Product: The Blob (1988)
Rating: 5.0
The Costs of Prodding Meteorites With Sticks
When hearing people swear by the classics of horror while giving newer "remakes" the cold shoulder by proclaiming the inferiority of their posturing almost immediately, I oftentimes find myself wondering if they actually watch the movies they make such broad generalizations about before commenting on them. I say this because a movie in the "reissue phase" of livelihood will oftentimes find itself with a facelift that will make it a totally different piece for its predecessor, wearing not only a newer cast and script changes but also a new budget and effects to do the idea justice. This, in turn, opens something outdated to an audience that would be turned off to a colorless feature offering inside jokes to a generation they don't understand, granting them insight to ideas that would otherwise find themselves lost and that might help turn a viewer on to the idea of seeing a classical rendition of something because of a remade influence.Such is the case in this reissuance of The Blob; a movie that keeps the namesake of something from an earlier era in film when graphic depictions of the horrific and the monstrous themes that empower the needy mind weren't actual allowed - without adopting its stance. In fact, I found it particularly chilling in some instances as bodies were dissolved inside that reddish-hued monstrosity and as some people met their fates in terrible fashions; an idea that slips well beyond the realm of the campy original and into the glamorous world of the terrible. In it, some people find themselves folded, some crushed beneath waves of gel, and others seem to take the Nestea Plunge into waters hungry with acidic undertones and appetites that make special effects fun. To me, that is what makes this film stand apart from its former titlebearer.The premise of the movie involves a meteorite falling in the woods and someone being around to see it. Drunk and clearly ignorant of the dangers that all movie meteorites keep in their possession, our "patient zero" opts to prod at it with a stick until something comes oozing out. Further deciding that a stick would be the best offense to feed curiosity, he finds himself manacled in the lovely embrace of something horrifyingly delicious. Enter the town's local badboy, his need to play and subsequently wreck his motorcycle throwing him directly into contact with this drunken miser and with his attempts to remedy the invasive organism's attempt to claim his hand by trying to hack it off; a plan that doesn't hold much in the way of reasoning. This leads to a run toward a nearby road, the introduction of two more of a vast array of characters, and the carting of our friendly organism to the feeding ground called civilization. That's when the real fun and subsequent government intervention begins.For anyone that likes movies with the dying always in earshot of their otherworldly hero (or menace, if that's how you see it), a storyline that can make one laugh at its bumbling and at its surprise ending, and that is saturated in gruesome spectacles, then this edition of The Blob is for you. It will not disappoint.