Night of the Lepus

When I was about sixteen, I was watching tv with my girlfriend Sheri. The only interesting thing on was Night of the Lepus. It's a 1972 movie about giant rabbits killing people. That relationship lasted only another week or so.

Two years later, Sheri and I dated again. We were watching tv, and suddenly Night of the Lepus came on. That relationship lasted only another week or so.

Three years later, I went to see The Matrix. When Neo walks into the apartment where the Oracle lives, there are a bunch of kids hanging out in the living room, bending spoons and whatnot. Or maybe there was no spoon--it's been a while since I've seen The Matrix. Anyway, the tv in the room is playing Night of the Lepus. At that moment, I looked around the movie theater, and noticed Sheri sitting three rows back and to the left. That relationship lasted only another hour or so.

Five years later, I went to this video store that showed B movies every month or so for people to watch and ridicule, called Atomic Cinema. They were playing Night of the Lepus. About half way through, in that one scene where Bones from Star Trek is running through a train station with Janet Leigh, there in the background was Sheri. I still don't know how, but she managed to create a time machine and travel back to 1971 and get hired on as an extra in Night of the Lepus.

Anyway, that night the Atomic Cinema guys gave out colored rabbits feet. I got a green one. I think it's still in my desk somewhere.

What I think is really weird is the poster. They're promoting the movie with the line "How many eyes does horror have?" But everybody knows that the scariest part of the rabbit is the ears. They're all big and...they stick up in the air so the rabbit can hear things well. I mean, seriously, they weren't even trying with that one. It's as if somebody had a poster for a movie about something with big eyes (frogs? flies?) that never got made, so they just sold the Lepus people the poster with the name of the movie switched out.


In case you were wondering, lepus is the Latin word for the family that includes rabbits, hares, and those sorts of things. And on the IMDB page for Night of the Lepus, one of the keywords is pantyhose.