Announcement
Collapse
No announcement yet.
Killer Klowns From Outer Space
Collapse
X
Collapse
-
Killer Klowns From Outer Space
Released by: MGM
Released on: September 11, 2012.
Director: Stephen Chiodo
Cast: Grant Cramer, Suzanne Snyder, John Allen Nelson, John Vernon, Michael Siegel, Peter Licassi
Year: 1988
Purchase From Amazon
The Movie:
A legitimate cult classic if ever there was one, The Chiodo Brothers' 1988 film Killer Klowns From Outer Space starts when Mike (Grant Cramer) and his girlfriend Debbie (Suzanne Snyder) decide to head to the local make-out spot for some alone time, only to be interrupted by Rich (Michael Siegel) and Paul (Peter Licassi), Mike's two best friends cruising around in an ice cream truck. When Mike sees something come hurtling out of the sky and crash nearby, Debbie talks him into going with her to investigate but when they arrive at the crash site they find a circus tent. They check it out and find a bunch of cocoons made out of cotton candy only to be chased out of there by some bizarre and rather frightening looking clowns!
Debbie and Mike make it back to town and go to the local cops, lead by Curtis Mooney (John Vernon), who understandably figures that there's something up with their story. He more or less dismisses them but Debbie's ex-boyfriend, a cop named Dave Hanson (John Allen Nelson), agrees to go take a look at things. Soon enough, however, there are big, scary clowns popping up all over town, making life difficult for bikers, pharmacy owners and ice cream truck drivers in the area.
A fun throwback to fifties style sci-fi and monster movies, Killer Klowns From Outer Space was a lot of fun in the eighties and it's a lot of fun now. Time has been kind to the picture, with the makeup and costumes holding up very well, the eerie and somehow perverse looking clowns themselves still having a completely creepy look to them. The set design and use of color, particularly in the last twenty minutes or so of the movie, is ridiculously over the top and yet completely appropriate in the context of the story. On top of that, the movie is paced very well, making for a very rewatchable film that's never dull, never boring.
Performances are decent here too. The key cast members play their parts well enough and the great John Vernon is excellent as the town's requisite grumpy old cop. Siegel and Licassi are hilarious as the two goofballs in the ice cream truck and both Cramer and Snyder make for likeable enough leads, even if they look a bit older than they're probably supposed to be in the movie. What really makes the film such a kick, however, is the inspired sense of lunacy that is evident throughout. Everything from the way in which the clowns get rid of their victims to the design of the characters shows some serious creativity and while it may be at least partially a parody of the movies that inspired it, the whole thing is done with such obvious love for B-movies that it's pretty much impossible not to have a great time watching this.
Video/Audio/Extras:
It's hard to imagine Killer Klowns From Outer Space looking a whole lot better than it does in the 1.85.1 AVC encoded 1080p high definition transfer from MGM without undergoing a serious restoration. Some minor print damage shows up as small specks here and there and the image is fairly grainy but in the right way, resulting in a pretty nice film like transfer. Detail is quite nicely improved here, the most obvious examples being the close up shots of the clowns themselves, you can really notice all the small little creases in their faces and the dirt and seediness that they give off. Skin tones generally look nice and natural, colors are very nicely reproduced, and if black levels aren't perfectly inky, they're definitely good.
The English language DTS-HD 2.0 mix is fine for what it is, but it's fairly low-fi for the most part. The dialogue doesn't sound as strong as something more modern might but for an older B-movie, there's little to complain about here and the Dickes' theme song sounds pretty cool. An alternate French Dolby Digital 2.0 mix is included and there are subtitles offered up in English SDH and Spanish.
Extras are replicated from the special edition DVD release, there's nothing new here but at least everything from that release is carried over, though the Dickies' music video is still missing. First up is the commentary with the Chiodo Brothers which is worth listening. These guys have a great sense of humor and do a fine job of relaying the story behind the making of this odd movie. From there, we move on to a bunch of featurettes, the first of which is The Making Of 'Killer Klowns, a twenty two minute mix of 2001 interview footage with the Chiodo Brothers and vintage footage shot on the set during the production of the film. Komposing 'Klowns' is a thirteen minute interview with the film's composer, John Massari, while the fifteen minute Visual Effects With Gene Warren Jr. is a similar featurette that sheds some light on the work that Warren did for the picture. The thirteen minute long Kreating Klowns pieces lets Charles Chiodo talk about his work in literally creating the Klowns we see in the movie, while the seven minutes Chiodo Brothers' Earliest Films is a collection of clips from early pre-Klowns projects that the three brothers collaborated on.
Rounding out the extras are five minutes of Deleted Scenes, three minutes of Bloopers, four minutes of Klown Auditions clips, a very quick bit on dubbing one scene for TV entitled Holy Smoke and last but not least, the film's original Theatrical Trailer. Pop-up menus and chapter selection are also included on the disc and all of the supplements are presented in standard definition.
The Final Word:
Killer Klowns From Outer Space hold up surprisingly well and if for some reason the music video that as on the DVD is missing from this Blu-ray, the improved transfer and low MSRP are going to be reason enough for most fans to want to snag this one, as it's otherwise a very good release of a fun, quirky movie.
Posting comments is disabled.
Categories
Collapse
article_tags
Collapse
- album review (218)
- album reviews (274)
- arrow video (270)
- blu-ray (3225)
- blu-ray review (4138)
- comic books (1392)
- comic reviews (872)
- comics (988)
- dark horse comics (484)
- dvd and blu-ray reviews a-f (1969)
- DVD And Blu-ray Reviews G-M (1711)
- DVD And Blu-ray Reviews N-S (1757)
- DVD And Blu-ray Reviews T-Z (878)
- dvd review (2512)
- idw publishing (216)
- image comics (207)
- kino lorber (385)
- movie news (260)
- review (318)
- scream factory (279)
- severin films (295)
- shout! factory (537)
- twilight time (269)
- twilight time releasing (231)
- vinegar syndrome (496)
Latest Articles
Collapse
-
Released by: Severin Films
Released on: April 30th, 2024.
Director: Lee Frost
Cast: Joseph Mascolo, Virginia Goodman, John Alderman
Year: 1969
Purchase From Amazon
Hot Spur – Movie Review:
Director Lee Frost and Producer Bob Cresse's film, Hot Spur, opens in Texas in 1869 with a scene where a pair of cowboys wanders into a bar where they call over a pretty Mexican waitress and coerce her into dancing for them. She obliges, but...-
Channel: Movies
03-22-2024, 11:53 AM -
-
Released by: Mondo Macabro
Released on: April 9th, 2024.
Director: Max Pecas
Cast: Thierry de Carbonnières, Jean-Marc Maurel, Denis Karvil, Lillemour Jonsson
Year: 1985
Purchase From Amazon
Death Squad – Movie Review:
Also known as Brigade Of Death, French sleaze auteur Max Pecas’ 1985 film, Death Squad, opens with a night time scene outside of Paris in the Bois de Boulogne Forest where cars pass by a small gang of transsexual...-
Channel: Movies
03-22-2024, 11:46 AM -
-
Released by: Quality X
Released on: February 28th, 2024.
Director: Chuck Vincent
Cast: Samantha Fox, Vernoica Hart, Kelly Nichols, Jerry Butler, Jamie Gillis
Year: 1982
Purchase From Amazon
Roommates – Movie Review:
Directed by Chuck Vincent and released in 1982, Roommates opens with a scene where a young woman named Joan Harmon (Veronica Hart) gets a hotel room with an older man named Ken (Don Peterson, credited as Phil Smith),...-
Channel: Movies
03-15-2024, 01:10 PM -
-
Released by: Blue Underground
Released on: March 26th, 2024.
Director: Jess Franco
Cast: Christopher Lee, Maria Rohm, Dennis Price
Year: 1970
Purchase From Amazon
Night Of The Blood Monster – Movie Review:
Directed by Jess Franco, The Bloody Judge (or, Night Of The Blood Monster, as it is going by on this new release from Blue Underground) isn't quite the salacious exercise in Eurotrash you might expect it to be, and while it...-
Channel: Movies
03-15-2024, 01:07 PM -
-
Released by: Vinegar Syndrome
Released on: March 26th, 2024.
Director: Saul Bass
Cast: Nigel Davenport, Michael Murphy, Lynne Frederick, Alan Gifford, Robert Henderson, Helen Horton
Year: 1974
Purchase From Amazon
Phase IV – Movie Review:
Saul Bass’ 1974 sci-fi/thriller Phase IV is an interesting blend of nature run amuck stereotypes and Natural Geographic style nature footage mixed into one delicious cocktail of suspense and...-
Channel: Movies
03-15-2024, 01:02 PM -
-
Released by: Radiance Films
Released on: March 26th, 2024.
Director: Shigehiro Ozawa, Eiichi Kudo
Cast: Tomisaburo Wakayama, Minoru Ôki, Arashi Kanjuro, Bin Amatsu, Chiezo Kataoka
Year: 1969-1972
Purchase From Amazon
The Bounty Hunter Trilogy – Movie Review:
Radiance Films gathers together the three films in Toie Studios’ Bounty Hunter Trilogy, starring the inimitable Tomisaburo Wakayama. Here’s how the three movies in this...-
Channel: Movies
03-13-2024, 11:30 AM -
Unless there's a later pressing that added it (which I don't believe so), the music video was unfortunately missing from the DVD release as well.