Eaten Alive (1976) on Netflix
Clara, turned out of Miss Hattie's brothel, crosses the swamp to the Starlight Hotel, where Judd keeps a crocodile by the porch. Days later, Faye and Roy arrive with their daughter Angie.
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Trailer
Plot summary
Clara Wood works as a prostitute in a small East Texas town, and when she turns down a request from a customer named Buck, Miss Hattie, who runs the brothel, puts her out. Clara crosses the swamp nearby and takes a room at the Starlight Hotel, a run-down place whose proprietor, Judd, keeps a crocodile in the water by the front porch. Days later, Faye and her husband Roy pull in with their daughter Angie while driving across the country. The crocodile takes the family's dog, and Angie is badly shaken by it. Roy fetches a shotgun to go after the animal, and Judd steps in.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Eaten Alive (1976)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The plot was loosely based on Joe Ball, the Texas bar owner known as the Alligator Man or the Butcher of Elmendorf, who murdered several women in the 1930s. Legend says he fed his victims to the alligators at his live-alligator bar attraction, though it was never proven.
- Director Tobe Hooper left the set of Eaten Alive shortly before production ended because of a dispute with the producers, though his good relationship with his actors remained intact.
- Eaten Alive became one of the first "video nasties" prosecuted under Britain's Obscene Publications Act 1959, after its violence drew criticism from activist Mary Whitehouse. The master tapes were confiscated from VIPCO's offices and all video copies were removed from retail stores.
- Chicago's film review board upgraded Eaten Alive to an X rating, but New World Pictures rejected it on free speech grounds. The film was one of the first to challenge a Chicago law letting films be banned for under-18s over violent content, though the board's decision was upheld on appeal and in court.
- Eaten Alive was filmed entirely on the sound stages of Raleigh Studios in Hollywood, whose large-scale pool doubled for the bayou swamp. Tobe Hooper described the resulting look as a "surrealistic, twilight world."
- Quentin Tarantino liked Robert Englund's performance as Buck so much that he referenced Englund's opening line "Name's Buck and I'm rarin' to fuck" in his 2003 film Kill Bill: Volume 1.
- With The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), Eaten Alive helped Tobe Hooper advance in his career, allowing him to direct his first major studio film, The Funhouse, in 1981. The film also gained a cult following.
