For The Love Of Freedom, Warts And All

Although it may often seem that the US is sinking into a pit of its own stupidity and that our government has become irreversibly dysfunctional, this is still (we hope) the greatest country on Earth, damn it, so in celebration of Independance Day and all the wonderful freedoms we Americans enjoy, the latest Retro Shock Theater column looks back fondly at 1972's 4th of July-set favorite, Frogs.

When I was a kid, Frogs was in regular rotation on the 4 O'Clock Movie on Channel 30 out of Hartford, Connecticut and it never failed to give me the creeps. Even though its sillier aspects became more apparent to me as time went on, I still think it's an effective horror yarn. I don't know if it's the best of the nature attacks films of the '70s as it has plenty of competition for that title (Kingdom of the Spiders might have a leg - or even eight! - up on it) but its all-star cast of critters makes Frogs the most emblematic of its sub-genre.

So on this 4th of July, I'm saluting not just the flag, but Frogs. It's a movie that has America written all over it. Like this country, loving Frogs means accepting the occasional troublesome, ugly, and possibly incurable, wart.