The Loch Ness Horror (1981)

The Loch Ness Horror features an item i've never seen in another movie: a magic telescope. A man is in his home looking through this telescope, which is pointed straight out through his window, not up at an angle. What he sees is a fighter plane high above the ground. The plane dives down, and the camera (so also the telescope) pans with it. The plane continues down, actually going below the camera, which means that the plane is somewhere in the first floor of his house. The film cuts back to the man, and the telescope is still pointed straight out through the window. And again we see through his telescope. This time (and keep in mind it's pointed exactly where it was a moment earlier) he sees the Loch Ness Monster pop its head out of the lake. That is one amazing telescope.

Anyway, that was in 1940. The film then takes us to 1980, when two men are on a small inflatable raft in the lake. They talk about how they have all the gear they could beg, borrow or steal - though what it amounts to is two scuba tanks. Apparently, they're not good thieves or beggars. They see Nessie pop her head above water for a moment. So they put on their scuba gear, dive down, and find the plane and also a large egg. One of them is killed, but the other makes it to shore with the egg. An older man is waiting in a camper van at the shore. That night Nessie, who is amphibious, comes out onto the land and kills the guy who took the egg, but not the old guy, who remains in the camper van watching his cohort get killed.

There are also some college students on bicycles, and a somewhat cute (though incredibly prudish) girl with the worst Scottish accent ever in the history of film. And for some reason there's a kidnapping. The old guy in the camper van kidnaps the chick with the bad accent. It makes no sense whatsoever, but soon Nessie eats the guy anyway. That is one of the best shots in the film - the ridiculous Nessie creature with its mouth around the old guy's head. And by "best" i mean funniest.

This film also has an odd Shakespeare quote for no reason whatsoever. And the magic telescope comes into play once more near the end. The girl who was kidnapped returns home, changes her clothes and pretends she was home all along. Then she looks through the telescope and sees a diver on a raft who is about to set off some explosives that will kill Nessie and destroy (or at least damage) the fighter plane.

As the young scientist says at one point, "It isn't easy to achieve monster status." Indeed.