GREMLINS (1984)
In this movie Randall Peltzer is a traveling inventor trying to get his gizmo’s and gadgets sold around the world. Realizing he’s forgot to get his son a Christmas present, he stops by a mysterious store in Chinatown and ends up buying a cute small creature called a “Mogwai”. Apparently the name was so catchy that a Scottish post-rock band decided to name their band that. They named the creature “Gizmo” (voiced by Howie Mandel) and Randall relays 3 special rules about the creature to his son. No bright light, no water (you can’t get him wet, so maybe he cleans himself like a cat?) and 3, you can’t feed him after midnight. That last rule is a really good one for me too, in case anyone reading this kidnaps me. It doesn’t take long before a few of the rules are broken and what eventually comes out are these hideous gremlins. They kind of look like cracked out green horny toads with longer arms and bat ears. Can our heroes and “Gizmo” save the day, or will the world be taken over by movie loving murderous
Side note, in TWILIGHT ZONE THE MOVIE, a gremlin destroys a plane’s engine in one of the stories. Only the gremlin in the movie was larger and more humanoid looking. The gremlins in GREMLINS are smaller monsters maybe up to your knee. This movie is directed by Joe Dante who actually directed one of the stories in TWILIGHT ZONE THE MOVIE and THE HOWLING among others. The movies lead Billy Peltzer (played by Zach Galligan) is perfect for his role, but I didn’t find Phoebe Cates as good in her role as Kate Beringer as I did say Susan Ursitti as “Boof” in TEEN WOLF. It’s not on Phoebe, but the character is given more “drama” lines than I needed in a horror comedy.
As a kid this movie was just amazing. The effects, the storyline, Gizmo himself was just awesome. However, at some point I kind of realized that I liked CRITTERS better because they didn’t get outrageously goofy with the creatures dressing up. As if there is a gremlin tailor somewhere just belting these outfits out for belch and a hard pat on the back. For a lot of movies I grew up with, the nostalgia stuck, and I still love them just as much if not more now. GREMLINS was one of them only not as much as others. I own it, but I may have watched it twice since I bought it. This is not to say it wasn’t movie making magic and a great movie to open up in 1984 on the same freakin day as GHOSTBUSTERS did.
Overall for originality I have to give GREMLINS a solid 6 out of 7. It almost got a 7 out of 7 for the Corey Feldman and Dick Miller sightings.
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