Genre Grandeur – Gremlins (1984) – Encore Review 2 – MovieRob

For this month’s next review for Genre Grandeur – Alternative Christmas movies here’s a review of Gremlins (1984) by me.

Thanks again to Chris ‘Tank’ Tanski of Fright Rags for choosing this month’s genre.

Next month’s genre has been chosen by Lisa Leehey of Critical Critics and we will be reviewing our favorite Unreliable Narrator Movies.

Please get me your submissions by the 25th of Jan by sending them to unreliableLisa@movierob.net

Try to think out of the box! Great choice Lisa!

Let’s see what I thought of this movie:

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“Uh oh.” – Gizmo

Number of Times Seen – Too many to count (theater in 1984, cable, video, DVD, 24 Feb 2002, 28 Oct 2013, 9 Sep 2019 and 29 Dec 2020)

Link to original review – Here and Here

Brief Synopsis – A struggling inventor buys a strange gift for his son that has three important rules to follow, which if not heeded to could cause catastrophic results.

My Take on it – This is a film that I have loved ever since I first saw it in the theater as a 10 year old.

This is such a fun film due to the fact that the story is presented as a mix of comedy and horror aspects.

The cast of the film work really well in making things more believable.

Zach Galligan and Phoebe Cates help keep the story enjoyable.

Hoyt Axton is superb as the struggling inventor who still has so much faith in his inventions despite nothing ever seeming to work properly.

The true stars of this film tho are the creatures, especially Gizmo who is so cute a cuddly throughout.

They do a wonderful job of showing how such a creature could turn into something so monstrous.

This is part of the message of the film about how each of us has some evil within us and we must do our best to follow simple rules in order to keep them at bay.

They do a wonderful job filling this film with holiday spirit which shines through from start to finish.

The effects are superbly done and help make both the Mogwais and the Gremlins come across so realistically.

Bottom Line – Really fun film that works so well due to the comedy/horror mix. The cast is great with Galligan and Cates helping to keep things so enjoyable. Axton is superbly cast as the struggling inventor who still has so much faith in all of his concoctions even when they fail miserably. The way that such a small and cuddly creature could transform into something so menacing is done so well here. The special effects are superb and allow us to really believe that these creatures could possibly exist. The film’s tone is perfectly set and that helps keep things so entertaining to watch unfold. The way that this film is filled with the holiday spirit works really well. The message of the film abut how we all have some evil within us is shown really well with the way that Gremlins can be spawned form the cute and cuddly Mogwais. Highly Recommended!

MovieRob’s Favorite Trivia – The Santa speech proved to be controversial and studio executives insisted upon its removal because they felt it was too ambiguous as to whether it was supposed to be funny or sad. Director Joe Dante however stubbornly refused to take the scene out saying it represented this movie as a whole, which had a combination of horrific and comedic elements. Executive producer Steven Spielberg did not like the scene, but despite his creative control, he viewed this movie as Dante’s project and allowed him to leave it in. (From IMDB)

Rating – Oscar Worthy (9/10) (upgrade from original review)

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