The Blob

R 6.6
1988 1 hr 35 min Horror , Science Fiction , Mystery

In Arborville, California, three high school students try to protect their hometown from a gelatinous alien life form that engulfs everything it touches. The first to discover the substance and live to tell about it, the trio witness the Blob destroying an elderly man, then it growing to a terrifying size. But no one else has seen the goo, and the police refuse to believe the kids without proof.

  • Cast:
    Shawnee Smith , Kevin Dillon , Donovan Leitch , Jeffrey DeMunn , Candy Clark , Joe Seneca , Del Close

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Reviews

Phonearl
1988/08/05

Good start, but then it gets ruined

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Senteur
1988/08/06

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

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Jonah Abbott
1988/08/07

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

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Brenda
1988/08/08

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

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jadavix
1988/08/09

The blob is a viscid, amorphous creature, which looks like a huge jellyfish. It comes to Earth in the shell of a fallen meteorite, where it immediately dispatches the vagrant who discovers it, and then works through the usual hierarchy of horror movie casualties: sex mad teens, cynical working stiffs, and finally, shady government bureaucrats.The film is a remake of the '58 Steve McQueen vehicle, but, as I'm sure I don't have to tell you, this version's Kevin Dillon is no Steve McQueen. His mullet does steal the show, but he's an obnoxious screen presence; perhaps all too convincing as a moronic delinquent teenager.This remake also came after Watergate, meaning that the government types are maybe the real bad guys; at least, they would be in a better movie, which would have developed these guys to people you hate. Here, they're just callous a-holes.There's also a particularly creepy, unpleasant child actor, who I feel I must have seen in other '80s flicks; or perhaps there were just a bunch of child actors around in the '80s who looked and acted that way, or a lot of roles that required them.The movie also has a cameo from Jack Nance, but this is not a movie you watch for the actors. It's a creature feature, and after all this time, the effects are still really impressive, making "The Blob" a great schlock fest, even if its story and characters aren't up to much.

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Foreverisacastironmess
1988/08/10

Now here's one rather unsung 80's classic that's quite dear to my heart, I had an absolute blast watching it many times as a kid, it was such a scary thrill ride, and I still feel pretty much the same these days. I think it's miles from being something that could be considered campy or a B-movie it's very slickly directed, I love this movie. It's such a solid little entertainer, I always find it so easy to get into. I like the spooky intro sequence that shows what appears to be a ghost town, foreshadowing how it nearly does end up, until you find out that everyone's at a football game. I love the small town atmosphere, I think that comes across really well. It has something of the feel of a 50's sci-fi film with more modern sensibilities and humour. And the 80's twist on the nature of the Blob is cool and really works, making it a government experiment in germ warfare gone out of control instead of an alien. For me it's the only version of the Blob worth a damn and I find it genuinely scary. The excellent tag-line "Terror has no shape" does have meaning to it, there is something extra nightmarish about a faceless gelatinous force that can get anywhere, sneak up on you, and that indiscriminately and ravenously swallows up any unfortunates it comes across and melts them down like acid to component matter that becomes more of its mass. It gets redder and redder throughout the movie as it grows larger and more powerful until it has all the townfolk trapped. The fantastic practical special effects are probably the real standout showpiece of this picture. It has a high kill rate, and the often surprising and brutal death scenes are stunning. It's a very ruthless horror movie, characters who you don't expect to, die horribly. Like the handsome guy who seems like he's going to be the hero until the Blob gets the drop on him in a creepy hospital, or a friendly waitress who's crushing death inside a phone box is a scene of abject terror, a good sheriff who's death is offscreen, and an honest-to-god kid! It even spits him back out for a second so you can admire the half-melted handiwork! The other ones that I can't resist mentioning is the scene that takes the sex equals death rule to the next level as well as to me feeling like a bit of a homage to John Carpenter's The Thing as the Blob explodes out of the sleeping girl as the guy feels her up, the cook who's forced down a tiny drain hole head-first, and also the poor goofy-looking f**k with the yoyo who ends up a wailing freakish horror stuck to the ceiling and the whole awesome theatre attack sequence that soon follows. Perhaps the Blob whipped up that loudmouth guy because it was just trying to watch the movie? These are the kind of special effects sequences that are very memorable, and I love that! They take a lot of everyday places and things and effectively make them disturbing. I love Shawnee Smith in this, who doesn't? She's so cool and natural as the cheerleader who loses her jock, saves the no-good local punk and the whole town! The chemistry between her and Kevin Dillon was terrific and you genuinely bought them as unlikely heroes. This movie is fantastic, it embodies a great deal of what I personally find endearing about 80's monster horror. It proves that you don't need a massive budget to make effective sci-fi horror. You just need a solid script, a cast with good chemistry, some ingenuity, and you can take a little and make it into a lot. Thank you kindly Blob, you engulfed and absorbed me with your charm!

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cls0680
1988/08/11

In a time when so many "horror" films had no story, no point, bad acting, and the same rehashed "slasher" villains AND rehashed party teen victims, The Blob was definitely a stand out GOOD horror movie.I'll be honest, I've never seen the old original, so I have no clue how similar or not they are. But I can compare them to similar movies of the 80's and this one is much smarter. There is an intriguing story to it, some decent acting, a couple of well-timed funny moments, thought-out characters, and the "gore" level mixed in with simple tasks we all do and take for granted make it a pretty fun watch. I never stick my hand in a sink drain without thinking of this movie! For the time, the effects were also not too bad. Some bad green screen here and there and a couple of wacky things that were probably scary at the time, but for the most part they were believable and scary, and definitely gross.The ending - or the finale anyway - is the worst part. I never really swallowed the solution as believable. Not the idea of the solution, but the execution of it.As far as 80's horror films go, this one is one to see.

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GL84
1988/08/12

Following a rash of mysterious deaths in a small Midwestern town, a local teen finds it to be done by a killer amorphous blob that grows bigger with each body dissolved into it and forces him and his friends to try to find a way to stop it before it gets out of hand. Overall this was an outrageously fun remake that really has a lot going for it and is a lot more enjoyable than expected. One of the better parts here is the ton of high quality special effects on-board, which is quite well removed from the original an serves as this one's biggest influencing factor. With a large portion of that coming mainly from the slimy creature and it's constantly changing appearance, there's some really creepy work done here to make the different incarnations of the creature, going from formless blob and distorted, mechanized mass it eventually turns into as this is quite an impressive creature. Much as that works, this one has a lot of great stuff that gives it a cheesy, enjoyable quality on the special effects front, mainly because of the increased screen-time here for the creature so not only is there more action scenes but they're also highly energetic and enjoyable. The attack on the clinic is a prime example as it just winds through the personnel with a great sense of fun and action as the race to get up from the bed in order to get out before the creature gets to the dissolving victims that generates a lot because of the gory wounds and scars. Due to the how it plays out, that continues on into the finale that really plays up a rather healthy amount of excitement due to the course of the action scenes of the creature's attacks on the different defensive groups in the sewers before the utter fun of the big shootout at the end to really get a lot out of this so there's a lot of impressive elements at work throughout the film. Overall, these are more than enough to hold off the few small flaws here. While providing the film with a lot of great action scenes, the introduction of the biohazard team in the last half doesn't really do much and seems to feel tacked on merely for an added body count since they're not mentioned before then just get dropped into the film without a lot of cleverness to the story. That lack of regard for cohesiveness is what makes their overall purpose hinder the film a tad, and it never really gives a solid explanation for the purpose behind their experimentation either as for how it got loose to begin with. Likewise, the fact that there's a few too many similarities both in terms of storyline and even wholesale sequences that come straight from the original could be a bit problematic for some with this one due to those factors. Overall, though, this one is a lot of fun and has plenty to like about it.Rated R: Graphic Language and Graphic Violence.

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