Critters (1986)

Critters (1986)

"Where do they come up with this stuff?!" - Raphael leaving a showing of Critters in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

      The 1980s were probably the last golden age of the horror film.  It was also the last era of the science fiction B movie.  The late 80s brought about CGI, which rapidly became the special effect of choice through the 90s and continues to be today (along with wire work that is hidden by CGI and of course the old standby of green screen).  Back in the 1980s, science fiction and horror films were routinely made on low budgets with simple blue screen, matte paintings, and puppets for the creatures.  Now, of course, sometimes these effects look ridiculous now to some.   Puppets are clearly puppets to some people, and you won't convince them otherwise.  To me it's the same with CGI.  I know it's fake and I just see the actor there reacting to nothing but a tennis ball on a stick... if even that.  Give me the old effects any day.  Thankfully, in the past few years film-makers have started to mix puppetry and other older forms of special effect in with their CGI like CGI was supposed to be used originally.  The best films tend to do this.  Jurassic Park and Lord of the Rings for example.  LOTR used a lot of large miniatures (bigatures) instead of just making CGI forts or castles.  Jurassic Park used more puppets and animatronics than CGI to great effect.  But I digress.  This is about a film that didn't use CGI at all.  A low budget movie made to cash in on the success of 1984's Gremlins.  

     So we all know by now (if you read my Nightmare on Elm Street blogs) that New Line was pretty much put on the map by Freddy.  (Kreuger, not Mercury)  And hey, if you do well with horror, why stop, right?  And man, that Gremlins flick did pretty darn well, didn't it?  So New Line buys up this script that's been sitting around since 1981 written by Dominic Muir.   The script was then redone to make it less like Gremlins was by the guy who ended up directing the movie, Stephen Herek.  Now Stephen was a Roger Corman productions alumni.  He was an assistant editor on 1980s Corman films like Space Raiders and The Slumber Party Massacre.   Working with Corman was probably the best thing for a person to do that was going to make Critters anyway.  It basically is a 1980s Roger Corman type film without Corman being involved.  It's low budget but does the best it can with that budget.  Take the plot for instance...  They did this on $2 million!

     Shape-shifting bounty hunters are sent after some little ferocious aliens that did a prison break from an asteroid penal colony.  (Great so far, am I right?!)  The nasty little things of course land on earth.  Where on earth?  Kansas!  Where else?  The bounty hunters do their job and pursue.  They learn about earth through TV transmissions and the lead bounty hunter choses his body from a hair metal singer in a music video he comes across.  (Hey, it's the mid-80s)  The other one finds nothing to his liking so he stays a no-faced green humanoid until later on.  When the critters get to earth, they start eating, which is what their race is known for.  They eat cattle and then decide humans are up there on the menu too.  Now, the story is brought to earth by this quaint midwestern family.  You have mom of all 1980s movie moms, Dee Wallace-Stone.  (Mother in The Hills Have Eyes, Cujo and E.T.)  Billy Green Bush as the father.  (Known for character acting throughout the 1970s and 80s.)  The sister is played by little known Nadine Van der Velde.  And of course, our main protagonist, little Brad, played by Scott Grimes, the only one of those besides Dee Wallace still working today.  (E.R., Band of Brothers, Robin Hood, Justified)   Also in the film are Ethan Phillips (Neelix from Star Trek Voyager), Billy Zane as the sister's boyfriend (and critter snack), and of course Lin Shaye (sister of New Line owner Bob Shaye) as the police department receptionist.  

    So, as you can see, it's not a bad little cast.  Now, the question is, is the film any good?  That answer I suppose would have to depend on if you like 1950s science fiction films.  Because that's essentially what this is.  Rural family is trapped in farmhouse by little vicious aliens and must defend their lives.  It's more akin to Killer Klowns From Outer Space than the 1982 redo of The Thing.  More like the 1980s Tobe Hooper remake of Invaders From Mars.  To be perfectly honest, I really had a fun time watching this movie.  It doesn't take itself seriously.  It's fun but not goofy.  (In that way it's not Killer Klowns)  The acting isn't horrible.  It's not great by any means, but it doesn't distract from the fun of the film.  This isn't in the so bad it's good category.  It genuinely is good.  You just have to watch it and go with it.  I mean, you have bounty hunters that steal people's faces and aliens that roll around on the ground like hedgehogs and shoot out needle things to paralyze their prey.  Don't go looking for deep philosophical truths here.  It's a B movie.  A very fun B movie filmed in the 1980s.  And it's got some meta-humor. One critter attempts to communicate with an E.T. doll.  (And Dee Wallace was in that film.)  The family's cat is named Chewie.  There's a lot of fun to be had watching this if you will allow yourself.  

     The special effects are okay for a low budget film of the time period.  The effects were done by the Chiodo brothers.  (They directed and did the effects for the aforementioned Killer Klowns From Outer Space, which I also recommend for fun.)  They tend to keep the critters partially obscured by shadow or in low light.  The puppets are clearly puppets here.  They didn't have the budget of Gremlins to do animatronics as were done in that film.  There is a critter that grows to giant size later in the film, which was done via a man in a suit.  (Also shot so detail isn't shown.)  I think most of the budget here went to destroying a church halfway through the movie and blowing up a farmhouse.  I can't blame them.  I would spend half a budget on cool explosions too!  In the end the effects are simply serviceable, which is all they needed to be.

     The film went on to make over $13 million on a $2 million budget.  Dee Wallace still says she loves the film, but then again, unlike many actresses she embraces her horror movie roles.  The director, Stephen Herek's next project was a little film called Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, and he would follow that with the likes of Don't Tell Mom The Babysitter's Dead, The Mighty Ducks, The Three Musketeers, the live action 101 Dalmations, and Eddie Murphy's under-appreciated Holy Man.  Billy Zane would of course go on to be in one of the greatest movies of all time... Tales From The Crypt: Demon Knights... and Titanic.  3 of the actors, including young Scott Grimes, would come back for the second film in 1988.