Blob, The (1988)

Rating: ***/*****, or 7/10

This remake of the 1958 original film is less of a mixed bag genre wise and more of a straightforward horror film: the abundance of gore makes it clear it has no pretensions to be anything else. An gelatinous alien organism lands on Earth in a small American town and starts devouring its inhabitants, quickly increasing in mass until little escape seems possible for the remaining survivors, who also find themselves confronted with a secret government agency intent on capturing the life form for its own shady purposes. Several teenagers must try to evade both these sinister agents and the hungry entity itself to stay alive, in the classic eighties horror tradition. If you can stand the goriness of people being consumed alive, you might find this a fun though otherwise unremarkable decent horror flick. However, the typical love triangle between teenagers present in this film can cause some irritation. At least you won't end up with a very annoying theme song stuck in your head as you would have in 1958.

Starring: Kevin Dillon, Shawnee Smith, Donovan Leitch

Directed by Chuck Russell

USA: TriStar Pictures, 1988