Nightwing (1979)

          Never mind the enticing poster and fantastic title—Nightwing is one of the worst big-studio horror movies of the late ’70s. While Nightwing features atmospheric imagery of the American Southwest and a creepy score by Henry Mancini, of all people, the movie’s flaws are seemingly countless—a script riddled with problems of characterization, logic, and pacing; lousy attempts at copping elements from Jaws (1975); and the fundamental problem of making swarms of bats look scary even though the bats are depicted through shoddy optical work and some of the tackiest animatronic creations ever associated with formidable FX wizard Carlo Rambaldi. Buried somewhere in Nightwing is a passably silly creature feature, and forgiving viewers can groove along whenever Mancini’s eerie chords create a vibe or whenever costar David Warner applies diction and poise to sell a silly riff on Robert Shaw’s iconic Jaws character.

          The gist of the pice is that Youngman Duran (Nick Macusco) is the lawman for a struggling Hopi community in New Mexico. The holy man who raised him, Abner (George Clutesi), warns of a coming vengeful apocalypse. Meanwhile, Youngman quarrels with Walker (Stephen Macht), the slick Tribal Council official secretly angling to sell mining rights for shale deposits on native land. Then, once mysterious nocturnal attacks begin claiming the lives of animals and people, scientist Philip Payne (Warner) shows up and tells Youngman that his community has fallen victim to a colony of vampire bats that, unless eliminated, will spread plague across the continent. Can our heroes defeat the dangerous animals before short-sighted capitalists undercut their crusade? You know the drill--even though, apparently, the makers of Nightwing don't. Despite offering obligatory scenes of critters laying siege, the movie misses nearly every obvious opportunity to generate dramatic interest or even basic tension.
          Instead, the picture gets mired in murkily articulated hooey about Native mysticism, and calling the romantic subplot involving Youngman and white med student Anne (Kathryn Harrold) anemic would require considerable generosity. The tiniest of sparks manifest when Youngman goes on idealistic tirades or when Philip gives lectures about the evil of vampire bats, but the movie lacks the conviction to sell weird nuances such as Youngman’s consumption of hallucinogens so visions can guide him to victory. Especially weak is the movie’s lame emulation of the Jaws underwater-cage scene; in Nightwing, several characters crowd inside a wire-fence box while lifeless-looking Rambaldi bats flop around. Perhaps the most confounding aspect of Nightwing is that it was directed by journeyman Arthur Hiller—whose other 1979 release was the The In-Laws. Seriously?
          Having said all of the above, it’s time for a pair of true confessions. First, because I didn’t see Nightwing back in the day, its alluring ad campaign stayed with me for years, so whenever the title crosses my radar, I feel a shudder of anticipation for the spooky thriller I spent decades imagining. Second, once the initial shock of Nightwing’s awfulness wore off, I began to recognize its bad-movie charm. Taken straight, this is a hot mess. Viewed with a bit of ironic distance, it offers considerable pleasure as cinematic kitsch, especially during the laughably misguided third act. Rest assured, Nightwing climaxes inside a bat cave--and what happens there is so much dumber than you could possibly imagine.

Nightwing: LAME