Night of the Creeps (1986)

Title: Night of the Creeps (1986)

Director: Fred Dekker

Cast: Tom Atkins, Jason Lively, Steve Marshall, Jill Whitlow

Review:

Sometimes movies completely bleep out of the radar, disappear, cease to exist. This usually happens with really cheap sci-fi/horror movies that studios figure nobody cares about. Sometimes its films that were such box office bombs that the studio simply wants to forget about ‘em. But sometimes the public will claim for a long lost movie to re-emerge and re-emerge they do thanks to the good will of a distribution company who'll give a crap about these old movies and decides to rescue them from obscurity. I'm talking about companies like Anchor Bay, Synapse Films and Blue Underground, these companies thrive on pleasing horror/sci-fi fans by re-releasing these films on various formats. Even with companies such as these, Night of the Creeps was nowhere to be seen. But wait! Finally somebody out there heard audience’s cries (thanks Sony!) and released this long awaited gem from the 80's! Get ready, because this my friends is one of the best zombie films of the 80's!  

Storyline on this film is a complete homage to science fiction and horror films from many eras; it's as much a homage to 50's science fiction films as it is a homage to zombie movies from the 80's. But what you need to know is this: a meteor containing a deadly alien life form crash lands in the woods! A curious teenager ends up as a host to one of the alien beings! They begin to reproduce in his brain…until his body is found and cryogenically frozen. Fast forward 30 years and the body is unfrozen by a pair of teenagers trying to get into a college fraternity! The alien slugs escape and spread all through out college campus! Will Detective Cameron find a way to stop the alien slugs before they eat every football jock and cheerleader on campus?

I never got why audiences didn’t connect with this movie; Night of the Creeps had all the right elements to become a hit in theaters yet it didn’t; it died a quick and quiet death in theaters. Many members of the crew and cast agree, the film just wasn’t marketed properly. Apparently, the studio didn’t know who to sell Night of the Creeps too, since the film is a mish mash of genres, they couldn't pin point the proverbial target audience. Same thing happened to John Carpenters Big Trouble in Little China (1986), the studio didn’t know how to sell Jack Burton to people, as a result a fine film like Big Trouble in Little China tanked at the box office. Same thing happened to Night of the Creeps and consequently, same thing happened to Dekker’s second film, Monster Squad (1987), it seems as if Dekker specialized in making films that were a hard sell. But there’s one thing all these fine movies have in common: maybe Hollywood didn’t know how to sell ‘em to us, but we found the movie anyway and made it our own!



Night of the Creeps has so many cool things going for it, many elements make it an enjoyable watch. First off, it has this whole background with the alien experiment, the slugs that get released onto our world by an evil zombie midget alien/scientist. Yup, you read that correctly! So we got the science fiction angle there which is fun, especially considering the aliens are midgets! I mean little people.

Then, the movie shifts into a 50's horror film when we are introduced to this couple sitting in their car, enjoying the beauty of a quiet star filled evening. Suddenly a meteorite falls from the heavens! The teens investigate, but wait; theres an axe wielding maniac on the loose as well! Then the film turns into an 80's teen flick and now we  follow a pair of horny teenagers looking to get some action. How do we know this is an 80's teen flick? Well, the film uses that classic 80's plot device where the teens who want to enter a fraternity have to pull off some sort of prank to get accepted. Then it turns into a zombie flick along the lines of Return of the Living Dead (1985), when we enter a facility that conducts secret science experiments involving the dead. But wait, its also a mystery, and so the film suddenly feels like a film noir as we follow a detective slowly uncovering everything! On top of this, we’re on a college campus with cheerleaders and football jocks running around drunk, looking for their next hot date. As you can see, Night of the Creeps is entertaining because it mixes so many different genres, it keeps things fun.

Tom Atkins has to be mentioned as something special in this film because he truly is. He is the epitome of what a bad ass 40 something detective should be like. He’s always the smart ass, the guy who knows the answers to everything. Don't ask him a stupid question, because you'll get stupid answer! His character has so many quotable one liners here, but amongst my favorite is of course, the ever popular “Thrill Me!” or there’s the other one: “I got good news and bad news. Good news is your boyfriends are here, bad news is their dead!” Jason Lively, whom some of you might remember as Rustty Griswald in National Lampoons European Vacation (1985) plays a pivotal role here as the nerdy leading guy, again, the film plays with our expectations of a film, this time its the nerd who is the hero. Steve Marshall plays the wise ass handicapped best friend. And Jill Whitlows plays the hot yet innocent looking, quintesential 80s cutey!

The cheesy dialog and sci-fi angle might not sit well with some folks, but if you can’t take the midget aliens in the first five minutes of the movie, then what are you doing watching this movie anyways right? But if you love monsters, aliens, zombies, cool make up effects, flame throwers, exploding heads, sorority babes getting undressed, zombie dogs, zombie boyfriends, alien slugs, cemeteries, and corpses sleeping in cryogenic laboratories, then look no further, this movie is for you! 

The DVD has some really great extras. The film included in the DVD has the alternate ending, so you get to finally see that alien spaceship hovering above the graveyards, looking for that lost canister of slugs! The original theatrical ending is available separately on the DVD as a deleted scene. That’s the ending with the slug coming out of that dog’s mouth and flying at the audience. It’s got interviews with everyone, Tom Atkins, Jason Lively, Steve Marshall and Jill Whitlow. Its got extensive interviews with Fred Dekker the films director, you can see the guy really loved his film, and he really did put his all into  making it as awesome as he could. Don’t worry Mr. Dekker, your film rocks! I hope Dekker does finally get to make another film, and that he puts as much effort and cram it with cool stuff and love for the genre as he did with Night of the Creeps. Mr. Fred Dekker, this film connoisseur salutes you!

Rating: 4 out of  5

 

Two Evil Eyes (1991)

                         

Title: Two Evil Eyes (1991)

Directors: George Romero, Dario Argento

Cast: Harvey Keitel, Adrienne Barbeau, Tom Atkins

Review:

Two great horror masters Dario Argento and George Romero unite their creative efforts to create a homage to the stories of Edgar Allan Poe. Ive been a fan of both of these directors for some time now. When I found out that they worked together on this film I knew sooner or later it would have to form part of my DVD collection. I mean two of the greats! Romeros Dead Quadrilogy and his other fine films such as Martin, Monkey Shines and The Dark Half, among others have made him one of horrordoms most beloved directors, and his still working today. Still making zombie movies, a die hard horror director till the very end! His films are always infused with an air of rebellion to them. Things are not preatty in Romeros films...humans are often times the real enemy!

Dario Argento the grand guignol master of stylish Italian giallos. The man can orchestrate a murder sequence and make it look like a work of art. A director who doesnt let his camara shy away from a knife slashing the throat of its victim. We know him from his previous masterpieces Suspiria, Opera, Inferno, Deep Red and countless others wich he has made across the years. Not only a fine artiste but also a true lover of horror and the occult. Though I will have to admit, Argento's recent work has been on the dissapointing side. His true classics reside in his earlier work. I dont think any of Argento's recent work is of worthy of a "masterpiece" status like his older films. I am of the mind that his last great film came in 1987 with Opera. Still, I cant say Im completely informed. Ive yet to see more of the films he made in the 90's. But his most recent films like Mother of Tears was just cringe inducing.

What's great about a project like Two Evil Eyes is that it brought together these two legendary horror directors in one film. Both of them bring their own style and fashion in Two Evil Eyes, both of them have their moments to shine. Each of the two stories lasts about an hour each, so its almost like getting two movies in one. How can we go wrong with this one?

First of, we have George Romeros The Facts of the Case of M. Valdermar. In it Adrienne Barbeau and her lover hypnotize her old rich husband and make him sign over his fortune to them against his will. Then all they have to do is let him die and all the money goes to them. Problem is, this old man wont stay dead! A very cool story, its the kind of story that Romero loves to do. You mess with the dead, you die like the rest. He did it in Creepshow in which we get the story of a vengeful dead father who comes back for his "Fathers Day" cake Killing all his greedy sons and daughters who only care about the money he left them. And in the same movie we have two lovers who are drowned by the jealous husband only to have them come back from the dead to kill him. But what makes the zombie story in Two Evil Eyes interesting is the brilliant idea of adding the hypnosis angle to it.

I have to admit that Romeros half of Two Evil Eyes feels redundant at times. It has a "been there done that" feel to it. You defenetly feel like Romero is walking on familiar ground with this zombie/revenge story. If you have already seen most of Romero's zombie films, you'll feel like that. Still, the story does have a few twists that make it new enough for you not to loose interest. I loved how the zombie can talk "from beyond" and talk about what he is seeing on the other side. Really eerie moments there. The whole angle of hypnotism and the final effects of using it! Wow! What a scene! It was perfectly spooky at times....all leading to a really cool zombie filled conclusion.

The cast includes horror film regulars. We get Adrianne Barbeau who'd worked before with Argento on Creepshow. On this flick she plays a similar character, a selfish drunkard heartless bitch. Tom Atkins a horror film veteran (Night of the Creeps, The Fog, Halloween III to name a few) appears on this one once again, playing a (wait for it) cigar chomping detective! Tom Atkins is so type casted all the time it isnt even funny! They guy always plays a variation of a cigar chomping detective on practically every movie he is on!

The make up effects are great on both stories since they were handled by another master of disaster, the one and only Tom Savini. The zombie make up is excellent! I was also impressed with how much style Romero infused his short film with. Normally Romero doesnt concern himself with style. His main focus is to just tell the story with his camera. Yet on Two Evil Eyes, there are little shots here and there that I was really amazed with....specially towards the end. Romero using visual effects? Unheard off! Yet here they are and done in a perfectly eerie and subtle fashion. Maybe there was a little bit of healthy competition going on between Romero and Dario? Both trying to out do each other? Another positive aspect of this type of film. Because there are certain moments in Argento's half that were pretty shocking!

Dario's spooky tale The Black Cat, had all the things we come to expect from an Argento tale. The first shots in Dario's film show us of the gruesome remains of a Pendulum slicing a woman in half. You see in this film, Harvey Keitel is a photographer and he takes pictures of dead people at crime scenes. We meet him taking pictures of this gruesome site and you feel like you just walked into the middle of a movie you wished you had seen. I mean just the set alone with that huge Pendulum was awesome! And to top it all off in typical Argento style, he puts the camera on the Pendulum giving us a Pendulums eye view as it slashes back and forth on the dead body. Awesome shot! Right away I knew I was going to love this film.

Harvey Keitel always wants to get the most graphic and shocking images for this new book he is doing. So one day, after being particularly fed up with his girlfriends cat desides to kill the cat, and photograph it. Unfortunately, this isnt just any old cat. This is one of those magical vengeful black cats who wont go out without a fight.

Argento does his usual exploration of ancient myths and legends giving us a little insight as to why Black Cats are considered bad luck and why they burned witches in the past. I was like "this is just like Argento to teach us a little something before blowing our brains out with the gore!" And right I was! Theres plenty of gory goodies in this story once it gets going. It has little homages to many of Poes short stories like "The Pit and the Pendulum" "The Black Cat" and "The Cask of Amontillado". It seems like Argento is the most enamored with Poe of the two directors. Argentos short film is infused with all the style, gore and story that were used to get from Argento but in short controlled bursts. I like the fact that these two short films are fast paced due to the time constraint. It forced Argento to show us strictly what was needed to make the story move along and he doesnt play around with unnecesary plot lines like in some of his other Italian films. Here its just wham! Bam! Lets go! Not only that but we get a great performance from Keitel, very intense, very violent. The man is pure evil in this film!

There was only one thing I didnt like in Darios half. Theres this scene in wich a body is hanging from a rope and for some reason wich I cannot comprehend Dario decided to use reverse photography to make it look like the body was moving back and forth as it hanged. It just came off as sloppy or maybe even lazy filmmaking. But thats really the only negative thing I can say about this great flick.

As  you can see from most of my review I was greatly pleased with this film and cant recommend it enough to Romero/Argento lovers out there. It was a once in a life time type of deal and the fruits of their labor paid off. Great work guys! The extras on this special edition double disc DVD are really great! Theres a tour through Tom Savinis mask infested home with hundreads of masks and props from all the movies that he has worked on! Interviews with Argento, Romero and Asia. Great stuff. Worth the money.

Rating: 4 out of 5