Susan (Chelsi Stahr) is traveling by bus, on her way to Seattle to see her boyfriend.  She meets Josie (Mary Sellers) who is on her way home.  At a service station Susan gets off the bus to get something to drink.  Not knowing anyone got off, the bus driver leaves, and Susan is stranded.  Jack (Eddy Eby), the old gas station owner, tells her that she can probably get a ride from someone heading into town where she can pick up the bus.  Eventually someone stops and she asks him for a ride.  Not far from the station he pulls off the road and tries to rape her.  Susan gets away and runs into the woods.  Suddenly the roots from the trees come alive, grab her and kill her.

In the meantime, Dr. Taylor (Bubba Reeves), who works at the local power plant, has noticed some high radiation levels around the plant.  What bothers him is that the radiation doesn’t come from the plant, but instead is coming from the nearby woods.  He tells his boss Dr. Kruger.  Kruger orders Taylor to give all his research on the situation to Dr. Pritzi (Gabriele Tinti) and let him handle the matter.  What Taylor doesn’t know is that the nuclear waste from the plant is being dumped into the woods instead of being shipped for proper disposal.  What no one knows is that the waste has contaminated the trees in the forest causing a genetic mutation.  The roots of the trees have become carnivorous and have developed a taste for human flesh.

When Joie and her boyfriend Matt (Jason Saucier) come across the mutilated body of Susan, they tell the sheriff (Vince O’Neil).  The sheriff, being in league with Kruger, tells the power plant manager.  He has the body removed and the sheriff accuses the kids of doing drugs.  Kruger then sends a couple of goons after Taylor.  They chase him into the woods.  The goons get eaten by the tree roots. 

Back at the gas station, Jack’s dog, Chester (Lord Chester) gets eaten.  Jack, looking for revenge heads into the woods to kill whatever got Chester and gets killed himself.  Jack’s grandson, Brian (Patrick Collins), comes to town to bury his grandfather.  He finds out that Jack has already been buried.  Brian happens to be an investigative reporter.  When Josie and Matt tell him about finding Susan, Brian gets suspicious.  The three of them decide they need to find out what is going on.  In the meantime, more people are being killed and the tree roots are still hungry.       

“Contamination .7” AKA “The Crawlers” AKA “Creepers” AKA “Contamination Point “, AKA “Troll III” was released in 1990 in Italy, 1992 in the UK and 1993 in the U.S., and was directed by Fabrizio Laurenti and Joe D’Amato.  It is an Italian Canadian American science fiction horror movie.  In the U.S. it was a direct to video film.  I’m not sure why it was sometimes called “Troll III” since it has nothing to do with trolls.  It was, however, shot in Porterville, Utah, which is where “Troll 2” was filmed.  Of course, “Troll 2” 1990 plot line has no connection to “Troll 1” 1986 either.  It also has no connection to the Italian film “Contamination” 1980.

The movie looks as though some dubbing was done to it.  Quite often Italian films were shot with no sound and later dubbed in post.  Most of the dubbing works, but the sheriff’s voice doesn’t match what you expect he would sound like.  The voice seems to come from a younger, more refined man.  In any case the dubbing makes the acting flat and just plain bad.  Other than that, the movie is totally ridiculous but fun, and the monster harkens back an unusual scene from “The Evil Dead” 1981.  The tree roots themselves are actually not bad and slightly creepy.  Anyone with a snake phobia may feel just a touch uneasy.

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