So I've had this stuck in my head all day. It's the theme to Terror Vision - listen at your own risk. I think one of my personal golden ages of cinema could be bookended by the times it was okay to have a theme song proper for your movie. Not just a "Footloose" where you share a title and that's it, but song that tonally matches what happens and maybe even explicitly spells out the plot of the movie in the lyrics. Almost always cheesy and always fun.
"Terror Vision" the song is a bit catchy, a bit funny, a bit annoying - which sums up my feelings for the movie. It looked really good and had some intentionally funny moments. Unfortunately, it's attempts to apparently "out-camp" any and all other recorded motion pictures made it ultimately more annoying to me than anything else.
The Putterman's are amped-up versions of your average American mid-80's family. You've got the trying-to-be-hip-but still embarrassing parents (dad still in his 70's open shirt and gold chains, mom in tight work-out spandex), the aggravatingly new-age teen daughter, the survivalist/pro-military grandpa, and the son who follows in grandpa's footsteps (who also happens to know how to handle a loaded assault rifle and carries around a live grenade). There is no sense that this is supposed to be a real family that relate to each other in any meaningful, realistic way - they are just caricatures drawn in the broadest possible strokes.
Dad is installing a new satellite dish - the "do it yourself 100." Through some intergalactic mishap, a crazy space monster is beamed through the satellite and into the Putterman's life, interrupting a mom and dad's swinging session, daughter's date with a cartoonish metal dude, and grandpa and grandson's movie night.
What I liked
It looked really, really good in a set design sense. About 95% of the movie takes place in the Putterman residence, and it looks like a swinging 70's pad on acid. Neon colors, recessed rooms, pseudo-pornographic comics on the walls, crazy statues - visually, it was fun place to spend and hour-and-a-half.
The FX were pretty solid too. I think there was obviously some budgetary constraints, but even the parts that didn't look so good were not out of place given the overall campy vibe of the movie. And I think some of the FX would look better on roughed up film or VHS as opposed to the surprisingly crisp Blu-Ray transfer. And as always, I love me some practical monsters, and this was a good (if not realistically designed) one - think a globby nightmare HR Pufnstuf by way of Grimace.
And despite the overly campy tone, some of the humor did land. There is a great segement where the kids and metal-boyfriend are trying to teach the monster about life on earth - think ET but with huge, grotesque, slimy blob instead of a cute little alien. I liked the absurdity of that. And the best line made it on the poster - when another alien is talking through the TV, really laying it on thick about how terrible this monster is and how he will consume all living things, he says he's "terribly sorry for the inconvenience." Ha! I say that at work at least once a week...
What I didn't like
I like watching bad movies. I grew up on a lot of bad B-horror and action - I honestly feel like it's a part of my make-up as a human being. But bad movies are usually not fun if they are *intentionally* bad. I realize that being aggressively campy is a different thing, but it's in the same ballpark. It just doesn't sit well with me.
The performances in Terror Vision are just so silly and braying that there is no doubt that it's on purpose. This was confirmed in the extras, where director Ted Nicolaou says he made everyone in the movie a complete, over-exaggerated stereotype that the audience isn't really supposed to like. I guess I need *someone* to relate to in order to get into the story. In this film I related most to the man-eating monster. The over-acting overwhelmed the whole thing, and I just couldn't get on board.
I have no doubt that the director's vision was achieved however. There was a great bit in the extras where the monster designer (John Buechler, who was apparently working on editing his directorial debut Troll at night while filming this during the day) said his only direction on the design from Nicolaou was to "make it stupid." I feel like that was probably the mantra for the whole movie. It's obnoxious, silly, and stupid, but I think that it's the movie that he wanted to make. So props for that. And it's obviously found an audience - Scream Factory released a DVD/Blu-Ray combo pack last year, so there was obviously a demand for it. But given the choice I'd take the b-side of the release, The Video Dead. It's still campy, but goes about it a bit more subtly than Terror Vision. And if you've seen The Video Dead, "subtle" is probably not the first word that comes to mind.
Ultimately
I admire that this film got made. It is truly a different vision told from a unique perspective, and it's the type of movie that would never get made today (at least on anything bigger than a micro-budget). I have to respect that and do think that it's found it's audience. I just can't count myself as one of them.
I would probably not recommend this film
Until next time...
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