Wow! Such a good movie.
... View MoreThis is How Movies Should Be Made
... View MoreI didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.
... View MoreThis movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows
... View MoreThe premise behind Slugs sounds ultra cheesy - mutated killer slugs. But it actually turns out to be quite fun and better than any regular "nature-run-amock" horror flick. I was expecting another god awful cheesy, campy bug movie along the lines of Ticks or Skeeter. In other words, I didn't expect anything good at all, who would ever be scared of a slug? I mean, it is one of the slowest creatures in the world after all!. Imagine my surprise then, when I found that not only is this movie not that bad, but.... it is actually pretty damn entertaining and good! Actually, the best word to describe Slugs is FUN! Sure, it's pretty damn cheesy and the general idea is pretty laughable, but with the delivery, Slugs actually turned into a decent little horror movie. Not only that, but it does even manage to...ahem, get under your skin a bit. Plus, for those gore hounds out there, there's a ton of that as well.This is a very highly rated horror from the 80's, a fantastic movie with a well paced out plot and a great budget for effects, a good cast and an erratic tension building soundtrack, you wouldn't think slugs could be scary but they are now, only in the 80's could they get away with a creature feature like this, its chock full of amazing effects, plenty of marvelous stand out bloody gore moments throughout, if you're big on 80's horror then this is a must have!Overall rating: 7 out of 10.
... View MoreHere's an example of that rarity, an enjoyable late '80s horror film. This is B-grade film-making at its finest, with a derivative monster movie script which harks back to the late-night classics of the 1950s but with lots of added gore and general gruesomeness to shock and disgust modern, jaded audiences in equal measure. Of course, the film is easy to watch because it strikes the right balance between being campy and serious, and I guess it's impossible to make a totally serious film when killer slugs are your main ingredient.I quite liked the depiction of small town suburban America in this movie. Ironic, as it was actually made in Spain with a half-Spanish cast. The characters are developed before being messily dispatched and despite lots of trite dialogue, you end up caring for the people involved. Another thing to enjoy is the old-fashioned over-the-top score which really dramatises the slug attacks, and almost makes them believable. There's an almost palpable sense of impending danger at the film's climax as our two have-a-go heroes attempt to dispel the threat by literally blowing up the town's sewer system with a chemical concoction.Spanish director Juan Piquer Simon's direction is always interesting and keeps the action moving at a fast speed, making this a fun film to sit through. Right from the beginning as the mystery thickens there is no slowness in the build-up of the tale as with similar monster flicks, it's entertaining and watchable right from the start. The acting is generally good with some memorable characters popping up (the weird British scientist, the crazy mayor) and strong performances from the two leading guys.Another thing I loved was the excessive, gratuitously slimy slug attacks which really go over the top. In one scene a gardener finds a slug inside his glove and is forced to lop off his hand with a hatchet before his greenhouse explodes! It has to be seen to be believed. The film's most infamous moment sees a loving naked couple get bloodily dispatched by rampaging slugs which invade their bedroom and isn't for the squeamish. Other highlights include lots of shots of writhing, fat, slimy slugs, plenty of mutilated bloody corpses and a disgusting highlight of a man's head bursting apart and loads of parasitic worms flying from the eye sockets.It may be silly and sometimes juvenile but when it comes to the slug attacks the film delivers what you could hope from the title. Obviously a suspension of disbelief is required, i.e. in scenes of slugs dragging away the corpses to their lair. Imagine the kind of power these creatures would need to be able to drag a body mass hundreds of times larger than their own and the dynamics of such an operation and you'll realise just how untrue it is. However, in all SLUGS: THE MOVIE is just about all a fan could hope and expect from a B-grade horror film about killer slugs and therefore it gets a thumb up from me.
... View MoreJuan Piquer Simon is a director who doesn't have much to brag about. The majority of his films have been relatively bad and show no true sense of authenticity. Yet for a movie like this, even though it still isn't a great movie, it seems like a little more time and care went into producing it.Based on a novel with the same name by Shaun Hutson, Slugs is about a breed of killer gastropods that acquire an appetite for human flesh. Those are the main characters here. The actors that play their parts are OK but they are nothing to be remembered by. This movie has almost the same characteristic as Fright Night but nowhere as entertaining. The lead role belongs to a town man who suspects that there is a specific reason to why people are being killed in such horrific manners, and nobody believes him.The acting isn't that good either. Yes they act, but there are times where it's weird and doesn't sound normal to say. There are two parts to the death scenes. One part is good, and the other, improbable. The improbable part is that many times during death scenes victims will struggle and won't be able to resist the power of the slug. People get dragged away, while others get pulled down; are the slugs really that strong? I doubt it. These slugs are supposed to be supernatural so they have to have some other mutation besides teeth.The good part to the death scenes is that there is plenty of blood. No doubt will gore hounds get their fill. And although the scenes are predictable, it's still good to watch. What surprised me the most was the volume of slugs that were used for the movie. And it's not like they were prop slugs either. This was live footage of hoards of slugs! Some of these scenes were inside houses too; could you image the mess that had to be cleaned up afterward? I'm sure people are fine with cleaning up fake blood, but real slug ooze? Not sure.The sound that was added to the slugs was a nice addition too. Much of it sounds thick and gooey, just how slugs should sound! The sound and special effects department must've worked hard for this because this was the strong element of the film. And that's good too because after all, this is a horror flick! Tim Souster, the composer of the music, had a good feel for what he was doing too. It actually retained some pitch from what used to be 1950's horror movies with its constant base line of brass and screaming string instruments. Not really effective in creating fear, but nostalgic to say the least.This is one of the very few films that director Simon did with a little more effort. The dialog is weird but the sheer magnitude of live slugs that were used should grab the viewer's attention quite nicely.
... View MoreKiller slugs on the rampage in a rural community.Believe it or not, the story behind the screenplay started as a book. In the original novel, the titular slugs were not caused by radiation or any such thing, but actually on author Shaun Hutson's knowledge that there were three species of carnivorous slugs. (The book's success apparently was enough to get the author the gig to write "The Terminator" novelization.)If you love the late J. P. Simon's "Pieces" (a true cult classic if ever there was one), you may also love "Slugs". It has some of the same great things going for it: incredible special effects on the gore, a great 1980s mentality and some of the worst dialogue ever to hit a screen near you (which may be due to the fact that the actors are not proficient in English).The film is best enjoyed by taking it as not seriously as possible. I mean, thousands of slugs that come and go in unison, eat people and apparently have the ability to plan ahead? Not very plausible. A high school teacher who has his own lab for experiments? Not likely.But I personally love this movie. I think it is so unbelievable that it is just perfect for a good film with friends, some Tootsie Rolls and a soda. And if you have the legendary horror historian Jon Kitley lurking around making slug-shaped chocolates, that just tops it off. This Spanish film made in America featuring Italian actors is a must-see.The Arrow Video Blu-ray is jam-packed. We have audio commentaries with "Slugs" author Shaun Hutson and filmmaker Chris Alexander. The Hutson commentary is interesting in that he never actually met any of the film's producers, actors or director, so the focus there is much more on horror literature. There are also new interviews with actor Emilio Linder, special effects artist Carlo DeMarchis, art director Gonzalo Gonzalo and production manager Larry Ann Evans. The last one, with Evans, is really very insightful and tells you more stories about the making of the film than you're likely to hear anywhere else.
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