanns of ComingSoon.net wrote praised the film's use of practical effects, highlighting their ingenuity and uniqueness.[15]Milwaukee Record journalist Matt Wild noted the film's effective use of computer generated imagery for the ghost army and dream sequences.[42]Rue Morgue magazine's Dakota Dahl praised its parodying of low-budget monster movies, highlighting its practical effects as "intentionally cheesy" while also being 'technically impressive'.[43] Writing on the "campy, B-movie design", Boston Hassle's Nick Perry comments that the effects mixed well with the film's weird and humorous elements.[44]
The offbeat humor and witty dialogue were favorably reviewed by critics. Tracy Allen of PopHorror compared the film's comedic elements to Don Coscarelli's 2012 film John Dies at the End, while also commending the film for its fast pacing.[45]On Yorkshire Magazine echoed this sentiment towards the dialogue and visual gags.[46]Gruesome Magazine offered similar praise, further noting the comedic elements often switched between what he called "Vaudvillian corny to laugh-out-loud hilarious".[47] Writing for MovieWeb, Michael Gursky summarized the film by writing, "Littered with dry wit, slapstick bits, caricaturistic characters, kooky edits, and brief homages to classic B horror, Lake Michigan Monster is an earnestly funny, one-of-a-kind wild joy to watch."[48] While commenting on the film's dry wit "play[s] better than the splashier, wetter knockabout", Kim Newman favorably compared the retroactive comedic elements to Robert Altman's Popeye (1980) and Larry Blamire's Lost Skeleton of Cadavra (2001).[49]
Awards
Lake Michigan Monster has received numerous awards and nominations since its premiere. In 2023, the film website Collider ranked the film at No. 3 in their list of "10 Underrated Horror Comedies From the 2010s".[50]
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