Slugs (1988) d. Simon, J.P. (Spain) Simon, the maestro behind the gut-busting splatter flick Pieces, delivers another heaping helping of the red sauce, this time with toxic waste-fed gastropods doing the honors. While the line readings and WTF moments are not as abundantly plentiful, there’s enough head-shaking banana boat wackiness to keep guts chuckling and gruesome sequences to keep lunches buckling.
When several members of a quiet upstate NY community start turning up munchified, it’s up to public health inspector Michael Garfield (as a character named – snicker – Mike Brady) and his public works buddy Philip MacHale to save the day. The freewheeling and illogical means by which they manage this are questionable, but whenever Simon serves up the supremely slimy slithery screeching showstoppers, you probably won’t care much. Ah, Spain in the 80s, when you could have no-name no-talents doff their duds and roll around on the gore floor with about a zillion slugs, no questions asked. For the record, slugs were most definitely harmed during the making of this movie. But, hey, they’re slugs.
Juan Piquer Simon has blessed crap cinema with some of the most wacky,repulsive splatter flicks of the 80's. The shapely butt-naked chick who slips on the mollusk-covered bedroom floor and winds up writhing with the slime monsters is a standout, she had awesome buttocks!
ReplyDeleteHey Tony! Definitely agreed on both counts. I don't think there's any red-blooded horror fan who can argue with either of those statements.
DeleteA Spanish adaption of Shaun Hutson's lurid bestseller about a small town's garden slugs mutated into hordes of giant monsters in the sewers, the film retains the basic premise and set pieces of the novel except changing the slugs to toxic waste infected killers.Also in the book if you ingested their slime it gave the host a form of rabies that caused them to act like biting maniacs, what are thoughts on the nude girl the repulsive gastropods feast upon?
ReplyDeleteThanks for the solid intel! I haven't read the book (yet), but sounds like it's a winner. Really, I have nothing but applause - on multiple levels - for the young lady brave enough to doff her duds and roll amongst the slimy ones. Brave gal, and not too hard on the eyes as well. Wouldn't kick her out of bed...but she'd have to take a shower first. ;-]
DeleteThis was a wacky, absurdly gory "insects wrecking havoc" import from Spain headlined by a cast that was a mixture of Spanish/American "actors".The concept of slugs genetically altered into carnivorous flesh-eaters may be too hokey for non-horror/genre fans,I loved every second of it.Two outrageously gross scenes stood out in Slugs:The Movie-the bit where a restaurant patron's eyes explode in a shower of parasitic worms that live in the slugs bloodstream, and the bit involving the nude woman that becomes slug chow in the slime ridden bedroom carnage sequence, some of those icky slugs stuck to the sexual parts of her anatomy.
ReplyDeleteI love that so many people are keen on this flick! My favorite viewing was in early 2012, watching it with a big group of folks at Oshkosh Horror's monthly House of Horrors. People were freaking OUT at the restaurant scene you mention above. GENIUS.
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