Auckland's annual Incredibly Strange Film Festival strikes again. This is a five-turkey blast that ranks as one of the funniest bad movies I've ever seen.

Of course, it's well known that between 1950 and 1970 almost every species mutated into a giant, bloodthirsty, city-destroying form. But this? What is virtually the only species on Earth that NOBODY, of any age or ethnicity or culture, has ever found frightening? What species is so mindbogglingly timid and pathetic that it can die of heart failure brought on by sudden loud noises or changes of scenery?

When I tell you that this movie contains a scene in which a policeman announces to a crowd, "Attention, ladies and gentlemen! Remain calm! A herd of killer rabbits is heading this way!" -- and the crowd accepts this statement instantly and flees for its life -- you have some idea of the insanity which is "Night of the Lepus." You just won't believe this movie until you see it for yourself.

The best part is the actual rabbits. If, for some reason, I felt the need to make a terrifying movie about killer rabbits, I would at least use nasty grubby wild rabbits with mangy brown fur and fleas -- rabbits like General Woundwort in "Watership Down." The makers of this film used dear little fluffy pet bunnies. Bunnies with huge, soft eyes and adorable snuffly little noses and cuddly soft fur. They hop around in slow motion on their dear little floppy fluffy feet, and the camera cuts to a shot of a girl screaming in terror, and then back to the little bunnies again. What makes this movie so hilarious is the dead seriousness of the whole thing. In every scene, you can see that the makers genuinely thought this was a scary film.

Here are some random highlights which I hope will encourage you to go and buy or rent this movie. It must be seen.

-- DeForest Kelley (Bones McCoy from "Star Trek," and now I know why they wanted to send him into outer space) does a scientific test to see if there are still any giant rabbits in the abandoned mine. Standing over a giant hole in the ground, he drops a rock in. Thunk, it hits the bottom. He straightens up and says, "They've gone."

-- The rugged hero puts his hand into a cage full of (normal) rabbits, suddenly yells, pulls his hand out, and shows that his finger is bleeding. Someone who has been standing next to him and watching the whole procedure cries in alarm, "What happened?!" He says, "A rabbit bit me!" Well, duh.

-- The guy in the Easter Bunny suit who does all the "giant rabbits attacking people" closeup scenes.

-- The scientist at the forensic lab finds traces of saliva on a soda can from a bunny-trampled truck. "So what are you saying? We might be dealing with vampires here?" the cop asks. "Maybe," the scientist says solemnly.

-- Little fluffy bunnies chase stampeding herds of cattle and horses through the magic of stock footage and appallingly bad editing. There is not even an attempt to make it look like the segments go together. It just cuts from bunnies hopping around to stampeding cattle and back again. Over and over and over. Then the guy in the Easter Bunny suit jumps on his victim from almost out of the shot. Aaaaiiiiieeeeee!!!!!! *gnaw*

-- The bunnies hop around inside little doll houses to indicate killing rampages.

-- The scientist couple inject experimental rabbits with a growth hormone and put them in cages in a very small room. Then they turn their backs and talk loudly so they won't notice their little girl sneak in, open the cages, rearrange the rabbits, and take away the one that's been injected. Actually, any scene with the little girl in it is the world's most compelling argument for abortion.

-- The finding of the first Ominous Giant Bunny Footprint. It is about two feet long, eight inches deep and looks like it was made by a giant seagull. "Must be a mountain lion," the old cowboy decides.

A lot more scenes I wanted to describe wouldn't seem funny in writing; it's all in the delivery of the lines and the fact that this whole movie just takes itself so darn seriously. It's a laugh riot and would be a great introduction to the joy of bad movies. There isn't any gore, unless you count hilariously obvious red paint thrown across the legs of otherwise perfectly healthy-looking "corpses," and it's all quite family-friendly in its language and terror content. Besides, where else are you going to see Janet Leigh in a last-stand desperate screaming struggle against tiny cute harmless bunnies?

Rating: 5 turkeys.

Scenes to watch for: The whole thing. From start to finish. Honestly.

Best line: "Attention! Attention! Ladies and gentlemen, remain calm! There's a herd of killer rabbits heading this way!"

Things that make you go "Huh?": The fact that gravity is still working indicates the absence of giant rabbits?

Response From RinkWorks:

I still say it's completely unfair that you get to live in a city that has film festivals like this while I have to live in amazingly snobby and high-falutin Boulder Colorado, where if it isn't a fifty star movie, it isn't worth paying the two bucks to see it at the second run theater. Sheesh.