Gremlins

Rating:
Summary: Classic Film On A Great DVD!
Review: GREMLINS is one of those rare films that works on so many levels: comedy, horror, children's film, looney tune. And it works perfectly for each. The gremlins are incredibly realistic (especially for 1984), and all but steal the show. And I love that bizarre, yet catchy main theme by Jerry Goldsmith. Actually, there isn't much more to say about the film than what has probably been said countless times in other reviews. All I can say is: SEE IT!! It's a classic all the way.

The Special Edition DVD is well worth the fifteen bucks I spent at Borders. While the picture and sound aren't all that great (though it definitely passes), there's plenty of bonus features to be found. The documentary is pretty good, but my favorite extras are the deleted scenes. They're great!

It's nowhere near as good as the sequal's DVD, but even so, this original is a must-buy.

Rating:
Summary: Gremlins: A review
Review: Gremlins: Classic 80's cinema, and Joe Dante's best work. If you haven't see this movie, shame on you! Go and see it.

The movie open up when inventor Rand Peltzer(Hoyt Axton)is lead into a small curio shop in chinatown by the store owner's grandson. Rand hears some strange noises coming from the back of the pet shop and heads back to see what it is. The noises are eminating from a small furry creature called a 'Mogwai'. Impressed with it, Mr. Peltzer offers $200 for it, but is told that it is not for sale. "With Mogwai comes much resposibility," says the shop owner. "I cannot sell him at any price." The Chinese man's grandson, however, tells him to meet him outside with the money. Once outside, he is handed the Mogwai. The kid then tells Mr. peltzer three rules he must remember: #1:Keep him out of the light, especially sunlight. #2: Don't get him wet, and the most important rule: NEVER feed him after midnight.

Rand comes back home and presents his son, Billy(Zach Galligan) the Mogwai, which he has christened 'Gizmo'. Mom tries to take a picture of the Mogwai, thus breaking the first rule...and the other two will be broken in a matter of hours! The next day, Billy's friend Pete spills water on the Mogwai, breaking the second rule. When Mogwais are wet, they reproduce. Soon, 5 new mogwais are born, one of which is named 'Stripe' due to a stipe of white hair running down his back. That night, the Mogwais start making a ruckus for some food. Billy checks his clock, which reads 11:00, so he gives the mogwais some left over chicken. All of them eat it, except Gizmo. The next morning, Billy wakes up to discover 5 sticky cocoons on the ground next to his bed. His mother asks him if he fed the mogwai after midnight. Billy checks his clock, which still reads 11:00. The mogwais tricked him into feeding them after midnight by chewing through the power cord. When the cocoon hatch, Gremlins come out of them, and run amok, in the most comical way possible, of course. Can Billy stop the Gremlins and save his town? Watch and find out!

Rating:
Summary: Gremlins- a cut above your average film fare
Review: Gremlins is the tale of a young boy who gets an adorable little creature, known as Gizmo, for christmas, and Gizmo comes with a set of three rules. "Don't ever get him wet, don't expose him to harsh sunlight, and never, ever feed him after midnight". Perhaps predictably, his teenage owner accidently breaks all of these rules one by one, ensuing in mayhem and chaos. Gizmo spawns a host of cute, furry offspring, who transform into disgusting, scaly offspring once fed after midnight, courtesy of a broken clock.
Gremlins is a crazy little film, and one suspects it may fall into the 'love it or hate it', category. But i find myself straddled between the two. The film is in my opiniom somewhere between 3 and 4 stars for enjoyment, and i am tempted to give it four, as Gremlins boasts some truly funny and inventive scenes, especially a rather memorable one involving a recently-hatched evil gremlin and a microwave.
The film can be quite disgusting in parts, but is never really gory or scary. Gremlins is a horror-comedy, and plays both roles to pretty good effect. The creature effects and make-up are, considering the film is approaching its 20th anniversary soon enough, pretty good, and the SFX of the gremlin transformations are not bad.
Gremlins makes you laugh too, the behaviour of the bad gremlins is often pretty funny, and the chaos they inevitably create is gleeful and playful, rather like the film itself. The antics of the gremlins is what holds the attraction in the film for me and most people i know, who think that gremlins is a riotous piece of entertainment. The director has polished the film to good effect and gremlins stands out as a pretty sublime piece of horror-comedy to me.
But Gremlins does have flaws. Sometimes, the film is simply too silly for its own good, and does not know what it really wants to do in terms of plot. Gremlins does get slightly too far-fetched towards the end, and some parts of the film are cringe-makiingly embarrasing, particularly the bits where the Gremlins 'sing'. The acting is not particularly notable either, i have no idea what the man in the lead role is doing half of the time. Luckily for him, and for us, the Gremlins themselves steal the show.
This is a film that contains many twists, interesting bits and funny scenes, and occasionally a few shocks. The film itself bounces along at a fun and lively pace, the director keeps everything playful and tongue-in-cheek and the whole film acquits itself very well, never takes itself too seriously and sets the perfect mood throughout, given what is happening on screen.
It would certainly make a welcome addition to most DVD or video collections, although with this type of film there will be people who it will hold no appeal for whatsoever. Gremlins ceratinly does get full marks for effort though, and this special DVD will probably please most film fans.
Look out for the sequel, Gremlins 2, which is also a good film and a fitting sequel to Gremlins.

Rating:
Summary: A good collection for your DVD library
Review: I love this movie very much. I have bought the laser disc of Gremlins years ago. Thanks to the technology and Warner Brothers, we can see again this movie in 5.1 channel, and most important of all, the extras and never-before-seen footage and the cast commentary. For such a valuable price, this is a MUST for your DVD library!!

Rating:
Summary: Sooooooo much fun!
Review: Without a doubt, GREMLINS is a classic, and if you ask why, it's just sooooooo much fun! The gremlins are neat (if not somewhat unbelievable), the story's okay, the music is great (although annoying at times), and with writing by Chris Columbus, producing by Steven Spielberg, and directing by Joe Dante, it's a little hard to go wrong. It's also a great family film or for Halloween. Definately worth a rent!

Rating:
Summary: PG = Phunny "Gremlins"
Review: "Gremlins" is a Christmas classic for the family to enjoy. Ugly little critters run amok after being birthed by a strange creature named Gizmo. Zach Gilligan is the boy who takes care of his gift, given to him by his inventor father. Don't let it get wet, eat after midnight or get sunlight. He breaks all the rules obviously and he pays the price. The gruesome amount of violence is surprising since the movie is PG. It is funny and Joe Dante knows how to direct a dark comedy. Phoebe Cates is the girlfriend (of that guy? please). This is a splendid Christmas treat especially with the gremlins attacking with bulldozers and causing major damage to the city. Classic.

Rating:
Summary: Gizmo Caka!
Review: This is one of my all time favorite films. I grew up watching this and it scared me and made me laugh at the same time. i just picked up the special edition dvd. Anyway the Party at Dorry's scene with the gremlins cracks me up every time i watch it. The flashdancing gremlin and the cocktail waiter gremlin who spins on the bar (it lasts for bout a 1/2 a second) kills me every time. The director Joe Dante is a genius of the absurd. I just wish most of his movies didn't bomb at the box office (American movie going tastes if you ask me), so we could have seen more brilliance (Pick up Gremlins 2, which pretty much takes the Dorry's bar scene and extends it for the last 2/3rds of the movie. A bit much and part 2 has less scares and is less schizo in tone than the orignal. Still a must see.

Rating:
Summary: A Classic now on a new DVD.
Review: This 1984 Horror Fantasy comedy is the story of a guy who recieves a cute and cuddly furry creature before Christmas named " Gizmo" ( voiced by Howie Mandel) but there are three important rules if he wants to keep him. Rule 1# never expose him to the light especially sunlight, Rule#2 Don't get him wet and the most important rule of them all, Never feed them after midnight. But two of those rules have been broken, Gizmo has got wet and spawned more of his kind then when the other Mogawais eat after midnight they change into hideous Green Scaled monsters that is causing havoc on Christmas eve, can the man and his pet stop these creatures or will the town be wiped out?

A highly entertaining and original movie that has original ideas, interesting Social commentary, laughs, gore, and all around good fun that the entire family will love. When this premired in 1984 in the summer, it became one of the highest grossing movies of that year and also caused the new PG-13 rating cause of the violence. The Special Ed DVD here is excellent, has trailers including Commentaries, documentary, and Never-before-seen Deleted scenes, this is a must own if your a lover of horror and comedy.

also recommended: E.T., Lucio Fulci's The Beyond, Ghostbusters, House ( 1986), Return of the Living Dead, Critters 1 & 2, Hobgoblins, American Beauty, Pulp Fiction, Evil Dead, Evil Dead II, C.H.U.D., Lilo and Stitch, and Child's Play.

Rating:
Summary: Mostly fun; sluggish at points.
Review: I had remembered this movie as much better than it really is, having been a huge fan of the sequel for years. Gremlins had a great concept, but it falls into an uncomfortable middle between children's movie and teenage comedy-horror, and the scripting and lighting are badly dated.

Chris Columbus script takes much of the blame for the insufferably cutesy small-townisms. The stereotypes portrayed in this movie are pretty nasty at their core -- for example, the black high-school science teacher is so incredibly dumb that it looks like a racial statement, and the character of Mrs. Beagle, the inhumanly sadistic widow, is neither believable nor funny. The pacing lags badly, and there is a sore lack of good dramatic scenes throughout the movie, especially in its languid second act before lead character Billy finally goes out into the town after the bad gremlins. Zach Galligan is only mildly interesting in the lead (he would really come into life in the sequel), and Phoebe Cates is mostly window dressing, while Judge Reinhold's part was cut down to, mostly, one barroom scene and then, unfeasibly, disappears from the film entirely.

When this movie tries to make the gremlins a real monster threat, it doesn't work all that well. On the other hand, Gremlins is hugely enjoyable when the gremlins are just acting like weirded-out humans. The bar scene at Dorry's with the gremlins getting drunk and acting out is mostly hilarious (although the dated Flashdance spoof is a bit much), and the creatures look great. Notably,Gizmo is less cutesy than he is in the second movie -- probably because the powers-that-be were trying to go for even more kid-oriented merchandising imagery in the second film.

While its flaws don't prevent Gremlins from being a pretty enjoyable movie overall, I felt this movie to be slow and a little thin almost two decades after I'd first seen it. But in 1989 the sequel would turn the franchise on its head and correct every flaw -- and then some.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Addition to your DVD Collection
Review: You really cannot easily classify GREMLINS into a particular genre. Is it a children's film? A comedy? A horror flick? It's a little of each, so there's something for everyone out there, and when added together, it makes for one entertaining package.

But let's talk about this "Special Edition" DVD. Unlike the previous edition that was released on DVD a few years ago, this one has quite a lot of features. The filmmaker's commentary is funny and informative, the actor's commentary, though less educational, is also amusing to listen to. Lead star Zach Galligan seems to have a photographic memory, as he remembers quite a lot about every scene he was in, and has a fun time reminiscing.

It's quite fortunate that instead of incorporating the deleted scenes into the film and coming out with a new cut of the film, they just add these as a supplement, since the scenes merely slow down the story. Watch out for Judge Reinhold in many of these scenes. His entire subplot practically got cut from the final version of the film.

The photogallery is easy to navigate, just forward and back buttons; the featurette is a 5 minute 1983 "On The Set" piece.

But the real collectible on this disc is the film itself. Unlike many films from the 1980s, this one does not feel dated. It has that little quality that makes it timeless. It's rare that a film can have you laughing hysterically one minute, then jumping out of your seat the next. This is simply mixed-genre filmmaking at its finest.