PRAYING MANTIDS IN FILM & TV Like my thumbnail sketches, mantids in film come in three categories.

There are giant beasts, humanised mantids, and mantisised humans. Giant Beasts The Deadly Mantis (1957) A giant prehistoric praying mantis, recently freed from the Arctic
ice, voraciously preys on American military at the Dew Line and works its way south. It first attacks military outposts to eat their occupants, then makes its way to the warmer latitudes of Washington and New York. A palaeontologist works together with military units to try to kill it. Director: Nathan Juran http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050294/

Personified Mantids A Bug's Life (1998)

Disney/Pixar Directed by John Lasseter A Bugs Life is a computer animated fantasy film produced by Pixar, based on Akira Kurosawas film Seven Samurai and Aesops fable The Ant and The Grasshopper. Great and mysterious magician of the PT Flea Circus Troupe, Manny is a praying mantis and has hands instead of the claws and spines real praying mantises have on their front legs. Manny's most famous act is called "The Chinese Cabinet of Metamorphosis" where his assistant switches places with a hand-chosen volunteer inside an old Chinese food take-away box and the audience thinks the volunteer has transformed into a beautiful moth.

Kung Fu Panda (2008)

Dreamworks Directed by John Wayne Stevenson & Mark Osborne Master Mantis is a member of the Furious 5 and a master over the Praying Mantis style of Hung Ga Kung Fu. He is also a skilled acupuncturist, and is the only film mantis I have found who is described as Chinese. Mantis was quite impatient when he was younger. Mantis felt that the world was too slow for him and he was too fast for the world. However, he was captured on a

mission due to his overconfidence and lack of listening skills. Mantis was locked in a cage for days and forced to sit and wait for something to happen, and he entered a trance that allowed him to survey the world moving faster than he did. This allowed him to develop the patience needed to devise a plan of escape.

Milo the Mantis Who Wouldn't Pray (Video 2007) When a big storm destroys Milo's Snack Shack, he doesn't know what to do and that includes just talking to God about it. Milo thinks he has to get God's attention in order for God to hear him. Milo finally learns prays and realizes that God has been helping him all along. Ironically, all the things he was using to get God's attention are the very things he needs to rebuild his Snack Shack. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1051230/ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jb68P_gruc0)

Humans with Mantid Characteristics Praying Mantis 1993

Directed by James Keach

Jane Seymour stars as a female serial killer in this made-for-cable

thriller. Seymour stars as the unbalanced Linda Crandall, a woman who marries men only to kill them. She weds and kills five men before targeting widower Don Mc Andrews . Her plans for a sixth murder are put into jeopardy when her soon-to-be sister-in-law becomes suspicious. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107868/

Praying Mantis (Le Festin de la Mante) (2004)

Directed by Marc Levie

This fantasy film of love, sacrifice and the hunt tells the story of a
beautiful woman who is cursed with the instinct of a praying mantis. The growing force inside her compels her to go on the hunt for a man to consume. Although terrified, she will do anything to keep the man she loves from death including searching for a young man willing to give his life for her. This film could be interesting so I plan to watch it and write a review.