Gremlins (Dante, 1984): Regent Street Cinema, 2.40pm
This is a 35mm presentation.
Chicago Reader review:
E.T.
with the lid off (1984). At the center of this horror comedy is a tidy
family parable of the kind so dear to the heart of producer Steven
Spielberg: the cute little whatzits who turn into marauding monsters
when they pass through puberty (here gooily envisioned as “the larval
stage”) are clearly metaphors for children, and the teenager (Zach
Galligan) whose lapse of responsibility unleashes the onslaught is a
stand-in for the immature parents of the 80s (Poltergeist).
But Spielberg's finger wagging is overwhelmed by Joe Dante's roaring,
undisciplined direction, which (sometimes through sheer sloppiness)
pushes the imagery to unforeseen, untidy, and ultimately disturbing
extremes. Dante is perhaps the first filmmaker since Frank Tashlin to
base his style on the formal free-for-all of animated cartoons; he is
also utterly heartless. With Phoebe Cates, Hoyt Axton, and more
movie-buff in-jokes than Carter has pills.
Dave Kehr
Here (and above) is the trailer.
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