The Night Before (Thom Eberhardt, 1988)

This movie doesn't know how close it came to being shunned. And by "shunned," I mean not reviewed... by me. While most film critics show their disdain for the movies they don't like by writing a "bad review." I, on the other hand, show my disdain by not writing a review at all. I know, some of the most entertaining/enlightening film reviews can be the ones for so-called "bad movies," but I have less important things to do than waste my time writing about them. And that's what almost happened to The Night Before (a.k.a. Eine verrückte Reise durch die Nacht), another in a long line of "all night movies." When word gets out that Lori Loughlin's character has been sold to a pimp named Tito (for a measly 1500 bucks), I thought to myself: I like where this going. However, I quickly followed up that thought we this thought: If I don't see Lori Loughlin (The New Kids) in hooker clothes by the time the end credits start to role, I ain't reviewing it. I don't care if Keanu Reeves (Flying) wears black and white monk vamp buckle creepers during the film's final third. I'm not typing a word unless I see Lori Loughlin dressed like a floozy.

Now, given that I'm currently typing words about The Night Before, it's obvious that Lori Loughlin donned hooker clothes that met with my approval. But I have to say, it was touch and go for awhile there. I mean, I nearly had a heart attack when Lori Loughlin dismisses the tube top and black vinyl mini-skirt she's given to wear as unsuitable. I know, you're thinking, "unsuitable"? Call me crazy, but that outfit sounds pretty fucking suitable. In other words, stop making sounds with your mouth hole, Lori, and put those skanky ass clothes on.

The reasons as to why Lori Loughlin doesn't want to wear a tube top and black vinyl skirt are too complicated to get into at the moment. But she does eventually put them on. Oh, and the cool thing about her sleazy ensemble is that it comes with a pair of handcuffs and an iron headboard. I know, you're thinking, huh? Well, I told you it was complicated.

You could say it's convoluted as well, but I think complicated and convoluted pretty much mean the same thing. I know the word I'm looking for. It's absurd! In fact, the movie on the whole is pretty absurd. And a little racist, too.

In the middle of the night, a dark-haired teen from–I'm assuming–the suburbs named Winston Connelly (Keanu Reeves) wakes up in an alleyway in East Los Angeles. Unaware of where he is or how he got there, Winston, who is wearing a white blazer with a pink carnation on the lapel, tries desperately to piece together the events of his, as we'll soon find out, wild and crazy night.

Told via flashbacks, the film employs an unusual storytelling style in the early going. Jumping back and forth between different times frames, Winston slowly learns how he ended up in this particular part of Los Angeles.

Yeah, I know, an owl fridge magnet is what caused the read-out on his dashboard compass to say that he was going west. But that still doesn't explain how he ended up in that alleyway.

Staggering to a nearby coffee shop, Winston, after ordering a coffee and a donut, asks the waitress where he is. Since informing half-wits from The Valley where they are is not part of her job description, the waitress (Pamela Gordon) instructs him to dial 411.

After burning his lip on the coffee, a flood of memories come rushing into Winston's head. The prom!, he shouts. It would seem that Winston had a prom date with Tara Mitchell (Lori Loughlin). I know, you're probably wondering, how did the vice president of astronomy club manage to get a date with a girl who was recently voted Galleria Teen Model of the Month? If I told you, you wouldn't believe me. Actually, you might. Yeah, of course you might. You see, there was this bet Tara had with her friend Lisa (Suzanne Snyder). While I don't recall the exact details of the bet, I do know this, the loser has to go to the junior/senior prom with Winston.
  

Just as they're about to leave, Tara's father, Capt. Mitchell (Michael Greene, Rubin and Ed), tells Winston that grave bodily harm will come to him if anything happens to his little girl. If that wasn't enough, Tara warns Winston that she will bail on him the moment things get weird.

Excuse me, honey. But women in white lace fingerless opera gloves have no right to accuse others being weird.

What's that? Interesting. I've just been informed that women in white lace fingerless opera gloves do in fact have the right to accuse others of being weird.

As we're being brought up to speed as to how flashback Winston got to where he is now, the other Winston, the one currently lost in L.A., has just learned that he owes a lot of money to a man named Tito (Trinidad Silva). Of course, when he's told this, Winston yells, "I don't even know anyone named Tito!"
 

In a strange twist, both Winstons end up at the Rat's Nest bar at the same time. Let me rephrase that. The way the scene is edited makes it seem like they're there at the same time. In reality, however, they're there at different times. Flashback Winston is there with Tara when it's packed with people, and the other Winston is there when it's closed. To be honest, I think I'm making this seem more tangled that it has to be. I actually liked the way the film jumped all over the place, as it gave the proceedings a disorienting quality that mirrored what the protagonist was going through.

The Rat's Nest sequence is by far the film's strongest. For starters, the band is lead by George Clinton and Bootsy Collins. And the bartender is played by Tommy 'Tiny' Lister. If that wasn't enough... Oh, and the band's female keytar player was wearing a pair of four buckle (western-style) winklepickers/pikes. As I was saying, if that wasn't enough, Winston and Tara perform an extended dancer number.
  

It's some time after this dance number that Winston accidentally sells Tara to a pimp named Tito for 1500. Enlisting the help of a hooker named Rhonda (Theresa Saldana) and an unnamed gardener (Clifton Wells), Winston must act fast or else Tara is going to be shipped off to Morocco.

Personally, I would have cut the scene with the toys thieves (these guys reminded me of Cheech and Chong from After Hours - a film I plan on reviewing one of these days). I don't know, but the film seemed to drag to a halt during this sequence. However, since the film would have only been seventy-something minutes without it, I would have added more scenes that featured Lori Loughlin handcuffed to a bed in her bra and panties. When in doubt, add more Lori Loughlin tied up in her underwear is what I always say.
   

I loved, by the way, the fact Lori Loughlin refuses to remove her bra when she eventually agrees to wear the tube top. Sure, wearing a bra with a tube top is basically one of the worst fashion crimes you can commit. But Lori Loughlin makes it abundantly clear that she doesn't like tube tops. In other words, she isn't going to be pushed around by some funnel-shaped piece of fabric. And, at the end of the day, that's the message I took away from this film. Stay true to yourself. And also that, according to this film, people of colour are mainly pimps, criminals and prostitutes.

Night of the Creeps (Fred Dekker, 1986)

Some people describe paradise as a place where inflation is nonexistent and sore-free miscreants are always at the ready to lick your genitals. Others describe it as a giant vat of creamed corn. However, extremely normal people, like myself, see things quite differently. You see, our paradise bares a striking resemblance to a nondescript screening of Fred Dekker's exceedingly awesome Night of the Creeps, the Citizen Kane of intergalactic space slug movies. I mean, does get any better than seeing this film (which is still not available on DVD - Edit: The DVD and Blu-ray was finally released on October 27th 2009 by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment) on the big screen with a packed house full of rowdy creep fans? I don't think it does. (The fact that director Fred Dekker and star Steve Marshall were in attendance, and took part in a humourous Q&A afterward, wasn't too shabby, either.) Clear as the strategically-torn fishnets on a surly squeegee kid from Penetanguishene, everything in this film appeared to me like a crystallized beam of unclouded tranquility. Everything from the intense legginess of a couple of lounging sorority sisters to the repetitious ramblings of an easily amused custodian ("screaming like banshees"), was all there, staring back at me; and it was glorious.

The film is about this cryogenic stiff–who has been on ice since 1959–being inadvertently un-thawed by a couple of socially awkward fraternity pledges. At first, it just seems like a prank gone awry, but little do they know, that they've awakened the space slugs that live inside the stiff's brain. It's a long story how they got in there, but needless to say, the slimy critters need to find brains, so they can incubate, and where better to find fresh young minds than fraternity row? In charge of stopping the slugs is a hard-boiled cop, a cop whose high school sweetheart was killed by an axe murder–also in 1959 (they may be related).

It's true, Night of the Creeps may not have been the scariest or goriest film to claw its way out of the neon blur that was 1980s, but it sure was the most fun. And I can totally see why I watched it so many times back in the day when I did nothing but fondle my malnourished puppy. The way it combined the gratuitous nudity and frat boy shenanigans of your average teenage party movie, with the walking corpses and exploding heads of an intergalactic zombie epic, was obviously very appealing to the younger version of me.

And call me somewhat deranged, but shapely coeds combing the hair in dainty sleepwear while their decaying boyfriends lurk on the porch of their sorority is all I really need when it comes to cinematic satisfaction. They don't even have to interact; she can just comb, he can just lurk. It's all copacetic, baby.

The wonderful Tom Atkins gives grizzled detectives a good name with his turn as Det. Cameron. Impatient, churlish and forthright, Atkins is an utter delight (you know, the kind of delight who wields a large shotgun and has a penchant for kicking zombie ass). Whether he's emitting the words "Thrill Me" or mocking the incompetence of others, the accomplished thespian creates a timeless character who verbalizes some the film's most memorable dialogue.

However, Steve Marshall does come close to stealing the picture from Mr. Atkins as J.C. Hooper, the best friend and roommate of Christopher Romero (the film's shy hero played by Jason Lively). Steve's monologue about Lively's incessant whining was so great, that it was greeted with enthusiastic applause.

While the lovely Jill Whitlow redefines the image of the damsel-in-distress as the wonderfully-named Cynthia Cronenberg (all the main characters are named after well-regarded genre directors). Sure, it takes her longer than usual to realize her asshole boyfriend's head is replete with predatory slugs from outer space, but her first-rate flamethrower skills more than make up for her lack of zombie awareness.

Oh, and personal fave Suzanne Snyder (Killer Klowns From Outer Space) has a brief yet integral role as a sorority girl, one who is obviously from The Valley.

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Killer Klowns from Outer Space (Stephen Chiodo, 1988)

I hate it when people, especially those with pompously barbered facial hair, say, "Leave your brain at the door" when describing films like this. First of all, why would I leave my brain in a doorway? And second, how is that physically possible? I mean, you need your brain to function. Arrgh!! It just steams my buttermilk. People telling other people how they should look at filmed images... it's messed up. Anyway, I brushed aside the advice of the unidentified brain-door leaving reviewer man as kooky-talk and went into the candy-coloured cornucopia that is Killer Klowns from Outer Space with every ounce of my brain, and curvaceous lady friend, was I glad I did. Because this here film is a real head scratcher, one that nearly wiped me out, thinking-wise. You see, in it, planet earth is crawling with regular clowns. Friendly, yet slightly depraved, these so-called "regular clowns" bring joy and a non-despoiling exhilaration to millions of one-tongued earthlings from Addis Ababa to some other nonspecific urban centre with weird-coloured money. However, when homicidal space clowns land their intergalactic big-top in a forest on the outskirts of an Amerikanski small town (a town already steeped in clown-friendly folklore), the imbalance between regular clowning and bloodthirsty clowning causes a rift in the clown-perception continuum. And the townspeople, so accustomed to docile clownishness, remain unaware of the deadly buffoons lurking in their midst.

And it's here where the film will challenge you on an intellectual and confectionery level. By taking our preconceived notions of clowns and circus candy, the Chiodo Brothers have turned something that society has always deemed delightful and somewhat delicious into a nightmarish vomit stain. This unceremonious puncturing of the cheerful clown myth elevates the proceedings into something much deeper than your average clown killing spree movie.

Calling Killer Klowns from Outer Space "imaginative" and "awe-inspiring" would definitely be an understatement. The embryonic popcorn, the toxic cream pies, the unselective shadow puppets, and the balloon animal bloodhounds all added to the film's sense of wonderment and fascination. In other words, these clowns entice and entertain you before they kill you, and I thought that was a nice touch.

The way the cast was able to keep straight faces while uttering seriously-worded dialogue about clown invasions and cocoons made out of cotton candy was quite the achievement. A gravel-voiced John Vernon (Dean Wormer from Animal House), for example, is hilarious as Officer Mooney. Sporting a constant look of aggravated annoyance, Vernon takes a certain amount of pleasure at playing the only town member unconvinced of the clown threat (his large Saskatchewanian balls were literally bursting with skepticism).

The Terenzi Brothers (Michael Siegal and Peter Licassi) brought an extra hint of stupidity to the film's economical running time. Hell, I even liked the ice cream lovin' ladies they tried to score with. In fact, the moment the brothers try to sell ice cream at the neighbourhood make-out spot was the exact moment I started to feel comfortable in the film's demented crawlspace.

Lastly, Suzanne Snyder boasts an understated hotness as Debbie, a woman who finds herself in the middle of what could possibly be the blandest love triangle in sci-fi horror comedy history (Grant Cramer and John Allen Nelson).

The vivacious Suzanne, who you might remember from Weird Science, brings a sharp inquisitiveness to Debbie. For example, she'll investigate a strange flash in the sky, but when said flash turns out to be a radiant circus tent, she exercises caution. Her bathroom antics in the scene with the baby clowns were also a highlight. Utilizing an old-school can of hair spray and a plastic shower curtain, Suzanne goes toe-to-toe with these heinous little creatures like a pro.

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