Snowbeast (1977)

Snowbeast stars Bo Svenson, and is about skiing and a Yeti.  Actually it was mostly about skiiing.  Now if it was about a skiiing Yeti, I would have been psyched.  Instead we've got  characters who ski everywhere, all the time.  There are a couple of times where we get a Yeti point-of-view shot, and a freeze frame of a Yeti paw moving towards its victim.  But mostly you're going to watch people ski.

It's time for the Winter Festival. Yay!  Uh oh , there's a mystery death where the victims friend declares the killer was a strange beast.  So in the best interest of fun, frolic and income that only the Winter Festival can bring,  authority figures decide to say a bear killed her.

The best scenes when the Yeti crashes a prom or dance at the high school gym.  However he is a tricky Yeti and manages to destroy the event without ever going into the building.  His big ugly face staring in the window causes everyone to panic.  As the kids freak out and run, an old lady falls over and drops the prom queen crown.   When Bo tells her to run, she cries, "the crown!!" and a foot steps on it.

Next we see a mother pull up outside in a jeep.  Does she drive away when sees a Yeti looking in the gym window?  No, she just sits there.  But she does scream when the Yeti walks over to the car,  smashes the window and kills her.  There is no explaining why she didn't step on the gas and drive off.

In the aftermath of the Yeti dance fiasco - oh how I wish there were a dance called the Yeti -  the old lady is loaded into an ambulance with the smooshed crown beside her on the pillow.  Hooo boy!  Later we see the old lady crying as a casket is being lowered into the ground.  I speculate that they are burying the crown.

The Sheriff comes up with a brilliant plan to hang out in a camper in the woods and wait for the Yeti to show up so they can kill it.  Surprisingly the Yeti does show up and throws trees at them.  Why they don't move away to avoid the trees is a mystery.

Eventually only Bo is left to track the dreaded Yeti.  Fortunately for Bo, he is the victim of a Yeti  attack.  In one of the lamest endings every in a monster movie, the Yeti rushes at Bo, who braces his ski pole perpendicular against a tree... and the Yeti runs straight into it.  Then the poor critter careens off and we get to see things from the Yeti-with-a-ski-pole-in-it's-chest-cam.  Eventually it falls down and dies.  Threat neutralized.

Now I find it hard to believe that this damn Yeti has survived for years in the woods, but stupidly runs smack dab into the pointy end of a ski pole just because it's there.  Hurrah for ski poles!  If you're ever attacked by a Yeti or Bigfoot, just brace a ski pole against a tree, and the stupid thing will just run right into it.  Safety guaranteed.