"Tremors" (1990)

• Director: Ron Underwood
• Written by: Brent Maddock & S. S. Wilson
• Starring: Kevin Bacon, Fred Ward, Michael Gross, Reba McEntire

(Note: Hey guys! I'm posting this from Seattle! I'll be back on Sunday, and I'll try to have another review by then. I hope you guys enjoy.)

     A lot of monster movies are fairly light, innocuous fare, with very little to set them apart from one another. Despite all that, I find monster movies an absolute joy to watch. Films like "The Blob" are always entertaining, with hilariously wooden characterization and (usually shoddy) effects. So, I went into "Tremors" expecting just another B-grade monster movie. However, I found myself pleasantly surprised by it's excellent cast, suspenseful plotting, and downright hilarious black humor.
     "Tremors" takes place in the town of Perfection, Nevada with a population of only 14 people. Handymen Earl (Kevin Bacon) and Valentine (Burt Ward) finally decide to get out of the podunk town and escape to the city. However, on the day they decide to leave, they run into a corpse hanging from the top of an oil tower, and are then accosted by a strange snakelike creature. They soon learn that the entire valley is surrounded by giant worm creatures that they name "Graboids", which have the ability to tremor through the ground and the ability to detect their prey by listening to the vibrations of sound. They have no way out, because the vibrations of the Graboids has collapsed a rock wall, covering the only road out of Perfection. So, with the help of the fellow townsfolk, Earl and Val try to figure out a way to defeat the Graboids and escape to the city.
     "Tremors" is an unabashedly fun movie. It has a remarkably colorful cast of characters, all played well and with their tongues firmly in cheeks. My favorite character was Burt (Michael Gross) and his wife Heather (Reba McEntire), two militaristic gun nuts with an inconceivably large collection of firearms. In one hilarious scene, Burt and Heather fire bullet after bullet into a Graboid that has just broken through their basement wall. They cycle through bigger and bigger guns, until finally Burt takes the worm down with an elephant gun to it's fleshy parts.
     The film is full of great, funny, creative sequences like this, all supplemented by other great characters. Some of my other favorites include Walter Chang (Victor Wong), the owner of a general store who is constantly trying to scam people out of their money, and Melvin Plug (Bobby Jacoby), a snot-nosed teenager who won't stop playing pranks on everybody.
     But one of the great things about this film, and what makes all of the characters feel so fleshed out and real, despite their exaggerated personalities, is the setting of the film itself. Since it takes place in such a small, isolated town with an equally small populace, the characters all share a kind of "togetherness", and it's easy to believe that they're all close and know each other very well. They play off of each others strengths as well as weaknesses, and they frequently quibble like relatives. It brings them all together and helps the town, and the people in it, feel more realistic and closely knit.
     Every character feels alive in this film, even if there isn't a whole lot in the way of character development, which is astonishingly hard to pull off. It's fun watching them try to escape the Graboids, but since they've been given this "roundness", this believability, we also end up caring about them and wanting them to escape. So we alternately laugh at their hilarious clashing while simultaneously caring for them. This clashing is especially evident in the two main characters, Earl and Val, and Kevin Bacon and Burt Ward do a fantastic job of making us believe that these people are two friends who have known each other a long time. The rest of the acting is solid as well.
     The setting of the film also enhances it's mood. The constant shots of the dry, dull and orange Nevada deserts make the audience feel isolated, just like the townsfolk in the film. It also makes the film feel somewhat like a Western, with all of the hick cowboys and horseriding, with the occasional intrusion of the modern world (such as a sign on Walter Chang's window that mentions "VHS Rentals"). It's a really great setting, and lends itself well to the film's characters and atmosphere.
     But the heart of the film lies in it's monster-filled action sequences, which are taut and excellently directed. Look elsewhere if you're looking for violence and gore. The thing that makes these sequences suspenseful is that we never know what the Graboids are going to do, or if the characters will be able to escape. The Graboids have the ability to learn, so as soon as the characters in the film try to execute a plan, it goes belly-up before they can even think twice. It keeps us guessing, and we're never sure how the characters are going to work out how to escape, or even if they will at all. There are also some really fun chase scenes between the humans and the Graboids, since the characters can't move around on the ground due to their vibrations attracting the monsters.
     However, the film never takes itself too seriously, and is always willing to play up what would normally be a serious, dark situation for laughs. For example, there's a scene where the entire town has hidden inside of the store and are staying quiet to keep from attracting the Graboids. They do a quick head count, until they realize that one other person is still making sound: a daughter of one of the townsfolk, with headphones in her ears, is outside of the store, jumping up and down on a pogo stick. Even the set pieces themselves can be funny, such as when a Graboid burrows underneath the wooden porch of the general store, and pushes up the boards as it moves along, like a murderous Bugs Bunny, or when a Graboid pulls an entire station wagon under the sand.
     The special effects are pulled off well too, gradually showing us more and more of the Graboids as the film goes on, only letting us see one full and up close at the very end. The puppetry is, of course, low budget (the film was made for only 11 million dollars), but they're pulled off well, and are charming and fun.
     That's what I like most about this film. Rather than taking itself seriously and ending up simply being an unintentionally hilarious bad film, it actually revels in it's ridiculousness and comes out with some  great characters and some surprisingly taut and suspenseful plotting. If you love monster movies but find yourself a little bit tired of endless formulaic crap, pick up "Tremors". But be sure not to make too much noise on the way over to the video store... you never know what might be under the ground!