Monster Movie of the Week: Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970)

Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970)

Director: Ted Post

Genre: Science Fiction

THE MOVIE

The shocking twist ending of Planet of the Apes didn't exactly loan itself to a sequel but that didn't stop the powers that be at Fox from churning one out and creating a "franchise" that would set the stage later film series like Star Wars. The Apes sequels are a pretty diverse lot and, truth be told, it is one of the weakest and least original entries to the series. The first half of the movie is basically a retread of Planet of the Apes and the latter half is a bizarre visit to the remains of New York City and the psychic mutants which inhabit it.

Charlton Heston was not hot on doing a sequel but was talked into appearing so long as his role was scaled back to a cameo and his character Taylor was killed off at the end. The movie begins at the iconic conclusion of POTA and we follow Taylor and Nova into the Forbidden Zone where they come across some strange phenomena. Heston's character disappears and the rest of the movie is a search for him. To replace the Taylor character the writers came up with Brent, portrayed by mini-Heston, James Franciscus. Brent is an astronaut sent in search of Taylor who, improbably, passes through the same freak time warp which ensnared the crew of Taylor's ship.

While the first movie had some serious socio-political themes embedded into the story, in Beneath they seem a little forced and superficial. The Ape society as depicted in Beneath is highly divided between the chimpanzee "intellectuals" and the militaristic gorillas lead by the new character, General Ursus. Ursus seeks to lead a gorilla squad into the Forbidden Zone to confront the mysterious forces that have been observed there and any humans that they may encounter because, "the only good human, is a dead human." This whole subplot is a pretty ham-handed commentary on the Vietnam war, complete with chimpanzee peace protesters. The political angle in Beneath the Planet of the Apes lacks the wit and cleverness of the original.

Ursus, is the first in a long line of warrior gorillas in the movies. Even the Tim Burton remake carried on this tradition. In the original movie, however, the gorillas were depicted as laborers.

What is present in the sequel is a rather weird and subversive commentary on religion. There are two belief systems present in the movie: that of the apes, who worship a long dead messianic figure that they refer to as The Lawgiver and that of the mutants who worship a super-powerful doomsday missile. The religion of the apes is presented as a superficial and ineffective control system (Ursus barely tolerates sitting through a service) while the beliefs of the mutants presented as absurd and perverse.

Preparing for services at Our Lady of Perpetual Nuclear Destruction.

The other important point in talking about Beneath is the ending, in which Taylor blows up da earf, continuing/establishing a tradition in the Planet of the Apes movies for shocking or downbeat endings. I suppose there is no way to top the amazing ending of the first movie (although Tim Burton tried) so the writers just decided to go for destructive finality. Plus Heston wanted to have his character killed off. It is a pretty shocking ending, but one that is in character for the misanthropic Taylor. The funny thing is that there is not even music over the credits, just silence. I can imagine the slack-jawed, horrified reactions of audience members when the movie played in the 1970's: ominous silence, and then the sound of little boys afraid to cry. No wonder the next movie was a gentle fish-out-of-water comedy (well, with a shocking and traumatic ending).

But first you may want to catch a show while you are in town with the Ben Nye Dancers.

THE MONSTERS/EFFECTS

Sequels often operate under the economic principal of diminishing returns, that is each successive installment will bring in less money than it's predecessor. This is not really the case these days, unless you are talking about a series that is purely a money-making enterprise. Apes was a pioneering franchise that paved the way for all of the trilogies and sequels that would pop up in the '80's and beyond. Unfortunately, the producers of these movies were still operating under the old fashioned idea that each movie would make less and less money, and therefore should cost less to make. In Beneath, you can really see this in the decline in quality in the makeup. While the main characters, Cornelius, Zera, Zaius and Ursus, are given decent treatments, many of the background-and not-so-background-apes are given awful pullover masks with unarticulated mouths like something from Troll 2.

Ursus and Zaius even have a steam bath scene (!?) in which both actors wear some really bad full body monkey costumes. This is a pretty strong argument for keeping things concealed. No one was clamoring to see Dr. Zaius without his shirt on.

A lot of attention was payed to the newly introduced mutant characters who wear rubber masks to conceal their skinless faces. The mutants are irradiated humans who have developed psychic powers including telepathy, the ability to mind control humans to produce visions. These guys have some cool make up to give them that "invisible man" effect but are otherwise kind of goofy.

MOST MEMORABLE SEQUENCE

Beneath the Planet of the Apes features some impressive sets. There is a great scene in the middle of the movie where Brent stumbles upon the ruins of a New York subway station. The last third of the movie is set among these dilapidated urban underground settings.

SEQUELS

Escape From Planet of the Apes

HOME VIDEO AVAILABILITY

Widely available in a variety of really good formats. Can usually be found in one of the many Apes boxed sets, the best of which is the exhaustive Bluray set, which is complete with a book and an interactive documentary. The DVD set is quite good also.

TRAILER

Patrick Garone
www.patrickgarone.com
twitter.com/patrickgarone
facebook.com/cityofthegodsnovel

Hey Have You Seen The New "The Beaver" Trailer?

Is this the actual The Beaver Trailer? No. But it's even better! You almost hear this trailer say, "Meet Mel Gibson. He's insane."

By the way. This ain't safe for work. You're welcome.

A Hulk Family Portrait.

Could you move a little closer to the weird one please? No. The other weird one. Screw it. Smile everyone!

- pic courtesy of Ain’t It Cool News

Goodies Is Good

Here's some fun links that have been sent to me or I've stumbled across that you may enjoy.

Like Daft Punk and TRON? Talk to this: http://tinyurl.com/345887g

Like Criterion Collection films? Talk to this: http://fakecriterions.tumblr.com/

Love They Live? You ain't the only one! Talk to this: http://tinyurl.com/35apam8

Monster Movie of the Week: Gorgo (1961)

Like nothing you've ever seen before...unless you've seen Godzilla. Or King Kong. Or Mothra. Or Gamera.

Gorgo (1961)
Directed by Eugene Lourie
Genre: Anglo Kaiju

In the swinging '60's, every country had to have their own giant monster. Japan had Godzilla and co., Korea had Younggary, and America was frequently overrun by irradiated insects and spiders. Not to be outdone, En-guh-land came up with its own homegrown giant monster movie, Gorgo. Gorgo has all the elements of 1960's kaiju cinema: a giant monster, minature sets, landmarks destroyed, a kaiju single parent, military battles and even an annoying little kid.

Gorgo went on to start his own Skiffle band.

In Gorgo, an earthquake awakens a giant prehistoric reptile that has been slumbering off the Irish coast. When it comes ashore, it is subdued and transported to London to be shown off to the public by some people who have obviously never watched King Kong. They are also unaware of The Grendel Rule of British Monsters, which states that all British monsters have bigger more vicious mothers waiting in the wings. Kaiju-licious mama Gorgo comes to London in search of her son, and also enjoys some of the sites and attractions of the British capital. By "enjoy," I mean "goes all blitzkrieg on."

In Britain in the '60's, you could be a sex symbol and still have bad teeth. It didn't matter.

THE MONSTERS/EFFECTS

Compared to the contemporary Japanese giant monster movies, the effects in Gorgo are pretty crude. This is particularly true of the minature work, which lacks the detail of the Japanese kaiju movies. It is interesting to note that Gorgo really features two scales: what we find out to be the infant Gorgo is about thirty feet tall and there are sets scaled to him and then there is the more traditionally gigantic scale for mama Gorgo.

The creature design is pretty unimaginative, Gorgo is typical of the upright vaguely saurian monsters we have seen a million times in giant monster cinema. Gorgo has some little finlike appendages on either side of her head that highlight her aquatic roots and give her a bit of a Nessy vibe. I'm surprised they didn't try to tie her more into the many legends of lake monsters that spring from Great Britain. She also has some big mitt-like hands, unlike the rather fine pianist fingers of Godzilla.

SEQUELS

None.

MOST MEMORABLE MOMENT

This movie gets the Golden Meh Award.

HOME VIDEO AVAILABILITY

On DVD, and available on Netflix.

TRAILER

Patrick Garone
www.patrickgarone.com
twitter.com/patrickgarone
facebook.com/cityofthegodsnovel

Monster Movie of the Week: The Fly (1958)

The Fly
Director: Kurt Neumann
Genre: Horror


THE MOVIE

Based on the short story of the same name, the original version of The Fly is a decidedly different experience than its more famous remake. The 1958 movie features classic horror icon Vincent Price, and the story unfolds as a murder mystery, instead of the body horror/love story of the 1986 David Cronenberg movie. The movie is set in Montreal, (making both this and the remake Canadian-set) and there is a lot of Quebecois flavor throughout, which is a little confusing at first.

When a local scientist is found brutally murdered in an industrial press, his wife becomes the sole suspect. She refuses to reveal what she knows, instead she is obsessed with locating a strange white-headed fly that has been seen around her home. Her brother-in-law and the local police investigator are tasked with finding out what happened, which is finally revealed in a lengthy flashback. The scientist had invented a teleportation device, which he decided to try on himself but when a common housefly flew into the chamber, he and the fly ended up swapping heads and arms. In order to reverse the condition, he must locate the aberrant fly and go through the teleporter one more time.

Framing the movie as a kind of detective story was a nice touch, which allows the audience to peel back the mystery of The Fly a little bit at a time, as opposed to the more direct approach taken by Cronenberg, which allowed us a more intimate look at the characters. I imagine for someone watching the movie, not knowing anything about the story, The Fly would be a wild, weird ride. Also, the presence of the smaller fly/hybrid is a horrific little subplot that is not found in the remake. One has to wonder, to what extent can the poor creature reason. We don't see it until the movie's most famous shot at the end, in which the tiny screaming human-faced creature is devoured by a spider.

THE CREATURE/EFFECTS

This version of the creature does not feature the full genetic transformation that was featured in the 1986 movie, instead we see a man with a giant fly head and an insect arm. The head is actually pretty effective and realistic, covered in black hair and with a quivering proboscis and multifaceted eyes. The total effect is fairly revolting.



This scientist has neatly traded heads and limbs with the fly and doesn't really undergo any kind of transformation, except perhaps a mental one. We see him late in the movie, losing the ability to write and think, shades of Jeff Goldblum's performance two decades later. The actor playing the scientist, David Hedison, does some very nice work physicalizing the creature, with erratic jerky body language.



MOST MEMORABLE MOMENT

I really like the scenes late in the movie when Dr. Delambre really starts to really loose it. He begins having difficulty hanging on to his humanity. In these scenes lay the seeds for tragic horror of the remake.


SEQUELS

Return of the Fly 1959, and Curse of the Fly 1965

HOME VIDEO AVAILABILITY

DVD and currently streaming on Netflix.

TRAILER






Patrick Garone
www.patrickgarone.com
twitter.com/patrickgarone
facebook.com/cityofthegodsnovel

Hey Have You Seen The New Your Highness Trailer?

Everyone is talking about the Green Lantern trailer that was just released but I actually went with my gut and watched this trailer and in the words of the late, great, famous, somebody old who died, “Me likey.”

Oh the little things in life that make me laugh like a child, like cursing. I got a huge smile right at the 0:40 sec. mark in this trailer. Then what happens, Charles Dance shows up. “Who’s Charles Dance Ricky?” Who is Charles Dance? Charles Dance is “Sardo Numspa” the villain from The Golden Child!!! Don’t you people watch movies—Maaaaaaan get the f@ck outta my house!!! Actually come back, it’s cool.

Your Highness stars Danny McBride, not enough of Natalie Portman, and James Franco. (Little known fact, James Franco actually grew a new arm for this movie.) Rounding out the cast are Justin Theroux and Zooey Deschanel. (Littler known fact, Zooey Deschanel is actually pronounced “You Know That Really Pale Cute White Girl. No The Other One.”)

Hey Have You Seen The New True Grit Trailer?

Let’s get this out of the way. I’m not a fan of westerns. I can’t relate to them in the same sense that I can’t relate to musicals or movies set in Victorian times. And if a musical Victorian era movie ever gets made my head is gonna have a Scanners moment.

Josh Brolin may be the new go to when it comes to casting the role of a ”sonumbitch”. You just think “sonumbitch” when you see him. His teeth look like rotten corn. His beard looks like chewed up food, tumbleweeds, and “El Guapo” from The Three Amigos should be hanging from it.

Matt Damon! When I saw this trailer in the theater and he showed up onscreen I kept wanting to yell “Silverado! Silverado!”

But if this isn’t gonna be Jeff Bridges knocking it out of the park then you might be missing an eye just like Rooster Cogburn. If a Terminator could exist in the wild west I would imagine it would be in the mold of Jeff Bridges as Rooster Cogburn. The relationship between him and Hailee Steinfeld’s character just seems John Connor-esque.

Hailee Steinfeld……somewhere Dakota Fanning sits, plotting, rubbing her hands together, wondering, “Who this B@&h think she is?”

True Grit opens on Christmas Day. It’s directed by the Coen Brothers. Never heard of’em.

Monster Movie of the Week: Monsters (2010)

MONSTERS (2010)
Director: Gareth Edwards
Genre: Sci-Fi, Drama


With recent movies like Children of Men, District 9 and Moon, we seem to be having something of a renaissance in thoughtful social problem sci-fi . Now we have director Gareth Edwards' Monsters, which, while not as good as those movies, offers up a Mexican-set giant monster story which has roots in the current political situation between the US and its southern neighbor. While a lot of the political commentary is in the background of the movie, it is clearly extrapolated from real world current events and the (US-caused) alien monster outbreak in Mexico is cleverly layered over existing issues like illegal immigration and the War on Drugs. With a huge chunk of Mexico considered an "Infected Zone" in the movie, American conservatives finally got to build a massive militarized wall along the border, and, ironically, two Americans have to be smuggled to it.


The focus of Monsters is heavily on the relationship between the two lead characters: the daughter of a wealthy family who is stranded in Mexico and a photojournalist who is tasked with bringing her back to the US. It is really more of a quiet character-driven indie road movie than the orgy of action and special effects you might expect from the title . I've grown fond of calling it Lost in Monstration for its foreign setting and the weird quasi-romantic relationship at its core.

Monsters is a gorgeous-looking movie and it captures the particular beauty of Mexico, here often in ruins. The vivid Latin American color palette is muted with smoke and rubble. The movie presents us with a haunting apocalyptic vision contrasting ruined urban landscapes filled with architectural skeletons and jungles dotted with Mayan ruins and abandoned military hardware.

For a movie that gets a lot of mileage out its Mexican setting, Monsters makes some inexplicable mistakes about the country's basic geography. When the characters finally reach the US border near the end of the movie, they find the terrain covered in jungle and peppered with Mayan pyramids, which would more accurately be Mexico's border with Guatemala to the south. Anyone who has ever been to the arid American southwest will have a good idea what the US border would look like. C'mon, guys, look that shit up.

THE MONSTER/EFFECTS

The movie handles its creatures in an interesting way. For most of movie, the monsters are either referred to, glimpsed in Cloverfield-like video clips, or seen in illustrations and photos, which is in keeping with the movie's emphasis on its human protagonists. The monsters are handled in a way that is refreshingly casual, instead of reverential. The movie is not trying to knock you over the head with CGI. As in Cloverfield, the creatures are kept mysterious, except for the fact that they crashed to Mexico on some sort of NASA sample return mission which immediately overran a large chunk of Mexico, the "Infected Zone."

Once we finally see them, they are somewhat of a letdown, though. While an octopus is a great starting point for an alien creature-the tentacles, the slimness, the soft boneless body-the aliens of Monster look a little too much like octopi. Other than their size, bio-luminescence, and their ability to walk on their tentacles, they are pretty much Space Octopi. Maybe they are from the Mon Calamari system. It is unimaginative creature design and somewhat of a letdown after being teased for the whole movie. But again, Monsters is not really about monsters.




HOME VIDEO AVAILABILITY

Currently in select theaters and available On Demand.

SEE ALSO

Cloverfield 2008, District 9 2009

TRAILER







Patrick Garone
www.patrickgarone.com
twitter.com/patrickgarone
facebook.com/cityofthegodsnovel

Superman! Superheroes! Superhero Movie Genres!

Superman: The Movie. Damn. It's one of my favorites of all time. All. Time. He's not even my favorite superhero but the film make you do exactly what the poster says above, it makes you believe son! That's what good movies should do. Alright here's two solid articles on the movie and more things Superman-centric.

First is an installment from Roger Ebert's "Great Movies" where he reflects on Richard Donner's Superman: The Movie. You can talk to that here:

http://tinyurl.com/2bka5do

Second is also courtesy of the Chicago Sun-Times and it's also about the big man in blue from the Max Fleischer cartoon all the way up to Donner's film. Fun reads. Enjoy:

http://tinyurl.com/34emy4y

The Superman: The Movie trailer

Hey Have You Seen The New The Last Circus Trailer?

Well look at me being all fancy letting you know about a foreign movie. Keep looking. Keep looking. Hold up, let me strike another quick pose…..BLA-KOW! Alright stop looking. Stop! Now check out this trailer to the upcoming Italian film The Last Circus. What’s it about? What’s everything about when you boil right down to it? If you believe, like I do, what One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest mental patient Mr. Harding believes it’s about “…form. I’m talking about content! I’m talking about interrelationships. I’m talking about God! The Devil! Hell Heaven! Do you understand! Finally!!!” Say that shit Harding! Say it!

Watch this trailer and see if it’s not about all of those things as well as it’s about clowns, machine guns, knives, lips, more clowns, and silhouettes humping. I know this word gets thrown around a lot and overused but damn this trailer really does look beautiful. And what is it that works so well when you combine a really pretty moving song with just hardcore aggressive violent imagery? Is it like a really sweet ballet of sound and imagery? Wow. I sounded like a real uppity douche right there. Let me go back and read those last couple of lines again. Yep. A douche that is uppity. I like it. Word!

The Last Circus is directed by Alex de la Iglesia. I’m not familiar with his other work if he even has any. If he does let me know and I’ll check it out but I am looking forward to this when it’s released in 2011.

Monster Movie of the Week: Evolution (2001)

EVOLUTION (2001)

Director: Ivan Reitman

Genre: Science Fiction/Comedy

Country: USA

THE MOVIE

Evolution started its life out as a serious sci-fi/horror film about a hyper-evolutionary, extraterrestrial eco system that invades earth. When director Ivan Reitman took it over he rewrote the script and made it into a sci-fi comedy much in the vein of his earlier Ghostbusters. Like his earlier hit, Evolution is centered on a group of smart misfits lead by a laconic slacker who are tasked with a huge pseudo-scientific problem. Dan Ackroyd even has a cameo towards the end of the movie.

While the special effects and science fiction aspects of the movie are well-executed (it is actually a pretty cool concept which makes me wonder what the original straight version of the movie might have been like), the comedy elements don’t come together so well. This might have something to do with the weak script or the shtick of the incredibly unfunny Orlando Jones (he’s a funny guy but he’s workin’ his Eddie Murphy act way too hard in this movie) or the frequently annoying Sean William Scott. The leads, David Duchovny and Julianne Moore work out a little better. The movie seems to be fighting a loosing battle between a very droll and smart sense of humor and jokes about bodily functions.

THE MONSTERS/EFFECTS

Evolution’s saving grace is the quality and variety of its creature effects, which run the gamut from microorganisms to a goofy/ terrifying amphibian to a towering blob monster. The best one is probably the winged velociraptor-like creature that rampages through a mall. Also interesting are the blue-furred ape-like animals that represent the highest shown level of alien evolution. Apes are great subjects for monsters because they are so like us anatomically and when we see an ape that is fundamentally wrong it strikes a disturbing chord with us.

HOME VIDEO AVAILABILITY

Widely available on DVD. Has some deleted scenes, including an unfunny alternate ending.

MOST MEMORABLE SEQUENCE

The flier’s attack on the shopping mall.

SEQUELS

None.

SEE ALSO

Ghostbusters (1984)

TRAILER

Patrick Garone
www.patrickgarone.com
twitter.com/patrickgarone
facebook.com/cityofthegodsnovel

Monster Movie of the Week: Independence Day (1996)

INDEPENDENCE DAY (ID4) (1996)
Director: Roland Emmerich
Genre: Sci-Fi/Disaster


THE MOVIE

I learned a valuable lesson from Independence Day. It wasn't that people of all walks of life will come together to confront an insurmountable foe, with only their faith and patriotism to protect them. It wasn't that extraterrestrials have an overarching hatred for national monuments. It wasn't that alien computers are compatible with Mac OS 8 and susceptible to computer viruses.

It was that you should never, ever, trust a cool movie trailer.

I came into Independence Day with very high expectations due a very good trailer that should off some very cool visuals and ID4, promised to be a modern update of an old-school invasion stories like War of the Worlds. The story looked like it had shades of the great 1980's minseries V, which also featured a fleet of massive spaceships parked over Earth's cities.


But writer Dean Devlin and director Roland Emmerich-who were not well known at this point-give the movie a wide scope but almost no depth. Independence Day is not really about anything other than people fighting with spaceships. I like to compare this movie to M. Night Shyamalan's Signs, which is another invasion movie, but instead of being globally focused, Signs tells the story from the point of view of one family living in a rural house. There are only a handful of characters and you actually care about them. The characters of Independence Day are not really worthy of being cared about because they are simply two-dimensional avatars with simple relationships calculated to give the movie "heart," yet it has no heart. At best, the characters are archetypes (Cocky Fighter Pilot, Idealistic Young President, Good-Hearted Stripper) at worst, out and out stereotypes (Old New York Jewish Guy, Big Gay Mama's Boy).

The great visuals and set up are not supported by any ideas. There is no exploration of what it means that we are not alone in the universe. The aliens never reveal their intentions, they simply exist to be antagonists. This movie is science fiction in the most shallow sense. The sci-fi elements only exist to make the kind of big stupid disaster movies that the filmmakers seem to love so much. So Independence Day is a movie with neither heart nor brains.

It should be noted that this is one of Will Smith's breakout performance and the first of his many hit July 4th movies. It's really striking to see just how much he has grown as an actor since ID4. Thankfully, he no longer feels the need to constantly "work it" on camera like he does in this movie. Just look at the wonderfully somber and nuanced performance he gave in I Am Legend a few years back for comparison.



THE MONSTER/EFFECTS

The aliens of ID4 were designed by Patrick Tatopolous, who also worked on Devlin and Emmerich's hated Godzilla movie and are cool if derivative. The exoskeleton is biomechanical and looks a good deal like Giger's Alien, with the addition of a series of tentacles that come out of its back. This armor is apparently vulnerable to being punched in the face. Sadly, we see very little of these guys in the movie and we don't really see how they move around. Do they walk around on the tentacles like Doc Ock? These guys were briefly popular as toys in the '90's.


Inside the exo-suit are little guys that resemble the "grays" that are prevalent in UFO mythology (especially in the 1990's). They are given flared, manta-like heads and iridescent skin and eyes but are otherwise pretty typical aliens. They do resemble the alien from Devlin and Emmerich's previous movie, Stargate, giving some continuity in the Devlin/Emmerich cinematic universe (such as it is).




MOST MEMORABLE SEQUENCE

I will say that there is an interesting detour midway through the movie where the main band of characters end up in Area 51. The movie has some fun working some contemporary UFO mythology into its story in an almost clever way. There is also a very fun cameo from Brent Spiner (Data in the Star Trek: The Next Generation series and movies) as a wild-eyed scientist who looks to have been locked in the facility since the 1960's. This is a great bit of sci-fi casting in what is otherwise an unimaginatively cast movie (Jeff Goldblum as a scientist? Where'd you think of that?)

HOME VIDEO AVAILABILITY

Available on DVD, Bluray, and currently streaming on Netflix.

MINORITY REPORT

Verdict: The gay guy dies first!

So this movie pretty prominently features the pioneering openly gay actor Harvey Firestein in a supporting role. While he never actually says that his character is gay, it not unreasonable to assume it based on his performance and the fact that the character has a stereotypically overbearing mother. So this character that a savvy audience will be lead to assume is "gay" is the first speaking character to die and doesn't get to party with Fresh Prince, Brundlefly, and Lone Starr at the end of the movie.

The message: Diversity is great! We just don't want you around when we rebuild civilization.

SEQUELS

None yet but then Will Smith's career hasn't hit the rocks.

TRAILER

Monster Movie of the Week: The Blob (1988)

THE BLOB (1988)

Director: Chuck Russell

Genre: Horror

THE MOVIE

Thirty years after the release of the classic movie The Blob, writer Frank Darabont (who would later do a series of successful Stephen King adaptations, including The Shawshank Redemption) and director Chuck Russell (who had previously collaborated on A Nightmare on Elm St. III: The Dream Warriors) released this brand new version of the killer slime movie, complete with updated gory effects for a 1980’s audience. Chuck Russell’s remake follows the original movie in the broad strokes, with many characters and situations which correspond to those in its predecessor.

It is again set in a small town—this time a California mountain town that is anxiously awaiting its first snowfall and the upcoming ski season. Kevin Dillon plays Brian—a young trouble maker who-with the exception of his ‘80’s mullet—could have ridden his motorcycle out of any number of ‘50’s youth movies. He even makes it a point to say, “I have a problem with authority.” We get it, Brian. You’re a rebel.

Brian discovers a local hobo who has come in contact with an object that crashed to earth in a fireball. The old man is crazed and his arm has a weird pinkish growth, which he is trying to cut off with a pick axe when we first encounter him. Brian comes across with another young couple on a date and the four go to a local hospital, much as in the original movie. Soon the blob begins feeding on the townspeople, growing larger and larger.

Lady Gaga tries out a new look for the VMAs.

The biggest plot difference in the two movies involves the arrival of a government team to contain the creature and we learn that this version of the blob actually is a government experiment that crashed to earth on a wayward satellite. The government is working to capture the creature alive and is spreading misinformation about a viral outbreak. The townspeople are considered expendable. In the original, the blob was an alien lifeform that crashed to earth on a meteorite and this new origin seems a little unnecessary. After all, if ever there were a believable movie alien, it is the blob.

Stylistically, a lot had happened in the thirty years between the two movies. The 1988 version of The Blob seems to have been informed by such movies as Alien and The Thing and the movie features an impressive level of gore and effects. The remake takes the horrifying idea at the heart of the story—an insatiable shapeless creature that suffocates and consumes its prey—to a more horrifying level. The blob is a great concept and there is a lot more room for development. It has been recently announced that there is yet another remake planned, this one directed by exploitation/horror director Rob Zombie.

He should have asked for them to make his Camarones a la Diabla "menos picante."

THE MONSTER/EFFECTS

Another controversial aspect of this remake was in its depiction of the monster, which is often seen forming “blob tentacles” which whip around its victims. Some blob fundamentalists have said that this is out of character for the creature and that it should always remain amorphous and incapable of forming appendages. This version of the blob is reminiscent of the monster from John Carpenter’s The Thing, which in its base form is also able to form simple appendages and orifices.

One thing that the movie does very well is show how the blob feeds and how it leaves its victims. There are lots of great shots of partially digested people floating around inside the creature. This blob is able to cleanly strip the flesh from people’s bones and seems to have a set of consistent and believable biological processes.

Kevin Dillon, after winning the "Sigourney Weaver from Alien look-a-like contest."

MOST MEMORABLE MOMENT

Like the first version of The Blob, the 1988 version has a scene set in a movie theater where people are watching a horror movie. The remake builds a little more suspense and has some more fun with the idea. First the blob creeps into the projection booth through the AC vent and kills the projectionist. Soon, we see the image on the screen begin to distort as the blob presumably works its way into and around the projector. Then the screen goes pink as the light shines through the semi-translucent monster. It’s a very cool sequence.

DVD AVAILABILITY

Available and on Netflix.

SEQUELS

None.

THE TRAILER

Monster Movie of the Week: Sssssss! (1973)

Sssssss! (1973)
Director: Bernard Kowalski
Genre: Body Horror


THE MOVIE

Can I just say that this movie has the best title of all time? I want to get that out of the way right at the beginning. I'm a sucker for onomatopoeia in horror movie titles. But there is more than just 1970's camp value in Sssssss! The first scene alone is genuinely horrifying, with two men carrying a casket-sized box up from a spooky basement and there is clearly something alive and struggling inside but you don't find out what it is until later in the movie. It's really a great and unsettling scene. Plus I think the guy who sold Richard Crenna's family the Devil Dog is the head carnie. Gross.

Much of the movie is a slow burn, as the mad herpetologist, Dr. Stoner, slowly transforms his new lab assistant, David, into a serpentine monster. Dr. Stoner is a kooky old guy who likes to get drunk with his pet snake. He and his majestically bespectacled daughter live in a an old house far outside town. Much of the house is devoted to a research lab in which Stoner keeps dozens of live snakes, frequently "milking" them for venom.

David is played by Dirk Benedict, who would later go to play Face in The A-Team and Starbuck in Battlestar Galactica. His most recent work consists of making strangely hostile and sexist comments about the re-imagined Galactica series. Here, he plays one of the most effete and passive heroes I have ever seen in a horror movie (well, until A Nightmare on Elm St. 2). He eventually hooks up with Dr. Stoner's daughter and the two have a nerdy romance. Sssssss! almost feels like a prototype of David Cronenberg's The Fly but without the great tragedy of that movie.



THE MONSTERS/EFFECTS

Sssssss! is not a particularly effects-heavy movie. Over the course of the movie we see David slowly transform into a more reptilian creature through make-up effects by John Chambers who worked on Planet of the Apes. We also get a glimpse of the fate of Dr. Stoner's first lab assistant, briefly glimpsed in the film's opening. We see the snake man in an old-fashioned carnival freak show, in one of the film's creepier moments.



What is somewhat disappointing is that the final form that David takes is not some snake/human hybrid but an actual Cobra. He literally turns into a Cobra like any one that you would see in the zoo. This is done through a pretty awful stop motion/cross fade/proto-morph effect. It kind of sucks that after sitting through the whole movie, he just turns into a big snake. In fact, some of the later phases of his transformation are much more visually interesting than his final form.


MOST MEMORABLE MOMENT

The movie's creepy opening sequence, which manages to evoke a much different kind of almost Gothic horror than the light sci-fi tone which the movie eventually settles on.

HOME VIDEO AVAILABILITY

On DVD and currently streaming on Netflix.

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