The Blob (Remake)

Year: 1988
Director: Chuck Russell
Writer: Theodore Simpson, Kay Linaker
Genre: Horror: Sci-fi

The Blob has always seemed like something that just isn't appealing to me. Despite never seeing the original or any of either film, they both just seemed super cornball. I mean, come on, you've got a big glob of slime terrorizing a town. What is meant to be truly scary about that? It just seems too funny. Although there's nothing wrong with funny horror based on weird living/non-living entities I just wasn't ready to watch.

Grabbing The Blob I wasn't sure what version I had but popped it in and started watching. As it turned out it was the remake and while it was excellent it may have forever tainted my future opinion of the original. I say this because the remake is so fun and has great effects that the original may just seem completely dull in comparison, which is really too bad. I guess I'll find out when giving it a watch.

Anyway, The Blob is a great, goofy film. It starts out with a meteor crashing in the forest. Aliens don't pop out or anything, but instead we see some weird pink goo bubbling in the rock. A homeless man pokes at it, gets it stuck on his hand, and is rushed to the hospital by the lead teens. Everyone watching the movie knows how bad this is, but the film lets it build up for a little bit... making you wonder just when something will happen. Once it does, though, boy it lets it out.

Like I mentioned earlier, the effects are fantastic. They are so perfect and if there is another remake in the future they will probably be ruined with computer graphics. What we see from this late 80s film is pure artistic skill of putting skeletal people inside a pink blob, which is somewhat translucent. It's super effective to watch a face slide into the front of the blob, or see the remains of people terrorized by it.

As far as acting and storytelling goes it was well done too. It all helped progress the ridiculous story forward and get you into the world. The way the organism was depicted made it seem actually fearsome as well, instead of as just some funny-looking goo. I wouldn't say it was actually menacing, but there were parts that were slightly nerve-wracking. Overall, it was a tremendously enjoyable film.

A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors

Year: 1987

Director: Chuck Russell

Writer: Wes Craven, Bruce Wagner, Frank Darabont, Chuck Russell
Genre: Horror: Slasher

A Nightmare on Elm Street has been one of my favorite horror movies since I first saw it some years ago. Freddy is my favorite of the big three slasher characters and really is a "character". Despite my fondness for the first movie and A New Nightmare I really have not seen much of the huge series. I decided to change that today so I watched part 2 and 3. As it turned out, I'd already seen 2 but 3 was totally new to me.

Whereas 2 is really a big let down 3 was surprisingly incredible. It's fun. Something I always want to see more of is the power of Freddy's dreamscapes. Dreams don't make sense and are allowed to be as crazy as possible. In this movie it felt like the world was very dream-like. For example, there was this part where a character was attempting to run from Freddy. She ran and ran but her feet were practically in tar so she couldn't move. That's dream logic to the extreme and more movies need to make use of dreams for horror. 

The characters were all relatively likable and it was cool. The music was also memorable, if tremendously 80s. I don't think any of the other sequels I will watch will be nearly as good as this, but I can hope. 

By the way, a lot of parts of this movie were really unintentionally hilarious. From an attempt to seduce a young boy to a scene where Freddy attempts to literally eat a girl, I was laughing out loud when I wasn't supposed to. The acting wasn't necessarily off, but it was a very unusual story with strange effects. The giant girl-eating Freddy head especially was weird as hell. If nothing else, I'll probably remember that part for a good long time.