JP Nunez
I love silly monster movies. Whether they feature tiny creatures like Critters and the recent Frankie Freako, giant monsters like the Showa-era Godzilla films, or a bit of both like the 2022 indie gem Crabs!, I can’t get enough of these movies. So naturally, when I heard about the new zombie kangaroo flick Rippy, I was instantly intrigued. It sounded like the kind of dumb fun I just eat up, and I couldn’t wait to give it a watch.
Rippy was directed and co-written by Ryan Coonan, and it stars Michael Biehn, Tess Haubrich, Angie Milliken, and Aaron Pedersen. The film is set in the kind of small town where everyone seems to know each other, and as far as we can tell, the place doesn’t have a very high death rate. But that all changes when a zombified killer kangaroo enters the picture.
It starts when the local crazy guy encounters the beast and lives to tell about it, but nobody believes him…at first. Soon enough, the bodies start piling up and the evidence for this creature becomes impossible to ignore, so the town sheriff eventually gives in and enlists the man’s help to find the thing. As you can probably guess, they eventually come face to face with their marsupial foe, and they find that it’s almost impossible to kill.
On paper, that plot synopsis might sound like nonstop kangaroo madness from beginning to end, but surprisingly, Rippy takes a much more measured approach than most silly creature features. For the majority of the movie’s runtime, you don’t see much of the titular monster. Sure, you get a few glimpses of it here and there, but when the animal pounces on its victims, it’s almost always lurking just off camera.
In fact, up until the final 10 minutes or so, this creature doesn’t really rip into anybody’s flesh on screen. Instead, the characters get stalked, chased, and pulled out of the frame, but these scenes aren’t particularly gory. The blood and guts come primarily from the gruesome aftermaths of the creature’s attacks, and thankfully, these corpses are nasty.
They’re brought to life (or, more accurately, brought to death!) by top-notch practical effects, so these gory human carcasses go a long way towards making up for the lack of on-screen kangaroo carnage. However, I don’t think they go far enough. Granted, I enjoy the slower, somewhat Jaws-esque approach as much as anyone, and I appreciate films that take their time getting to the “good stuff.” But the good ones also have great stories with great characters, and in that regard, Rippy isn’t up to par.
To be fair, the human element in this movie isn’t bad. Everybody in it gives a Hollywood-level performance that’s far better than we often expect from low-budget genre flicks, so I had no trouble believing that I was watching real people going through real experiences.
In particular, I have to give special mention to Michael Biehn. If you’ve seen this guy’s work before, it should come as no surprise to hear that he completely steals every scene he’s in. He plays the crazy old man, and he totally embodies that typical small-town stereotype. However, as Rippy goes on, Biehn also exhibits layers you might not expect from the town whackjob.
Most notably, there’s a scene where he gives a brief monologue about some of his past experiences, and he’s absolutely magnetic. Not only does he hit all the emotions this bittersweet trip down memory lane evokes for the character, but he also makes you hang on his every word as you feel those same emotions yourself.
It’s just an excellent performance all around, but it’s not enough to save the film. The human drama in Rippy still ends up being fairly generic, and that simply doesn’t cut it. It’s all about a small-town sheriff trying to live up to her father’s heroic legacy, and the killer kangaroo gives her a chance to do just that.
We’ve seen that story a million times before, so this movie had to really lean into its bonkers premise to rise above its myriad cinematic peers. But unfortunately, it doesn’t. Instead, for the vast majority of its runtime, it tiptoes around the idea and relies on standard tropes you can see in just about any creature feature.
It’s only in the last 10 minutes or so that Rippy finally becomes the bonkers monster movie I wanted it to be, and when that happens, it’s super fun. This creature is way more menacing than you’d ever think a kangaroo could be, and there’s a cool moment when it actually does rip someone apart on screen.
That being said, I do have to warn you about something. Unlike the corpses it leaves in its wake, this monster is brought to life with CGI, and the effects aren’t great. Thankfully, the filmmakers manage to mostly hide those flaws by setting the ending at night, but when the kangaroo moves a lot, there’s no denying its digital nature. It can be pretty rough at times, so while I personally had enough fun with this sequence that I was able to forgive the shoddy CGI, your mileage may vary.
Unfortunately though, even with that awesome ending, I’m sad to report that I didn’t love Rippy. The movie has its moments, so it’s by no means a waste of time, but on the whole, it doesn’t lean into its crazy premise nearly enough. At best, it’s a generic creature feature with a fun ending, so if you want anything more than that, you won’t find it here.
Rippy is set to hit theaters and VOD on October 18.
