Night of the Creeps (1986) Alien Brain Bug Zombie Parasites

Opening in space, with a wet your panties laughing scene involving a hilarious looking freaky baby like rubber alien, naked, speeding down a corridor. Running as fast as his little legs can take him, this alien is being hunted down. In his arms he carries a large container which he frantically manages to jettison out into space. The container starts a trajectory on to Earth, the year is 1959.

Chasing the “shooting star” into the woods, two lovebirds hurry off to investigate. Now if the dark woods, lonely road and spooky night isn’t scary enough to go looking for a strange crash landing object, then maybe an escaped deranged axe murder might be needed to spice things up.  Unfortunately a young rookie cop called Ray Cameron stumbles upon a scene of horrifying carnage, which will go on to haunt him for the rest of his life. Fast forward to the present day of 1986.

With the foreboding notion that we all know this is a horror film with zombies and space bugs, it can’t be too long before action begins. So first it’s time to introduce our heroes, someone tough, a lean mean fighting machine, Arnie or Sly maybe? Step forward Rusty Griswold Mark 2 from National Lampoon’s European Vacation!! Our hero is Chris Romero (Jason Lively) a clumsy and socially awkward, geeky student at Corman University. Lucky he has his wingman with him, the more outgoing  James Carpenter Hooper known as JC (Steve Marshall). He doesn’t let being on crutches get the better of him and will do anything to help his best buddy Chris out, including giving him a helping hand with the ladies. One pretty girl in particular that Chris has his heart set on gets a little nudge from JC, sorority girl, Cynthia Cronenberg (Jill Whitlow).

One man’s past is about to catch up with him, Ray Cameron (Tom Atkins) it might of been 27 years ago but he’s always been ready. Now a hard drinking, chain smoking detective, still living his life in the style of the 50’s. Even driving around in a vintage 1950 Ford Custom Fordor Sedan with stick on police light. He’s cool as ice and ready to hit with one liners. No need to say hello when the phone rings when a “Thrill Me” will do.

Ray Cameron – “The good news is your dates are here. The bad news is… they’re dead.”

What with the additional havoc of alien brain bugs being let loose, things are certainly gonna take a turn for the worse. Get ready to unleash hell as gangs of frat boy zombies turn up for their dates, exploding heads, an undead axe-wielding maniac, freaky cats and dogs, flamethrowers, shotguns, a cryogenic lab and even a unibrow!

Ray Cameron – “It’s Miller Time”

How are they going to save themselves and rid the world from this zombie infestation? In amongst all the frenzied bloodshed, there’s a whole heap of cheesy brilliant special effects and hilarious good comedy b-movie horror gold to be had. It may of been around 30 years since seeing this one and to be honest I could only remember small scenes, so it was such a fun experience laughing along with all the action.

A Few Fun Facts

• All the cast names are paying homage to film directors, John Carpenter, Steve Miner, James Cameron, Roger Corman, Sam Raimi, Tobe Hooper, David Cronenberg, George A. Romero and John Landis. There could easily be more that I missed.
• Director and writer Fred Dekker also made the big fun family horror comedy fantasy The Monster Squad. I gonna have to revisit that one very soon.
• Fred Dekker also wrote episodes for the TV series Tales from the Crypt and penned the story for director Steve Miner’s comedy horror House in 1985. He is also friends with fellow screenwriter Shane Black who would co-write Monster Squad with him
• Tom Atkins is a cult movie legend, just see a few of his movies. The Fog, Escape From New York, The Ninth Configuration, Maniac Cop and also got to star in Lethal Weapon.

Feel like I’ve been neglecting some of my old favourite movies as I been hungry for new movie experiences. So I have been starting to revisit old classics which I loved or refreshing my memory from old films that I really can’t remember anymore. Hopefully some of them will get a post. Maybe pop on back to see what’s been on the wolfman’s screen or feel free to drop some suggestions. Off to watch another “night of” soon, as Night Of The Comet is on Netflix. Looking forward to that.

Keep enjoying the movies. Thanks for dropping in on my hairy place. All the best… Mikey Wolfenstein.

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