Many of us are Bigfoot/Sasquatch enthusiasts or just enjoy the idea that some furry monster walking fairly upright, half-man/half-beast (a throwback to the prehistoric Neanderthal), is somewhere out there lurking in the wilderness, its habitat often threatened by evolved humankind. MANBEAST: MYTH OR MONSTER is a documentary exploring the notion that a Sasquatch indeed exists and is essentially a series of re-enactments regarding reported sightings or other mysterious situations involving our furry myth. Like an expert skier who vanished after possibly encountering the Bigfoot, a husband-wife Sasquatch hunting team who answer phone calls of sightings (who investigate and make casts of the footprints they find) or a little girl seeing one while traveling in the cab of her lumber-truck driving father. Peter and Celia Byrne, the husband-wife Sasquatch hunters (not in the violent sense, mind you), figure prominently in this documentary—particularly Peter who narrates. Peter, once a professional hunter who killed game in Nepal and the Himalayas, became an animal conservationist and pacifist who preferred to help wild life than destroy it. Peter would travel to places overseas to hear of tales reported about Bigfoot, such as a Russian farmer's raising of a female human-beast, an audio recording which provides the voice as not recognized to be either human or any known animal by expert analysts. Hell, we even visit a "Sasquatch conference", which has those who are obsessed with the Bigfoot gathering together to chat and discuss the creature, both believers and skeptics, enthusiasts and scientists. There's also a "green" message about man's destroying the forests for lumber, reducing the living environments which allow the Bigfoot to remain hidden. I think this documentary will be of interest more to those who remain fascinated with the Sasquatch than the average viewer. Beautiful scenery and locations are an asset for this documentary which recounts eye witness accounts of coming face to face with them (one camping, another fishing, a zoologist awakening to find a Bigfoot in her bedroom). There was even an instance when a carnival sideshow attraction, a supposed Sasquatch contained in ice, which Peter sought after, denied access to study the creature (perhaps a sign that it was merely a fake) much to his frustration and dismay. During the re-enactments, the Bigfoot are presented as men in ape-like costumes as a separate narrator—other than Peter—also takes us through various stories of possible encounters.
Review of Manbeast! Myth or Monster?
