Pass the popcorn and the “Raid”
An alien spaceship crash lands in a swampy area of a national park. On board is a dying alien. Average, everyday mosquitos suck on the blood of the alien. The mosquitos mutate into a large mosquitos and begin breeding. Megan (Rachel Loiselle) and Ray (Tim Lovelace) are driving through the park. Ray is driving Megan to her new job as a park ranger. They run splat into one of the giant mosquitos. It seems to be a banner year for mosquitos at the park. Hendricks (Ron Asheton) is one of the park rangers. He is told by the head of the park to spray some mosquito repellent.
In the meantime, three bank robbers, Earl (Gunnar Hansen, Earl's brother Junior (Mike Hard) and Earl's cousin Rex (Kenny Mugwump) are making their getaway through the park, having just robbed a bank. They make a pit stop so Rex can use the outhouse. Rex finds a giant mosquito. He runs screaming for help. Junior accidently shoots him. Earl shoots the mosquito.
With their jeep out of commission due to a giant mosquito proboscis sticking out of the radiator. Megan and Ray need a ride. They meet a meteorologist named Parks (Steve Dixon). Parks gives them a ride to the camp. When they get there they find everyone is dead. Except Hendricks. During the night the mosquitos attacked. While the mosquitos killed everyone and short circuited the power and phone lines Hendricks hid under an overturned boat. Megan, Ray, Parker and Hendricks need to get to the city and a phone to call the authorities. They commandeer an RV, head on down the road and run smack into Earl and Junior. Earl and Junior try to high-jack the RV but end up tied up in the back of it. When the mosquitos attack this mismatched band of humanity needs to work together if they ever expect to get out of this nightmare alive.
"Mosquito" was released in 1995 and was directed by Gary Jones. This is one of those really, really stupid movies. And I mean that in a good way. This is what camp looks like.
What ensues is one of the best examples of cheezy midnight horror movie fun. Lots of bodies and lots of blood spurting everywhere. And that includes the high death rate for the mosquitoes. Everything you could possibly use for a weapon against two and three foot long mosquitoes is used. Including, should I say, a chainsaw wielded by the master himself Gunnar Hansen.
The mosquito effects were a mix of stop-motion animation and puppetry, and some shots, such as when the swarm of mosquitoes is shown to be converging on the farmhouse, were generated using traditional cel animation. The mosquito that explodes when shot by Earl was a rubber puppet, that was filled with the film crew's lunch leftovers, in order to simulate the insect's guts. Supposedly the film's original special effects artist left the set during production to buy some cigarettes and never returned.
The scene where the RV crashes onto its side was created using a scale model; the spacecraft in the film's opening scene was also a model, and was filmed using a forced perspective technique. The most expensive shot in the film was stock footage of a mosquito being born, shown in the opening scene. The footage was purchased for $1,500.