50 Years Ago: The Food of the Gods (1976)

A pro-football player, Morgan (Marjoe Gortner) and two friends spend a weekend in the country and unexpectedly meet up giant animals in the woods.  After one of his friends his killed, Morgan investigates and find that a strange substance bubbling out of the ground on the Skinner farm is causing animals such as rats and wasps to grow to dangerous proportions.  A selfish businessman, Bensington (Ralph Meeker) and his assistant, Lorna (Pamela Franklin) also arrive on the farm, and Bensington plans to exploit this “food of the gods” for all its worth.  But very soon, the farmhouse comes under siege from a pack of hungry, giant rats.

In 1904, the novel The Food of the Gods and How it Came to Earth by H.G. Wells was published.  The book was structured in three parts, but the first part involved a scientist who engineered a special food supplement that could cause those who ate it to grow to colossal size. This first section explored how the food substance accidentally got to wildlife on the Skinner farm, and thus began to imperil normal society. Also, in the book, some human children received the food of the gods, and became forty-foot-tall giants, but ones derided by society. The novel was intended as a social critique, as well as a science fiction story.

Bert I. Gordon’s The Food of the Gods differs dramatically in tone and intent from its source material.  In the case of the film, the food is a naturally occurring substance and it appears to have bubbled up from the Earth’s interior in response to man’s mismanagement of the environment.  Gortner’s opening narration puts a fine point on the matter: “This is mother nature’s revenge,” he declares.  Gortner’s Morgan also celebrates the “open spaces man hasn’t ruined with his technology,” further painting a picture of man’s misdeeds. Mrs. Skinner’s interpretation of the food is not all that different from Morgan’s. She believes the growth-substance comes not from Mother Nature, but “the Lord.” Representing the other side of the question is Ralph Meeker’s character, a rampaging businessman who can see only dollar signs when he looks at the food of the gods, not its impact on the world at large.  

In ways entertaining, though not particularly nuanced, The Food of the Gods diagrams these different opinions about the “miraculous” food by having this small group of characters, along with a few others, countenance a siege situation.  They become trapped in a farmhouse as rats swarm around everywhere, outside.  The film’s social critique doesn’t fully emerge until the coda, which sees the food of the god survive Morgan’s attempts to destroy it, seep into the water, and then get packaged into milk cartons in school cafeterias. The idea there is simply that when we pollute the Earth, we are ultimately polluting our children, and ourselves.   All life on the planet is connected, and if treat Mother Nature poorly, we’ll reap the whirlwind.  This wicked climax -- featuring innocent little kids slurping down contaminated milk -- is so much nastyfun that it almost redeems the rest of the movie, and earns it a positive review.  

The Food of the Gods’ falters almost entirely on the basis of its own story logistics.  Characters die on the island, and there is no real response from authorities.  Morgan leaves the island after some of the animal attacks, and comes back.  He brings a football buddy, but no the police.  On the same front, no one in the film suggests calling animal control.  It’s a little weird, but I suppose this approach saves money on cast members.

Surprisingly, the special effects in the film are often impressive, and hold-up remarkably well. Although some of the giant animals look ridiculous (namely the wasps), the giant rats and giant worms appear in convincing dimensions and shapes.  The moment when Mrs. Skinner is attacked by blood-sucking worms is genuinely disturbing.  And some of the film’s climactic moment, with rats swarming over the farmhouse in large number, are impressive too.  What also works in the film’s favor is its violence. The animal attacks are so gruesome and bloody and that they galvanize the attention, especially when the (potential) victims include a very pregnant woman. 

The Food of the Gods has long been considered schlocky, and probably rightly so, but the film features that droll finale, some sharply visualized attacks, and another 1970s message about being good to the Earth. I confess, this film was in regular rotation in TV syndication when I was a kid, and I must have watched it ten times. I have great affection for it, low-budget roots, acting, effects and all.