Let's Blow This Pop Stand

Fred Dekker might have been hurt career-wise by his two films' lack of box office success, but sometimes, as John Carpenter can attest, the future can often be more kind than the audience of a particular release date. As we know now of "The Monster Squad", Dekker's output, as minuscule as it is, the two middle 80s films, have since their time developed favorable statuses. Asking me to choose between the two is difficult but "The Monster Squad" (1987) slightly edges out "Night of the Creeps" (1986). That's not to say "Night of the Creeps" isn't a delight I appreciate from a favored era of my youth and well watched sci-fi/horror through the late 80s and early 90s. Most of that is Atkins, of course, as a grizzled cop with a traumatic past, having walked up on an old flame being hacked to death by a lunatic from a mental institution. Later admitting to Lively's Chris he hunted down and shotgunned the escaped nutcase, the film cleverly and morbidly has an outstanding setpiece where the rotted skeletal corpse of said ax killer breaks through the floor of a sorority housemother's  home and gives her a direct headshot split. Hunting down the skeletal walking corpse, the police shoot into him with a shotgun blast from Atkins to the head doing the work that frees alien slugs from outer space. The plot is wonderfully absurd. Slugs from outer space with Dekker including a nice homage in B&W 50s before taking us into 1986 where the young letterman jacket youth from 1956 is freed by Lively and Marshall because they were tasked by asshole Kayser (I know him as Bubba from "Mama's Family") to steal a corpse from a lab and leave it at a rival frat's front door. There is a tragic fate for Marshall, needing crutches for both arms to walk, in a restroom, later leaving a tape for Lively (one of many Rusty Griswolds) explaining how the alien slug invades the brain and harvests eggs). Lively as a good-hearted college student eyeing cute, gentle-voiced Whitlow, is a very likeable hero. Seeing Lively packing a shotgun and Whitlow firing off a flamethrower at a buscrash pack of frat zombies in tuxedos and letterman jackets is just quite a hoot. Especially fun is Atkins in a trenchcoat, glass of whiskey, and crumpled pack of cigarettes, seemingly always a bit intimidating, cranky, and ready to blast his firearm at zombies. And I noticed that the pacing was just spot on and the running time is a perfect brisk 85 minutes. Dekker knew exactly what kind of film he was making and I think as far a B-movie revivals go, the 80s had some real good ones, and I think "Night of the Creeps" is great. Slugs are, however, a creature often used in the horror genre but turning corpses into walking zombies is at least a different story arc for how the dead can walk. So the film does the now overwrought but at the time amusing tribute to horror directors and icons with many name drops for universities, roads, and last names for characters with the likes of Cronenberg, Corman, Romero, Carpenter, Hooper, and Landis among others. The special make up effects and gore varies from very impressive to mediocre but some of the zombies and headshots with exploding slugs are nasty and icky in the best way possible.

In my user comments, I mentioned a DVD release, but it has since gotten a great special edition one. I caught this viewing from TCM Underground, however. I haven't seen the special features unfortunately. I was surprised to see Whitlow had a nude scene, brief breasts shot which I would never have anticipated considering she is essentially the lead heroine and very much a final girl archetype.