I knew for a while after I saw The Blob that there was a remake as well as a sequel. After I was freaked out by the original, I didn't see the remake for a long time. I just happened to catch it on Cinemax one night when I was 14 and it didn't help me get over my fear. If anything, it made even worse. And yet, as much as it terrified me, I became fascinated with it until I sat down and watched it all the way through. As such, I realized what a killer movie it was and it eventually led to me overcoming my terror of the original and see it for the first time in years. While the original is undoubtedly my favorite of the two, this remake helped me become the admirer of it I am to this day.
It's interesting to note that all three of these movies have their own distinct tone. The original is a fairly serious movie with some campy humor thrown in. The sequel is a lame attempt at a horror-comedy. From the opening credits of the remake, you know what kind of movie you're in for: a dark, twisted movie that's going to scare the hell out of you. Michael Hoenig's creepy music slowly builds into a frightening piece as the title THE BLOB morphs onto the screen in black letters surrounded by an eerie purple glow. Each credit is designed that same way as the camera starts in space, slowly pans to Earth, cuts through the atmosphere, and reveals the town. The camera keeps cutting, showing you various parts of the town. Not only is the music creepy and atmospheric, it doesn't look like there's anybody around. Has the blob already come through and devoured everybody? Until the last credit when it's revealed that almost everyone is at a football game, that's undoubtedly what you're thinking if you know what the movie is about. It's an amazing opening.
One of the reasons why this movie is so good is the talent behind the camera. In the director's chair is the severely underrated Chuck Russell, who had directed A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, one of the best entries in that series, the year before and would go on to directed The Mask with Jim Carrey and Eraser with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Russell is really good at maintaining a fast, exciting pace with great visual style and effects and this film is no exception. He wrote the film with another great filmmaker, Frank Darabont, who would go on to direct The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, and The Mist, all three of which are well made films. Darabont is a big fan of monster movies and that clearly comes through in this movie. It is, at its core, a gory, fun monster flick and one of the best of its type. Just as an added bonus, the cinematographer on the film is Mark Irwin, who'd worked with the great David Cronenberg on many of his flicks so the film looks great as well. With so much talent behind the camera, it's little wonder why this film is so well made.
The actors are really good as well. Kevin Dillon plays Brian Flagg, the lead who starts out as a typical black leather jacket wearing, cigarette smoking punk who doesn't care about anybody but himself. However, as the film goes on, he gets closer to the lead female character, Meg Penny, and as he fends off the blob, he proves to be a pretty decent guy. Dillon may not have the charisma that Steve McQueen did but he still comes across as likable overall. Also, we find out why he's such a punk at first. We hear that his mother often takes off with a boyfriend and nobody even knows who his father was. At one point, when he's going to leave Meg and the town behind, she says, "Take care of yourself. That's the only thing you're good at, isn't it?" Brian simply says, "No one else ever volunteered for the job." That one line tells you all you need to know about the guy without learning his entire backstory. Also, even though I said he cares only for himself at first, he is good enough to try to help the old man when he runs into him. Also, when he, Meg, and Meg's date, Paul Taylor, take the old man to the hospital and the nurse dismisses the man because he has no health insurance, Brian snarls, "I don't believe this shit." He knows something isn't just when he sees it. He's not a bad person; he just has some rough edges.
Shawnee Smith plays Meg Penny, the lead female character. Smith is probably best known to horror fans for her character in the Saw films. In this movie, she's a sexy cheerleader who starts off rather reserved, especially towards her date Paul because her dad, through a misunderstanding, doesn't care for the guy. She's the only one to see the blob when it devours Paul, as in the original when Steve Andrews was the only one to see it when it killed Doc Hallen. Also like Steve, when nobody believes her and she's sent home, she sneaks out because she knows the monster she saw must be stopped. Even though she's afraid of the blob, she goes out of her way to save her little brother from it when it attacks him at the movie theater. By the end of the film, she almost becomes a female Rambo when she sets a trap for the blob and tries to get its attention by shooting it and screaming at it. It's a shame Smith will most likely be best remembered for the Saw films or possibly for the idiotic character she played on Becker because she has the potential to kick ass when she needs to.
Donovan Leitch plays Paul Taylor, Meg's date for the night, who is much closer in line with Steve Andrews from the original: a fairly popular teenager in the town, best loved for being a good football player. He's sort of a red herring because first-time viewers familiar with the original may think he's the hero but he's the first person the blob kills after it devours the old man. His death is quite memorable but we'll talk about that in a second. Jeffrey DeMunn played the sheriff in The Hitcher a couple of years before and he plays a similar sheriff here. His Sheriff Herb Geller is a sympathetic character. When what's left of Paul is discovered at the hospital, he says, "I want the son of a bitch who did this." When Brian is brought in as a suspect, Geller has enough sense to know that Brian didn't kill Paul. He says, "Flagg's a punk, but he's no killer." Unfortunately, he gets eaten by the blob in a memorable scene. Speaking of that scene, Candy Clark plays the kindly restaurant owner Fran Hewitt, who unfortunately gets trapped in a phone booth that's engulfed by the blob. Joe Seneca as Dr. Meddows, part of a biological containment team hunting the blob, first comes across as a good guy but when he discovers the blob, he's intent on capturing it to use as a weapon and doesn't care who dies in the process. He gets his comeuppance in the end. Del Close plays Reverend Meeker, a drunken priest who thinks the blob is Armageddon incarnate and at the end, keeps a piece of it to unleash upon the world at some point. Paul McCrane, who played one of the criminals in Robocop the year before, does a 180 and plays Deputy Bill Briggs, who is not as sympathetic as Geller, clearly has it out for Brian, and has a death as memorable as his one in Robocop. The last character I want to mention is Billy Beck as the old man who's the blob's first victim. He does a fair job, although I didn't feel as bad for him because he simply didn't come across as frightened and in pain as Olin Howlin did.
Great directing and acting aside, a monster movie only truly works if the monster itself is good and they have a great one here. This blob is like the original on steroids. The way it looks is interesting. The original always looked like a mass of red goo, whereas this looks like an organic creature. It still has the gooey look to it, obviously, but resembles an enormous amoeba, which I think is the very basis for its concept. When the old man first discovers the meteorite and it attaches itself to his stick, it does resemble an enlarged single-cell animal like an amoeba or protozoa. When it drops down onto Paul, it spreads open like an octopus, something you'd expect a creature like this to do when attacking. Also, before it attacks Paul, drops of goo from it drop down on the table he's sitting at and burn through, suggesting that it has an acidic nature. When it kills people, it's clearly burning them in some way because you can see steam. The original blob may be classic but design-wise, this one is much more believable. While the original didn't have that much life to it, this monster's actions and movements point out that it's extremely aggressive in ongoing hunt for food. It's very fast as well, able to keep up with its victims even when they're running like hell. While the original blob made no noise whatsoever, this one not only makes slimy gurgling sounds when it movies but it even screams when attacking. It's also able to create tentacle-like appendages out of its body to pull victims into it. In one impressive scene in the sewer when Meg is dangling above it, the blob stations itself beneath her and even forms an enormous mouth to catch her when she falls. It out and out roars at that point. So, while the original film is still my favorite, I'd have to say that this blob is much more frightening.
The kills in this movie are badass, sporting really impressive makeup effects. Unlike the original, you get to see people dissolve when the blob engulfs them. The old man's death is more horrific than simply being absorbed completely. The blob ate his lower half and left his upper half on the table! When the blob engulfs Paul, Meg tries to pull him out but his arms are burned off by its acidic nature. A particularly gruesome shot is of his face by eaten away. The blob's next victims are Paul's sleazy friend Scott Jeske and his date, Vicki. Apparently when Scott went outside his car to make a couple of drinks for them, the blob not only crawled into the car but went underneath her, slowly ate up through her, and when Scott copped a feel, it exploded out of her. Her head implodes and you can see bits of it coming out. Scott's actual death isn't shown but we get a shot of his leg bursting through the window before being sucked back in. Pretty gruesome.
The most outrageous death in the entire film has to be the death of George, the cook at Fran's diner. He's trying to unclog the sink when the blob shoots a tentacle out of the drain, grabs George by the face, and pulls him head-first down the sink! I knew that that scene was in the film before I saw it but it still amazed me by how realistic it looked. How is that even possible? That has to be one of the most creative and insane death scenes in any horror film! It's then followed by another memorable scene, where poor Fran goes into a phone booth to call for help when the blob completely covers it. Fran gets a closeup look at Sheriff Geller being devoured before it finally bursts through the booth and does the same to her. Two unbelievable scenes being in the same film is amazing enough but the fact that they come one after the other is almost unheard of. This is why Chuck Russell should get more gigs than he does. The man has got skills!
Before going on, I must talk about the only real gripe I have about this film and about it's portrayal of the blob in particular. In this film, it's revealed that while it came from the sky, the meteor it landed in is an American military space probe carrying an experimental virus. It's never completely explained but conditions in space seemed to have mutated the virus into this organism. I never liked the fact that the blob is revealed in this film to be a biological weapon gone wrong. Not only is that an overused concept horror and science fiction films anyway, it robs the blob of its mystery. The scariest thing about the original blob was that all you knew about it was that it's a strange alien life form. Not knowing what it really is or where it came from makes it all the more eerie. Since this blob is already much more frightening than the original, the idea of this thing just being a bizarre alien life form would have made it even scarier than it already was.
Another great scene is the recreation of the theater scene. It starts the same way with the blob devouring the receptionist (and the manager as well for good measure) but this time, you get to see all hell break loose. After eating one obnoxious man, the blob goes on a rampage, grabbing everybody it sees. Meg runs in to save her little brother Kevin and his friend Eddie and not only sees people being devoured but comes across the gross sight of a woman with half her face melted off. Unable to get by the front, the three of them are forced to go out the backdoor. One suspenseful moment has Kevin get his coat caught in the door. As Meg tries to get him loose, you can see the screws in the hinges actually getting yanked through the door by the blob! After Kevin is saved, the three of them have no choice but to go down a manhole. You can see the blob smashing garbage cans and piles of trash bags out of its way as it chases them. As I said, this blob is ferocious!
Remember when I said that I wished that annoying little kid Danny had been killed in the original film? Well here, Chuck Russell has Kevin's annoying friend Eddie get eaten. The kid's been an obnoxious little brat since his first scene, getting Kevin into trouble when he talks about the slasher movie they're planning on seeing that night and then acts surprised when Kevin gets mad. He also acts like a little asshole to his brother, who happens to be an usher at the theater. It justifies his not only being killed but in a really awesome way as well. Not only does he gets grabbed and dragged down into a deep part of the sewer by the blob, but you get a glimpse of him being dissolved before it kills him completely. That actually shocked me. You have to admire any movie, let alone a fairly sized budget one put out by a mainstream studio, that has the balls to kill a kid. My hat's off to Russell and Darabont for that one.
The movie goes out with a bang as the blob, after killing Dr. Meddows, erupts out of the sewers and rampages through the town. It swats people with its tentacles, kills one guy by jamming his flamethrower and causing it to explode in his face, and traps everyone in the city hall. The frightened citizens have nothing to do but barricade the doors as long as they can. During the chaos, Deputy Briggs dies a very painful death when he's grabbed and pulled through an opening, getting bent completely backwards when it happens. (I know this has been done in other horror films but this one in particular looks especially painful.) That's when Brian comes to the rescue, using a snowmaker machine to attack the blob. One thing this blob shares in common with the original is that it's vulnerable to cold. But like everything else in this film, it's defeat is much more grandiose than simply being frozen by fire extinguishers. Meg uses a bomb from one of the downed soldiers to explode the snowmaker's tank when the blob covers it, freezing it into a bunch of purple crystals. All they did to afterwards was lock it in the icehouse. Hope nobody leaves the door open!
One last thing I want to mention is the film that's being watched by the characters in the theater. Remember in my review for the original when I said that the scene in that film showed that audiences as far back as the 50's already knew that some horror movies were cheesy and they were laughing at the movie that was playing in the theater? The remake updates that for 80's audiences. The film they're watching is a hodgepodge of various slasher movie conventions. The killer is wearing a hockey mask like Jason Voorhees but is using a hedge-trimmer, similar to Leatherface's chainsaw in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre movies. Behind Kevin and Eddie is a guy who's clearly a fan of these types of movies and can predict who's going to die, who's going to get away, and how the killer is going to murder people. Many credit Scream as being the film that played on the conventions of the genre and the audience's knowledge of it but lesser known films like this had already done so. While this movie's concern isn't about that, it's obvious that even before the 80's had ended, smart guys like Chuck Russell and Frank Darabont were already in on the joke.
While I still personally like the original, The Blob '88 is a very close second. I feel that it's more than a worthy companion piece to the classic original. What makes both films great is that they're two completely different films. They share the same basic plot and monster but the ways they carry them out are different. To me, this is how you remake a classic film and not insult it. I think it's one of the best remakes alongside John Carpenter's The Thing and David Cronenberg's The Fly. It's a real shame that this film failed at the box-office and destroyed any interest in doing a sequel, which the ending sets up for. In recent years, there's been talk of another remake. For a time, Rob Zombie was rumored to be doing it, which I dreaded. (When I review the Halloween movies, I'll tell you why I dreaded it.) But he eventually backed out, leaving the film's future up in the air. Whether or not the blob ever returns to the screen, we'll always have the classic original and its kickass remake.
Showing posts with label The Blob. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Blob. Show all posts
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Friday, March 25, 2011
Movies That Suck: Beware! The Blob (Son of the Blob) (1972)
Some time after I saw The Blob, I read in one of the books at my school library that there was a sequel in 1972. The book referred to it as Son of the Blob and many years later, I saw it on AMC one night (remember back when AMC was an awesome channel?). I didn't really pay that much to attention to it because it come across as interesting. I saw it on DVD somewhere, this time with the title Beware! The Blob, and I almost got it but decided not to. I'm glad I didn't because I just watched the movie in order to do this review and I can tell you that this movie blows ass.
James Rolfe of Cinemassacre.com and best known as the Angry Video Game Nerd said it best when he said that everything that made the original great is gone in this movie. Of course, there are a lot of cheesy horror and monster flicks that are so bad that they're enjoyable but this movie is a chore to get through. I'm pretty sure that it was shot on 16mm film because it has that grainy look to it. At some points, it's so dark that you can't tell what's going on. Another problem that the movie has is the tone. While the original film was treated as a serious film with some mildly campy humor, this movie is pure cheese. It's clearly trying to be a comedy as well as a horror film (I think) but it either makes you scratch your head in bewilderment or focuses too long on something that's supposed to be funny but just isn't. The credits sequence is baffling to say the least. As they roll, we watch a kitten wander around in the grass while a bizarre and goofy piece of music plays. When I first saw the movie on AMC that night, I was like, "The hell?"
Whereas Steve Andrews saw the blob consume somebody and Jane didn't, the roles are reversed here. This time, the lead female character, Lisa, sees the blob eating a man and tries to tell her boyfriend, Bobby. He doesn't really believe her until he comes across the blob himself and then they spend the rest of the movie trying to warn the townspeople. That leads me to the characters and the acting. None of the characters are likable in the slightest, They're either bland, stupid, or obnoxious. The male lead, Bobby, is played by Robert Walker Jr., son of Robert Walker, best known as the psychotic Bruno in Alfred Hitchcock's classic Strangers on a Train. I think acting talent skipped a generation with Jr. Granted, he doesn't have much to do in this film anyway but he just comes across as bland, with none of the charisma of Steve McQueen. Gwynne Gilford, who plays Lisa, is the same way. All she does is scream and have breakdowns. Nothing else. None of the other characters do any better. In fact, most of them are just cannon fodder for the blob. Whereas the original focused on Steve and Jane encountering the blob and then trying to warn people about it, this one almost entirely ignores the two main characters in the middle and focuses on random people getting killed by the blob. There's a dumb police officer who cracks down on two teens playing music in a drainpipe (what?), a bunch of bums (one of whom is played by Burgess Meredith, which pains me to say that, and the film's director, Larry Hagman), and a hair stylist who thinks he's an artist. One funny instance is when the blob attacks this Turkish guy when he's in the bathtub. He escapes but he's running down the streets naked and the police bring him in. (Not to mention, he keeps losing and regaining his accent.)
Richard Stahl's character of Edward Fazio is supposed to be a pompous asshole whose car is damaged by Lisa when she's in a panic but he comes across as annoying more than a jerk. It's a running joke throughout that they keep encountering him and when Bobby and Lisa try to warn the people at a bowling alley about the blob, they discover he owns the alley. He doesn't die either, which is unforgivable. The sheriff, played by Richard Webb, is another bland character and at the end, he keeps blabbing on and on until the blob manages to ooze toward him and, supposedly, eat him. He's also the only one in these films to refer to the monster as a "blob", which I suppose is special.
As I said, the movie focuses too much on stuff that's meant to be funny but comes across as filler. You have a scene with this idiotic scoutmaster, played by Dick Van Patten, having to deal with his boy-scouts and get them to pitch a tent. He keeps taking away one kid's toy but the kid always produces another one. Later, you see their campsite deserted, suggesting that the blob devoured them. This would be a dark twist but at the end, the kids reappear and reveal that the blob only killed the scoutmaster. What was the point of them? They don't add anything to the plot! I've mentioned the running gag with Fazio but I'll add on to it: when Lisa hits his car, the camera focuses on him getting out, yelling at her, and throwing things at her. Again, what was the point except in getting a stupid laugh? And there's a dumb instance between the sheriff and his bumbling deputy at the climax that diffuses the tension even more. By the way, the sheriff is white and the deputy is black. I'm not trying to insinuate anything but I can't help but wonder.
Another thing that bugs me: this is supposed to be a sequel to The Blob, correct? The story is that Chester, a technician, has returned home from laying a pipeline in Alaska (I think) and has brought with him a frozen piece of the blob unearthed by his team. We can assume that they were laying the pipeline near where the blob was dropped at the end of the original film except for glaring detail: Chester was working in Alaska supposedly, whereas the blob was dropped in the arctic! But that's not the worst of it. Later, before he gets killed, Chester turns on the TV and what is he watching? The original film! How the hell is this supposed to be a sequel if it makes the original just a movie? People complain about a similar scene in Halloween III: Season of the Witch where an advertisement for the original Halloween is shown playing on a TV. But here's the thing: that movie takes place in a completely different continuity than the films that preceded it and has nothing to do with the plot or characters, so it's acceptable. This is supposed to be a sequel to The Blob but it apparently isn't. Why even market is as a sequel if you're just going to relegate the original to being just a movie after all? I can't follow the logic behind that.
Speaking of which, here's, supposedly, how this film came about: Jack H. Harris, the producer of the original, had wanted to do a sequel for a long time but for various reasons, it was constantly delayed. Larry Hagman, who was best known at that time for his role in I Dream of Jeannie, happened to lived next door to him. Harris showed him the original film and Hagman expressed an interest in directing a sequel. Purportedly, Hagman was stoned throughout the making of this film, which I can believe, and most of the dialogue was improvised. And as many know, when Hagman later became famous in Dallas, this movie was actually re-released with the tagline, "The movie J.R. shot!" I'm sure that Hagman is embarrassed by this movie to this day and if he isn't, he should be. (Note: all the information above comes from IMDB and Wikipedia, so I can't clarify their authenticity.)
The special effects for the blob are downright sloppy in this movie. People feel the effects in the original are primitive but these effects make those look like Star Wars. The blob itself is nowhere near as uniform and solid a mass as it was in the original. It looks like they used red silly putty instead of silicone. When the blob drops down off the counter after it's thawed, it's obvious that somebody just flung a big glop of the stuff on the floor from off-screen. Other times, it looks like red-colored pudding or even just water. At one point, the blob is clearly just a big red balloon. It's quick but if you look, you can tell. It doesn't even feel as alive as it did before. There are some effects that manage to rather eerie, like the blob swallowing a housefly when it's first thawed, the rather horrific instance when it eats a kitten, and the disturbing image of it crawling up a woman's legs. But for the most part, it's obvious that this is a low budget movie with hardly any care for special effects.
This movie just doesn't cut it. It's cheap, it's stupid, and it has none of the charm or heart of the original. I wondered how Jack H. Harris reacted when he saw the finished film? However, he would later go on to produce the awesome 1988 remake, which we'll talk about next. Bottom line, I recommend seeing the original and the remake and leaving this movie right where it belongs: the trash.
James Rolfe of Cinemassacre.com and best known as the Angry Video Game Nerd said it best when he said that everything that made the original great is gone in this movie. Of course, there are a lot of cheesy horror and monster flicks that are so bad that they're enjoyable but this movie is a chore to get through. I'm pretty sure that it was shot on 16mm film because it has that grainy look to it. At some points, it's so dark that you can't tell what's going on. Another problem that the movie has is the tone. While the original film was treated as a serious film with some mildly campy humor, this movie is pure cheese. It's clearly trying to be a comedy as well as a horror film (I think) but it either makes you scratch your head in bewilderment or focuses too long on something that's supposed to be funny but just isn't. The credits sequence is baffling to say the least. As they roll, we watch a kitten wander around in the grass while a bizarre and goofy piece of music plays. When I first saw the movie on AMC that night, I was like, "The hell?"
Whereas Steve Andrews saw the blob consume somebody and Jane didn't, the roles are reversed here. This time, the lead female character, Lisa, sees the blob eating a man and tries to tell her boyfriend, Bobby. He doesn't really believe her until he comes across the blob himself and then they spend the rest of the movie trying to warn the townspeople. That leads me to the characters and the acting. None of the characters are likable in the slightest, They're either bland, stupid, or obnoxious. The male lead, Bobby, is played by Robert Walker Jr., son of Robert Walker, best known as the psychotic Bruno in Alfred Hitchcock's classic Strangers on a Train. I think acting talent skipped a generation with Jr. Granted, he doesn't have much to do in this film anyway but he just comes across as bland, with none of the charisma of Steve McQueen. Gwynne Gilford, who plays Lisa, is the same way. All she does is scream and have breakdowns. Nothing else. None of the other characters do any better. In fact, most of them are just cannon fodder for the blob. Whereas the original focused on Steve and Jane encountering the blob and then trying to warn people about it, this one almost entirely ignores the two main characters in the middle and focuses on random people getting killed by the blob. There's a dumb police officer who cracks down on two teens playing music in a drainpipe (what?), a bunch of bums (one of whom is played by Burgess Meredith, which pains me to say that, and the film's director, Larry Hagman), and a hair stylist who thinks he's an artist. One funny instance is when the blob attacks this Turkish guy when he's in the bathtub. He escapes but he's running down the streets naked and the police bring him in. (Not to mention, he keeps losing and regaining his accent.)
Richard Stahl's character of Edward Fazio is supposed to be a pompous asshole whose car is damaged by Lisa when she's in a panic but he comes across as annoying more than a jerk. It's a running joke throughout that they keep encountering him and when Bobby and Lisa try to warn the people at a bowling alley about the blob, they discover he owns the alley. He doesn't die either, which is unforgivable. The sheriff, played by Richard Webb, is another bland character and at the end, he keeps blabbing on and on until the blob manages to ooze toward him and, supposedly, eat him. He's also the only one in these films to refer to the monster as a "blob", which I suppose is special.
As I said, the movie focuses too much on stuff that's meant to be funny but comes across as filler. You have a scene with this idiotic scoutmaster, played by Dick Van Patten, having to deal with his boy-scouts and get them to pitch a tent. He keeps taking away one kid's toy but the kid always produces another one. Later, you see their campsite deserted, suggesting that the blob devoured them. This would be a dark twist but at the end, the kids reappear and reveal that the blob only killed the scoutmaster. What was the point of them? They don't add anything to the plot! I've mentioned the running gag with Fazio but I'll add on to it: when Lisa hits his car, the camera focuses on him getting out, yelling at her, and throwing things at her. Again, what was the point except in getting a stupid laugh? And there's a dumb instance between the sheriff and his bumbling deputy at the climax that diffuses the tension even more. By the way, the sheriff is white and the deputy is black. I'm not trying to insinuate anything but I can't help but wonder.
Another thing that bugs me: this is supposed to be a sequel to The Blob, correct? The story is that Chester, a technician, has returned home from laying a pipeline in Alaska (I think) and has brought with him a frozen piece of the blob unearthed by his team. We can assume that they were laying the pipeline near where the blob was dropped at the end of the original film except for glaring detail: Chester was working in Alaska supposedly, whereas the blob was dropped in the arctic! But that's not the worst of it. Later, before he gets killed, Chester turns on the TV and what is he watching? The original film! How the hell is this supposed to be a sequel if it makes the original just a movie? People complain about a similar scene in Halloween III: Season of the Witch where an advertisement for the original Halloween is shown playing on a TV. But here's the thing: that movie takes place in a completely different continuity than the films that preceded it and has nothing to do with the plot or characters, so it's acceptable. This is supposed to be a sequel to The Blob but it apparently isn't. Why even market is as a sequel if you're just going to relegate the original to being just a movie after all? I can't follow the logic behind that.
Speaking of which, here's, supposedly, how this film came about: Jack H. Harris, the producer of the original, had wanted to do a sequel for a long time but for various reasons, it was constantly delayed. Larry Hagman, who was best known at that time for his role in I Dream of Jeannie, happened to lived next door to him. Harris showed him the original film and Hagman expressed an interest in directing a sequel. Purportedly, Hagman was stoned throughout the making of this film, which I can believe, and most of the dialogue was improvised. And as many know, when Hagman later became famous in Dallas, this movie was actually re-released with the tagline, "The movie J.R. shot!" I'm sure that Hagman is embarrassed by this movie to this day and if he isn't, he should be. (Note: all the information above comes from IMDB and Wikipedia, so I can't clarify their authenticity.)
The special effects for the blob are downright sloppy in this movie. People feel the effects in the original are primitive but these effects make those look like Star Wars. The blob itself is nowhere near as uniform and solid a mass as it was in the original. It looks like they used red silly putty instead of silicone. When the blob drops down off the counter after it's thawed, it's obvious that somebody just flung a big glop of the stuff on the floor from off-screen. Other times, it looks like red-colored pudding or even just water. At one point, the blob is clearly just a big red balloon. It's quick but if you look, you can tell. It doesn't even feel as alive as it did before. There are some effects that manage to rather eerie, like the blob swallowing a housefly when it's first thawed, the rather horrific instance when it eats a kitten, and the disturbing image of it crawling up a woman's legs. But for the most part, it's obvious that this is a low budget movie with hardly any care for special effects.
This movie just doesn't cut it. It's cheap, it's stupid, and it has none of the charm or heart of the original. I wondered how Jack H. Harris reacted when he saw the finished film? However, he would later go on to produce the awesome 1988 remake, which we'll talk about next. Bottom line, I recommend seeing the original and the remake and leaving this movie right where it belongs: the trash.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Stuff I Grew Up With: The Blob (1958)
This is one I've been meaning to get to ever since I started doing this blog and that's for one very specific reason: this movie terrified me when I was a little kid. I know most of you will probably burst out laughing when you read that but it's the God honest truth. I saw this movie one night when I was eight years old and it got to me. I was terrified to take a bath after it was over and when I went to bed, I was still petrified. It would be years before I finally saw the movie again. I wish the film's director, Irvin S. Yeaworth Jr., was still alive so I could tell him what this flick did to me.
The very simplicity of it is what made it scary to me: one night, a small meteor falls to Earth in the woods outside an American town. An old recluse goes out to investigate and when he finds the meteor, it cracks open to reveal a strange, jelly-like life form that immediately latches onto his hand. It eventually completely absorbs him and goes a killing spree, devouring any poor soul that gets in its path and growing larger with every meal. A teenage boy and his girlfriend are the only ones that know about the creature but they can't get any of the adults to believe them. Can they do so before the monster wipes the town off the map?
The movie is straight and to the point. After a delicate kissing scene between our two heroes, this thing just comes. Other than its being from space, you have no idea what the blob is or where it came from. Also, the entire film takes place in just one night, another thing that surprised me. I often wonder what would have happened had Steve Andrews and Jane Martin, the two main characters, had just done what the authorities and their parents told them and went to bed. Would anybody have been around the next morning?
The blob itself is definitely a unique movie monster just for its sheer simplicity. It's nothing more than an oozing mass. When its meteor cracks open to reveal it, it looks merely like a sphere of jelly. It doesn't even seem to be alive. The old man pokes it with a stick and when he holds it up, it still just acts like a mere substance and slowly drips down the stick. But when the old man turns the stick back over, the blob proves it's a living creature by quickly attaching itself to the man's hand. The poor guy is slowly eaten alive after Steve and Jane find him and take him to the local doctor. One creepy moment is when you can see the blanket covering him move, indicating that the blob is spreading to other parts of his body. By the time the doctor and his nurse get ready to operate, the blob has completely eaten the old man and proceeds to devour both of them. This is when it begins to turn from fairly colorless to a bright red, no doubt from the blood of its victims. (For some reason, I thought it was purple for the longest time.) Things that start out small and grow ever larger in a short amount of time frighten me and the blob does exactly that. Strange thing though: after killing the nurse and the doctor, the blob eats a mechanic, apparently a bar full of people from what one police officer discovers, and a grocery clerk. And yet, when Steve and Jane encounter it again as his father's store, the blob is still basically the same size as it was after eating the old man. But then, after it eats the projectionist at the movie theater and proceeds to ooze out of the projection booth, it suddenly appears to be gigantic. After the crowd runs screaming from the theater, it pours out of the building and is now big enough to cover a restaurant. How did it suddenly get so big? Maybe it ate a lot of the people in the theater but most of them seem to make it out okay. This continuity error doesn't ruin the movie for me but I've always wondered about it.
The scariest aspect of the blob itself to me was its oozing nature which allows it slip under doors, squeeze through any opening no matter how small, and hide just about anywhere. When I saw it come out of the air vent in the projectionist booth, I nearly had a fit. The vent looked exactly like the air vents in my own house and when I took a bath after the movie was over, I kept staring at the air vent next to the tub! It's also completely silent. Only once does it make a gooey, sloshing noise and even then it's so faint you probably can't hear it. It could come right of your air vent or your faucet and you'd never know it until it was too late. And to add even more to my terror, this is one of the few 1950's monster movies where the monster isn't destroyed at the end. Unable to kill the blob with bullets, electricity, or acid, all the characters can do is subdue it by freezing it with fire extinguishers and have the army drop it in Antarctica. Steve says it's been stopped as long as the arctic stays cold. Even seeing the blob dropped into an ice field isn't comforting because the THE END title morphs into a question mark, suggesting that the blob may return. Made sure that I would have a sleepless night!
This is the 1950's monster movie I can relate to the most. Most of these movies take place in foreign countries, in big cities, or little towns out in the middle of nowhere. The town in The Blob feels like a regular American community, with reckless teenagers, old-town cops, and protective parents. I just happen to live in the woods outside a town very similar to that one! My house is a lot better than that old man's run down cabin but it hit a little too close to home for my eight-year old sensibilities. And while the town I live near isn't as sophisticated as the one in the film, it felt like it could be my town. On Friday nights, I'm sure there are teenagers doing reckless stuff on the back-roads and the empty streets. (In this day and age, though, they're probably getting high.) It just felt the most authentic of any of these types of movies. The town of Santa Mira in the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers is pretty close to it but there were no kids in that one except for one very young one. The presence of teenagers in The Blob made it realistic and in retrospect, this is probably one of the first movies of this type to make teenagers the main characters and heroes. Finally, I feel that this film is a perfect look at small town life in the 1950's and what the baby boomers were up to. The vehicles, the clothes, the way the teenagers act and talk, etc. It's so obviously the 1950's. And what are the kids up to? Watching horror flicks at the local theater. And they're laughing at how cheesy and ridiculous it is! Many feel that some movies from the 30's or 40's are dated now but teenagers in the 1950's were already aware of how silly some of them were.
Steve McQueen's character of Steve Andrews is the best thing about the movie by far. Some have said that they feel McQueen's acting in this film is wooden but I disagree completely. From the moment the film starts, he comes across as a charming, funny, kind, and completely likable teenager (even if he was almost 30 at the time). At the beginning when Jane asks him to her by her real name instead of "Janey Girl" as he does at first, he does so from then on out. He also promises Jane that he's never brought any girl up to the Lover's Lane they're parked at before and he feels sincere. When they come across the old man, Steve offers to help him get the blob off his hand and then takes him to the doctor as quick as he can. When the doctor tells him to go see if he can find anyone who knows what happened and he runs into the other teenagers who want to challenge him to a race, he makes it clear that he has no time for this nonsense. He tricks them in a funny way and prepares to leave but gets stopped by an officer. He also proves to be courageous when others are in danger, like when he saves Jane from the blob in the market and later rushes to save her little brother from it as well. A likable guy all around.
Aneta Corsaut as Jane Martin doesn't quite do it for me though. She comes across as warm and kind but otherwise, she feels like a typical heroine of the times. One thing she does that annoys me is when denies knowing of the blob when questioned at the police station. She may not have seen it devour the doctor like Steve did but she obviously saw it on the old man's hand. She obviously does so because she doesn't want her overbearing father to scold her but it doesn't help Steve's case at all. She later admits that she believes what Steve saw. Maybe I'm being too hard on her but that part always kind of annoys me.
Earl Rowe plays Dave, the lieutenant of the local police department. Of the three officers in the film, he's the most sympathetic and likable. Unlike his partner Sergeant Bert, who clearly has it out for teenagers and is ready to throw Steve in jail the minute they discover the state of the doctor's office when they get there, Dave is more willing to listen, even if he doesn't entirely believe him. When Bert accuses Steve of messing up the doctor's office, Dave comes to his defense, knowing that he couldn't have done so because the door was locked. Late in the film when Steve tells him that he and Jane encountered the blob again at the grocery store, he believes him just by looking at him. Another stand-up guy, very similar to the sheriff in the 1988 version of The Blob, as well as the one in The Hitcher (both of which are played by the same actor, I might add).
Olin Howlin, who was a prominent character actor in scores of movies dating back to the silent age, made his last movie appearance as the unfortunate old man who becomes the blob's first victim. While he's not in the film long for obvious reasons, he's very good at displaying pain and fear when the blob attaches itself to his hand. Stephen Chase plays Doc Hallen, the doctor who tries to save the old man but ultimately becomes another victim. Again, not much to say but he is a sympathetic doctor who does what he can to help his patient. As Sergeant Bert, John Benson comes across as cranky, disbelieving, and, according to Dave, has an unfair grudge against teenagers because one hit his wife with a car. But when it looks like they aren't going to be able save Steve, Jane, and several other people from the cafe that the blob has covered, Bert sees that Dave is taking it hard and comforts him, proving he's a decent guy after all. The only other notable characters are Steve's reckless friends Tony Gressette, "Mooch" Miller, and Al, played by Robert Fields, James Bonnet, and Anthony Franke respectively. Tony is the one that has most personality. At first, he seems like a blowhard but when Steve tries to warn the other teenagers about the blob, he's the one that tells the other disbelievers to listen to him. One final character: Jane's little brother, Danny. I can't stand that little fart! He has one of the most annoying voices I've ever heard and when Jane tries to meet up with Steve, he wastes her time by wanting to go with her. When Jane tells him that she'll bring him a little dog if he'll go to bed, he asks if he can name the dog William. When Jane says that's a nice name, Danny suddenly says, "I don't like William!" Geez, just get up there and shut up, you little pest! Moreover, he's the reason Steve and Jane get trapped in the diner by the blob because he was stupid enough to try to kill it with his popgun. He even has the gall to say, "I almost got him!" I wish the blob had gotten him! (Something that the 1988 version rectifies, I might add. We'll get to that later.)
Lastly, let's talk about the music. The music score itself is nothing special. It's fairly standard music but it serves its purpose. However, the first thing you hear is a really silly song called Beware of the Blob. The credits sequence itself is bizarre. It's just a bunch of wavy lines circling across the screen with that cheesy song playing. As a little kid, I was like, "What is this? Am I watching the right movie?" Then the lyrics are sung, which perplexed me even more. This song lulls you into a false sense of security that the film is going to be silly when in fact it's quite creepy. Some people really like it. I personally have mixed feelings about it. I think it's the reason most may view the movie as just another cheesy monster movie and when they hear it, they'll probably turn it off. On the other hand, it's a catchy tune. I just don't know.
The Blob was made outside the Hollywood system by a group of independent filmmakers who merely wanted to make the best film they could with almost no money. So just like its title character, the film was an alien that slowly crept into the American consciousness, ended up making a fortune (over $4 million, which was a lot in the 50's), and became a favorite among fans of the generation. It sort of did the same to me. I'd heard about it before I saw it but never understood what it was until I did see it. It terrified me and for years, I couldn't watch it or even see an image of it without getting frightened. But eventually, I overcame my fear and it's now one of my favorite movies ever. One day I hope to go to Blob Fest, a yearly celebration of the film in Phoenixville, PA, the very town it was shot. Among other things, you can meet the actual blob! A film memorabilia collector has the actual silicone mass that was used in the film. It'd be interesting to come up close and personal with the very thing that terrified me years ago. I think it's about time the blob and I actually meet! How many can say they got to actually meet one of their favorite movie monsters; not the actor that played them or the effects designer that created them or a stand-in but the actual one? Not too many. So I eagerly await that day. Until then, I'll always have this great flick to look back on.
The very simplicity of it is what made it scary to me: one night, a small meteor falls to Earth in the woods outside an American town. An old recluse goes out to investigate and when he finds the meteor, it cracks open to reveal a strange, jelly-like life form that immediately latches onto his hand. It eventually completely absorbs him and goes a killing spree, devouring any poor soul that gets in its path and growing larger with every meal. A teenage boy and his girlfriend are the only ones that know about the creature but they can't get any of the adults to believe them. Can they do so before the monster wipes the town off the map?
The movie is straight and to the point. After a delicate kissing scene between our two heroes, this thing just comes. Other than its being from space, you have no idea what the blob is or where it came from. Also, the entire film takes place in just one night, another thing that surprised me. I often wonder what would have happened had Steve Andrews and Jane Martin, the two main characters, had just done what the authorities and their parents told them and went to bed. Would anybody have been around the next morning?
The blob itself is definitely a unique movie monster just for its sheer simplicity. It's nothing more than an oozing mass. When its meteor cracks open to reveal it, it looks merely like a sphere of jelly. It doesn't even seem to be alive. The old man pokes it with a stick and when he holds it up, it still just acts like a mere substance and slowly drips down the stick. But when the old man turns the stick back over, the blob proves it's a living creature by quickly attaching itself to the man's hand. The poor guy is slowly eaten alive after Steve and Jane find him and take him to the local doctor. One creepy moment is when you can see the blanket covering him move, indicating that the blob is spreading to other parts of his body. By the time the doctor and his nurse get ready to operate, the blob has completely eaten the old man and proceeds to devour both of them. This is when it begins to turn from fairly colorless to a bright red, no doubt from the blood of its victims. (For some reason, I thought it was purple for the longest time.) Things that start out small and grow ever larger in a short amount of time frighten me and the blob does exactly that. Strange thing though: after killing the nurse and the doctor, the blob eats a mechanic, apparently a bar full of people from what one police officer discovers, and a grocery clerk. And yet, when Steve and Jane encounter it again as his father's store, the blob is still basically the same size as it was after eating the old man. But then, after it eats the projectionist at the movie theater and proceeds to ooze out of the projection booth, it suddenly appears to be gigantic. After the crowd runs screaming from the theater, it pours out of the building and is now big enough to cover a restaurant. How did it suddenly get so big? Maybe it ate a lot of the people in the theater but most of them seem to make it out okay. This continuity error doesn't ruin the movie for me but I've always wondered about it.
The scariest aspect of the blob itself to me was its oozing nature which allows it slip under doors, squeeze through any opening no matter how small, and hide just about anywhere. When I saw it come out of the air vent in the projectionist booth, I nearly had a fit. The vent looked exactly like the air vents in my own house and when I took a bath after the movie was over, I kept staring at the air vent next to the tub! It's also completely silent. Only once does it make a gooey, sloshing noise and even then it's so faint you probably can't hear it. It could come right of your air vent or your faucet and you'd never know it until it was too late. And to add even more to my terror, this is one of the few 1950's monster movies where the monster isn't destroyed at the end. Unable to kill the blob with bullets, electricity, or acid, all the characters can do is subdue it by freezing it with fire extinguishers and have the army drop it in Antarctica. Steve says it's been stopped as long as the arctic stays cold. Even seeing the blob dropped into an ice field isn't comforting because the THE END title morphs into a question mark, suggesting that the blob may return. Made sure that I would have a sleepless night!
This is the 1950's monster movie I can relate to the most. Most of these movies take place in foreign countries, in big cities, or little towns out in the middle of nowhere. The town in The Blob feels like a regular American community, with reckless teenagers, old-town cops, and protective parents. I just happen to live in the woods outside a town very similar to that one! My house is a lot better than that old man's run down cabin but it hit a little too close to home for my eight-year old sensibilities. And while the town I live near isn't as sophisticated as the one in the film, it felt like it could be my town. On Friday nights, I'm sure there are teenagers doing reckless stuff on the back-roads and the empty streets. (In this day and age, though, they're probably getting high.) It just felt the most authentic of any of these types of movies. The town of Santa Mira in the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers is pretty close to it but there were no kids in that one except for one very young one. The presence of teenagers in The Blob made it realistic and in retrospect, this is probably one of the first movies of this type to make teenagers the main characters and heroes. Finally, I feel that this film is a perfect look at small town life in the 1950's and what the baby boomers were up to. The vehicles, the clothes, the way the teenagers act and talk, etc. It's so obviously the 1950's. And what are the kids up to? Watching horror flicks at the local theater. And they're laughing at how cheesy and ridiculous it is! Many feel that some movies from the 30's or 40's are dated now but teenagers in the 1950's were already aware of how silly some of them were.
Steve McQueen's character of Steve Andrews is the best thing about the movie by far. Some have said that they feel McQueen's acting in this film is wooden but I disagree completely. From the moment the film starts, he comes across as a charming, funny, kind, and completely likable teenager (even if he was almost 30 at the time). At the beginning when Jane asks him to her by her real name instead of "Janey Girl" as he does at first, he does so from then on out. He also promises Jane that he's never brought any girl up to the Lover's Lane they're parked at before and he feels sincere. When they come across the old man, Steve offers to help him get the blob off his hand and then takes him to the doctor as quick as he can. When the doctor tells him to go see if he can find anyone who knows what happened and he runs into the other teenagers who want to challenge him to a race, he makes it clear that he has no time for this nonsense. He tricks them in a funny way and prepares to leave but gets stopped by an officer. He also proves to be courageous when others are in danger, like when he saves Jane from the blob in the market and later rushes to save her little brother from it as well. A likable guy all around.
Aneta Corsaut as Jane Martin doesn't quite do it for me though. She comes across as warm and kind but otherwise, she feels like a typical heroine of the times. One thing she does that annoys me is when denies knowing of the blob when questioned at the police station. She may not have seen it devour the doctor like Steve did but she obviously saw it on the old man's hand. She obviously does so because she doesn't want her overbearing father to scold her but it doesn't help Steve's case at all. She later admits that she believes what Steve saw. Maybe I'm being too hard on her but that part always kind of annoys me.
Earl Rowe plays Dave, the lieutenant of the local police department. Of the three officers in the film, he's the most sympathetic and likable. Unlike his partner Sergeant Bert, who clearly has it out for teenagers and is ready to throw Steve in jail the minute they discover the state of the doctor's office when they get there, Dave is more willing to listen, even if he doesn't entirely believe him. When Bert accuses Steve of messing up the doctor's office, Dave comes to his defense, knowing that he couldn't have done so because the door was locked. Late in the film when Steve tells him that he and Jane encountered the blob again at the grocery store, he believes him just by looking at him. Another stand-up guy, very similar to the sheriff in the 1988 version of The Blob, as well as the one in The Hitcher (both of which are played by the same actor, I might add).
Olin Howlin, who was a prominent character actor in scores of movies dating back to the silent age, made his last movie appearance as the unfortunate old man who becomes the blob's first victim. While he's not in the film long for obvious reasons, he's very good at displaying pain and fear when the blob attaches itself to his hand. Stephen Chase plays Doc Hallen, the doctor who tries to save the old man but ultimately becomes another victim. Again, not much to say but he is a sympathetic doctor who does what he can to help his patient. As Sergeant Bert, John Benson comes across as cranky, disbelieving, and, according to Dave, has an unfair grudge against teenagers because one hit his wife with a car. But when it looks like they aren't going to be able save Steve, Jane, and several other people from the cafe that the blob has covered, Bert sees that Dave is taking it hard and comforts him, proving he's a decent guy after all. The only other notable characters are Steve's reckless friends Tony Gressette, "Mooch" Miller, and Al, played by Robert Fields, James Bonnet, and Anthony Franke respectively. Tony is the one that has most personality. At first, he seems like a blowhard but when Steve tries to warn the other teenagers about the blob, he's the one that tells the other disbelievers to listen to him. One final character: Jane's little brother, Danny. I can't stand that little fart! He has one of the most annoying voices I've ever heard and when Jane tries to meet up with Steve, he wastes her time by wanting to go with her. When Jane tells him that she'll bring him a little dog if he'll go to bed, he asks if he can name the dog William. When Jane says that's a nice name, Danny suddenly says, "I don't like William!" Geez, just get up there and shut up, you little pest! Moreover, he's the reason Steve and Jane get trapped in the diner by the blob because he was stupid enough to try to kill it with his popgun. He even has the gall to say, "I almost got him!" I wish the blob had gotten him! (Something that the 1988 version rectifies, I might add. We'll get to that later.)
Lastly, let's talk about the music. The music score itself is nothing special. It's fairly standard music but it serves its purpose. However, the first thing you hear is a really silly song called Beware of the Blob. The credits sequence itself is bizarre. It's just a bunch of wavy lines circling across the screen with that cheesy song playing. As a little kid, I was like, "What is this? Am I watching the right movie?" Then the lyrics are sung, which perplexed me even more. This song lulls you into a false sense of security that the film is going to be silly when in fact it's quite creepy. Some people really like it. I personally have mixed feelings about it. I think it's the reason most may view the movie as just another cheesy monster movie and when they hear it, they'll probably turn it off. On the other hand, it's a catchy tune. I just don't know.
The Blob was made outside the Hollywood system by a group of independent filmmakers who merely wanted to make the best film they could with almost no money. So just like its title character, the film was an alien that slowly crept into the American consciousness, ended up making a fortune (over $4 million, which was a lot in the 50's), and became a favorite among fans of the generation. It sort of did the same to me. I'd heard about it before I saw it but never understood what it was until I did see it. It terrified me and for years, I couldn't watch it or even see an image of it without getting frightened. But eventually, I overcame my fear and it's now one of my favorite movies ever. One day I hope to go to Blob Fest, a yearly celebration of the film in Phoenixville, PA, the very town it was shot. Among other things, you can meet the actual blob! A film memorabilia collector has the actual silicone mass that was used in the film. It'd be interesting to come up close and personal with the very thing that terrified me years ago. I think it's about time the blob and I actually meet! How many can say they got to actually meet one of their favorite movie monsters; not the actor that played them or the effects designer that created them or a stand-in but the actual one? Not too many. So I eagerly await that day. Until then, I'll always have this great flick to look back on.
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