Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Slugs (1988)

If there's one thing to learn from Steven Spielberg's 'Jaws' it's that producers love to steal ideas. The amount of giant killer animal, and nature takes revenge films that came out after the summer of '75 is absurd. There are some stellar examples of films that understood what their "stories" were, and tried to make the best of it.

As is the case with any sub-genre you're often left with more bad than good. For every 'Orca' there's 'Up From the Depths' and 'Claws'. For every 'Birds' there's 'Frogs' and 'Day of the Animal'. It's a viscous shit cycle, but man do I love me some shitty movies. If you're thinking that the movie 'Slugs' can't really be about giant killer slugs, well, you're right. These are just your ordinary garden slugs, but with one exception; they crave human flesh!

In a small town, like every other horror film, a couple goes out on a boat in the middle of a lake. Suddenly the boy gets pulled into the water by an unseen force. The girl laughs as she thinks it's a prank, but little does she know that her boyfriend is being devoured alive by toxic slugs! She screams as a blood pool floats to the surface.

Town Health Inspector Mike Brady is apparently also the town sheriff, as he goes out to every emergency situation in the entire town. People are dying left and right all in bizarre fashion, and there are always slimy slugs at the scene. Mike takes a live slug to his friend, who happens to be a chemist, or biologist type scientist. Apparently these slugs have been feeding off of toxic chemicals and now have developed an insatiable taste for warm flesh! I could go on, but I highly doubt a movie about killer, man-eating slugs needs much of a plot.

Like many other films on this website, this was a VHS cover I had seen in every video store in the early '90s. I mean shit, look at that cover. That guy has had the rest of him devoured by slugs, and he's still screaming as they devour the rest of his face. That has "Rent Me" plastered all over it. The first time I got around to seeing this film I was shocked to find out that it was a Spanish/American production, and with that, some hysterical dubbing. The acting in this film, regardless of the performer's nationality, is bottom of the barrel. Some real cringe inducing dialogue allows for some real unintentional hilarity.

If you've seen director Juan Piquer's 'Pieces', then you should know the gore factor is at 11. The situations where the characters die are fucking priceless. There's a couple having sex, and then the girl falls off the bed to be eaten alive by the titular slugs. Then the guy falls to his death. We also see a guy whose digested some slug to have a collection of blood worms spew from his eyes while his face melts off. It's one of those times you know if they remade this film that all these effects would be CGI, and that makes me a sad panda. The highlight of the film though is when Mike has to kill all of the slugs, and blows them up in the methane filled sewer beneath the city. Then the town proceeds to blow up killing dozens of unnamed citizens in the explosion.

'Slugs' is one of the pinnacles of bad movies. The dialogue, acting and premise are fucking awful. I mean seriously? Killer slugs? However, if you're like me you live for these ridiculous violent horror movies you'll probably find a lot to enjoy in 'Slugs'.

'Slugs' available on DVD from Image Entertainment.

Rating: 3 1/2 out of 5 Trash Bags



IMDB Page

Amazon Page

No comments: