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, they disappear, they cease to exist. This usually happens with really cheap sci-fi/horror movies that big studios figure nobody cares about, sometimes, its films that were such box office bombs that the studio simply wants to forget about ‘em. Sometimes the public claims for these long lost movies and they re-emerge thanks to the good will of a company who gives a crap about these old gems. Companies like Anchor Bay and Blue Underground thrive on pleasing horror/sci-fi fans by releasing these films on DVD. Even with companies such as the ones I just mentioned releasing old favorites to DVD, Night of the Creeps was nowhere to be seen. Finally, somebody heard the audience’s cries (thanks Sony!) and released this long awaited gem from the 80s on DVD!

Storyline on this film is a complete homage to science fiction and horror films from all eras. To me this movie is as much a homage to 50s science fiction films as it is a homage to zombie movies from the 80s. But what you need to know is this: a meteor containing a deadly alien life form has just crashed 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! The alien slugs escape his body and spread all through out college campus! Will Detective Cameron find a way to stop the alien slugs before they spread out all over the university and eat every football jock and cheerleader on campus?

I never got why audiences didn’t connect with this movie. It has all the right elements to be a hit in theaters yet it really didn’t become a hit at all, it died a quick and quiet death in theaters. Many of the crew and cast agree, the film just wasn’t marketed properly. The studio didn’t know who to sell it too. 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). But there’s one thing all these fine movies have in common: maybe Hollywood didn’t know how to sell ‘em to us upon their original release, but we found the movie on our own and made it our own!



Night of the Creeps is a film that everyone always wanted to have on their horror/sci-fi collections right next to Monster Squad and all those seasons of Tales from the Crypt. It’s a film that every fan always spoke about as “damn, that film has not surfaced on DVD yet!” And the demand for this film is not without merit. I recently had the pleasure of re-watching this fun gem of horror/sci-fi thanks to the new DVD that was just released (finally!) by the folks over at Sony Pictures, and honestly, the film is still a fun thrill ride from beginning to end.

What I love about this film is that it has so many cool things going for it. So 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 alien, yup, you read that right! 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 50s horror film with the couple sitting on their car, looking at the stars when suddenly a meteorite falls from the heavens! Suddenly it goes into The Blob territory! But then it skips and goes to the 80s, following a pair of horny teenagers looking to get some action. Then it turns into that classic 80s 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 an 80s zombie flick along the lines of Return of the Living Dead (1985). But wait, its also a mystery, and we follow a detective slowly uncovering everything! Hell, we even have psychotic murderers on the loose! On top of this, we’re on a college campus with cheerleaders and football jocks running around drunk and looking for their next hot date. So the movie is entertaining, mixing lots of 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 be stupid or he’ll tell it to your face! His character has so many quotable one liners 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). On this one he plays the nerdy guy who’s scared of life, but soon learns you gotta let go of that fear and take matters into your own hands! Steve Marshall is the wise ass handicapped best friend. And Jill Whitlows 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 get the hell out. This movie isn’t for you. But if you love monsters, aliens, zombies, cool make up effects, flame throwers, exploding heads, sorority babes getting undressed, zombie dogs, zombie boyfriends, slugs, cemeteries, and corpses sleeping in cryogenic laboratories, then look no further, this movie is for you! 

The DVD has some cool 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 it to make it as awesome as he could. Don’t worry Mr. Dekker, we can assure you, this 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 as he did with Night of the Creeps. Long live the Creeps!

Rating: 4 out of  5