MOVIE:
Some might call The Nest campy, but in a way, that overused word denies the depth of incompetence involved in the production. I would call The Nest craptacular, one of those awful, awful horror flicks that's so cringingly bad you can't help but laugh.

The small town of North Port has a cockroach problem. Seems the mayor has inked a shady deal with a genetic-engineering corporation called INTEC, and now mutations are terrorizing his innocent voters. Sounds like a perfectly fine setup for a killer-bug movie, doesn't it? Throw in a cute-as-a-button love interest for the local sheriff, a local exterminator doing his best Bill Murray imitation, an evil INTEC scientist doing her best Ed Wood dialog, and you have the ingredients for a classic. Unfortunately, the film's supposedly killer cockroaches look like they'd rather be sleeping in a half-eaten can of Spam. They're as harmless as, well, your everyday cockroach. Many times, I yelled at the screen, "Just stomp the little bastards!"

Through much of the movie, the principal characters whine about how they'll possibly get rid of the cockroach menace, which, from all appearances, amounts to about 40 seemingly drugged roaches. At one point, the besieged mayor moans, "We gotta evacuate the island!" Who can deny that reaction, when the horror of attacking cockroaches sounds like a bunch of midgets spinning little hula hoops?

There are a few moments worth savoring. A disturbing cockroach-eats-cat scene left me wondering whether The Nest obtained any kind of ASPCA approval. During the scene in which cockroaches attack a woman who's laid up in bed with a broken a leg, slipping underneath her cast to get at the juicy flesh, I about cried out for my mommy. And at one particularly fine exploding-eyeball effect, I could only applaud. Unfortunately, the entire budget seems to have gone to that effect. The other special effects are laughably bad, and don't even get me started on the animatronic effects. Oh dear lord.

VIDEO:
The full-frame image is murky, dark, and very soft. Poor image quality isn't exactly in the service of a film about tiny monsters. At times, I couldn't determine whether I was looking at a man-eating cockroach or, say, a wad of spat tobacco.

It appears as though the original aspect ratio of The Nest was wider than 1.33:1. In a couple scenes, I noticed hallmarks of pan-and-scan: characters chopped vertically, unnatural camera moves, characters reacting to something we should see but can't.

AUDIO:
In line with the video quality, the audio is tinny and sometimes shrill. This mono presentation is generally poor, but hey, it's not like I was expecting DTS 6.1 Discrete.

EXTRAS:
This DVD's static menus are accompanied by some of the most annoying music ever committed to disc. From that embarrassing period between 70s disco and 80s hairdo-aerobic, this repeated 10-second tune clip is like a dull blade stuttering between your gray matter and skull.

The DVD offers fairly extensive cast biographies, and three bonus trailers for other Roger Corman flicks. Although you don't get a trailer for The Nest, you do get an eye-opening one for Humanoids from the Deep (which is loaded with gratuitous full-body nudity) and two more: The Unborn and the Aliens ripoff The Terror Within.

FINAL THOUGHTS:
A no-brainer: Get it for the Humanoids from the Deep trailer.