The Blob (1988) - Slick and Slimy Practical Effects From the 80s (2024)

2 месяца назад

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The Blob (1988) - Slick and Slimy Practical Effects From the 80sToday we’re going to talk about Chuck Russell’s 1988 remake of The Blob. After a meteor crashes in the woods of a small little town, a strange goo attaches itself to a homeless man and he’s taken to the hospital by highschoolers… who conveniently hit him with their car. When it’s been revealed that the old man’s body has been mysteriously melted, the police are now on high alert for an unknown killer. Will the teens be able to survive the ever morphing monster with their beautiful hair intact? Will a military presence in a movie ever be friendly? And finally… is this what gum looks like while I’m chewing it in my mouth…? The Blob has a really sharp script that swiftly moves the plot forward with character building before hitting you with a horrific encounter from the titular creature. Scenes with dialogue feel like they naturally run their course and we’re given just the right amount of time to get to know the protagonists. The movie also keeps you on edge because you’re never really sure who’s going to live and who’s going to get absorbed. Main and secondary characters are all literally… up for grabs. I remember being surprised when I first saw this because it didn’t follow the normal horror movie tropes and people I actually liked were suddenly getting killed off. There are also lots of fun little details written throughout the film that seem like throwaway lines at first but cleverly come back later for life threatening situations or simple moments of comedy. Fun fact, when I saw this movie as a kid I didn’t know what a ribbed condom was. I thought it had something to do with food… like maybe it was a barbecued flavored condom. The thing that stands out most from this film is definitely the special effects and you can see how most of the budget was spent on it. The practical effects look wickedly horrific as we learn that the blob is able to burn and decompose its prey while completing engulfing them with its body. A very clever way they showed the progress of the blob dissolving its victims was to use reaction shots to break up two different phases of the effect.Here, we can see that they had the actor underneath a slime like coating to get a genuine reaction from the actress. After witnessing her scream and struggles, we then cut back to the next stage of effect which now excludes the actor, so the team can further break down his body and increase the shock value.When Shawnee Smiths pulls off the arms of the character she’s trying to save, it’s disgusting….but very inventive touch. The movie also ends with us a catastrophic climax as we get a ridiculously oversized blob wreaking havoc on the military and townspeople. We’re treated to many fun shots of people frantically running for their lives and the military also unsuccessfully using their weapons to try and keep the monster away. Since I mentioned the scene earlier, Shawnee Smith’s character surviving after trying to save her fellow classmate from the blob, doesn’t really work for me.Once she falls back from pulling off the character’s arms, she suddenly passes out and wakes up in the care of her parents. You could argue that the blob needed time to digest its recent victim but it’s a little too convenient that it didn’t just kill her right there because she was such an easy target…Sometimes we get wide shots where we need to fully see the blob in the same frame as the actors, and it’s obvious that they needed to blue screen the 2 elements together. It looks like they were using some sort of large puppet or stop motion animation and it’s not always that convincing. I can’t exactly fault this because these are the limitation of the time period, but if you have a keen eye, you’ll definitely notice it.On the positive side though, the filmmakers were probably aware of this so you never linger on these shots for too long and it’s never distracting from the scene.This is typical of any genre but once the military and scientists get involved, you pretty much know their intentions and how they’ll probably go up against the main characters.The armed forces tend to act as resistance in these types of films so there’s more of a sense of deja vu than relief when they first appear. Their presence definitely adds addition bodies for the blob to absorb but I think it would have been more interesting to have the entire town ban together and try and contain the creature themselves.Thankfully in order to add some human elements to that group, the script does have some scientists weary of certain decisions and actually question orders from their superiors. Practical effects aficionados will definitely love all the slick and slimy kills that Tony Gardner and Lyle Conway have come up with. Horror fans will also appreciate that Shawnee Smith’s character Meg isn’t just a simple damsel in distress.