Gremlins

I’d never seen Gremlins before the other night, snuggled up on the couch with my 10-yr-old and expecting a fun little Christmas movie about cute furry creatures who turned into monsters that wreak family-friendly havoc.  I’m pleased to say that I mostly got what I wanted, but those monsters were deadlier than expected.  Gremlins turned out to be an effective horror-comedy.

Here’s the plot:  It’s Christmas Eve.  This guy wants to go out with Phoebe Cates, which is understandable (Fun fact: the commentary’s filled with stuff like, “Hey Phoebe, remember that one time you smiled at me in the lunch line?” “Umm, no.”).  His dad brings home a cute, fuzzy little Christmas pet, which we know will later turn into an evildoing gremlin from which Cates must eventually be rescued.  We’re talking about serious dramatic tension here, as we know springtime is only four or five months away and our hero’s gotta come through if he wants a red bikini in his future.  So the stakes are high.

Once the fuzzy pet multiplies and its offspring turn into monsters, Gremlins hits a delightful stride.  The eponymous gremlins are funny and wicked and evil and deadly but, most importantly, they’re practical.  Not only are they practical, but they’re masterpieces of puppetry and stop-motion photography, proving yet again that there’s no reality like objects that are actually, objectively real.

Not only does Gremlins bring nail-biting, edge-of-your-seat suspense in the form of the hero’s romantic aspirations, it provides lots of wicked gags and imaginative uses of those devilish little puppets.  This picture has it all – silly jokes, jump scares, and unbounded creativity.  It’s a nearly perfect Christmas movie.