One of the very rare instances of a remake using the original as a base in order to create something new and different. The 1988 remake of ‘The Blob’ takes a harsher more political turn on the 50’s schlocky B-movie with largely positive results.

To clarify, I very much enjoy the original ‘Blob’ but its a feature not without its faults, largely stemming from the time it was produced. The titular ‘Blob’ in the original is kind of an aimless, almost ‘Zombie’ like organism that just eats and grows, it has a more lighthearted slant to it despite all the destruction that happens in the film, and that 50’s peppiness (alongside the vision of a visibly aged and at that point 28 year old Steve Mcqueen playing a teenager)and zany theme tune makes the whole thing feel more like a cookie family sci-fi picture than a serious threat.

The 80’s Blob plays things more or less completely straight, as an organism crashes to earth and viciously hunts down and consumes anything and everything that gets in it’s way. Our core heros ‘Brian’ and ‘Meg’ are in a duel role here trying to both save the town from the creature, while also trying to reveal a government conspiracy that threatens life WAY beyond the sleepy town entering ‘Ski Season’

And while the original had buckets of charm, this film is a much more focussed and coherent production. The script feels a lot sharper, with a more realistic response from our characters vs how the original cast tackled the beastie.

Its got a jet black tone, but it isnt afraid to have fun with the subject matter, its just trading a campier angle in for a daker humour that I feel really helps carry the film off in a different direction. Theres a lot more adult themes present here, which is a nice touch. The films first act almost subverts audience expectation for those who caught the original, and from the 2nd act onwards, it pretty much breaks off into it’s own new story. But the pace is good, the act structuring is solid, theres super smooth transitions between the acts. The characters all have a decent level of backstory established, they feel decently fleshed out and are just plain fun to hang around with for 90(ish) minutes.

It also must be said that the scripts themes of dealing with excess, greed and it’s ties to corporate America were VERY acidic and VERY welcome. I feel like those tones really helped add a bit more depth to what could have otherwise been a just ‘good’ little cult flick.

The direction is gorgeous, with a clean and coherent vision that clearly took significant effort being displayed gorgeously here. With special not HAVING to go to the special effects, which go above and beyond and would honestly give most modern productions a run for their money, seriously, the way they make ‘The Blob’ move in this is astounding and some of the death scenes are very intense and well handled. Yes, theres some green screen here thats starting to look a little bit dated, yes theres some stop motion that is starting to creak. But what this film achieves in effects and its vision is arguably some of the finest to be produced in the latter half of the 80s.

The cine is gorgeous too, a heavily styalized affair thats got a near perfect shot composition track record, it’s ultra tight on the edit, with decent coverage and B-roll, it uses colour grades effectively which really helps give things a further boost. and, in a rare occurance for me. This is a film where the edit feels just about right, not to long, not too short, it feels exactly as long as it should be and left me wanting more, which is just what I want from any decent production.

The cast all handle the material very well with Kevin Dillon and Shawnee Smith delighting as Brian and Meg in giving rock solid and well ranged performances, they really seem to get the source material and I know they did a good job when I legitimately wouldnt want to have seen anyone else attempt the roles for this thing.

Even the supporting cast are interesting, strange and animate. They all add to the mix, entertain and feel like they could really actually exist somewhere out there. They were a delight.

Throw in a frankly awesome 80s pop rock soundtrack thats up there with some of the greats from this era, and honestly? theres very little to dislike with ‘The Blob’ I certainly will give it a rewatch again sometime soon. I really enjoyed it and I highly recommend if you havent seen it, you check it out when you can. I think it would pair up very well with Larry Cohens ‘The Stuff’ or maybe even ‘Friday the 13th Part 6’ for the whole ‘Juvinile gets locked up and has to take on a threat while the sheriffs are trying to take him down’ angle.

This was great fun.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/the-blob-1988/