Tremors (1990)

18. TREMORS (SCI-fiction, 1990) Welcome to Perfection, Nevada. Population: a couple. Opportunities: none. That's why handymen Val (Kevin Bacon) and Earl (Fred Ward) have always planned to leave town. And this time they mean it. Suddenly a series of bizarre killings prevent them from leaving. With the help of a seismology student, they discover giant-worm like creatures living under the desert sand. Now their goal is to leave town in one piece.

Critique: Lighthearted horror, sci-fi, comedy 'mish-mash' has an interesting premise, oddball characters, and wonderfully ferocious action. As our embattled heroes struggle to survive against the relentless creatures, the battle of wits that ensues becomes inventive and exciting.

The film shares strange similarities with Spielberg's legendary 'Jaws'. As the suspense and body count mount, the threatening desert sand (water) becomes an infinite playground for the bloodthirsty worms (sharks), as they use scare tactics against their unbeknown victims (swimmers). Not knowing where they will strike next, people tiptoe their way across town trying not to alert the creatures. It all makes for 'TREMEndous' fun.

Fmovies: This movie caught me by surprise: I worked in a video store, and one day we got a preview tape of this movie, prior to its video release. I hadn't heard much about it, so I watched it, and was quite surprised at how enjoyable it was. Since then, I have seen the movie about ten more times (at least), and still get a kick out of it.

Tremors is basically a landlocked variation on 'Jaws' and those 1950s giant bug movies: the isolated town of Perfection, Nevada (population 16), finds itself under siege by four monstrous, subterranean worm like creatures, that hunt by sensing vibrations in the ground. The plot revolves around the townspeople trying to outwit and escape the creatures (dubbed 'Graboids'), which are tearing the town out from under them.

What really makes the movie work is the characters: all of them come across as real people trapped in an insane situation, and all have a lot of charisma, even though the film doesn't have tons of character development. Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward are a hoot as a pair of low-rent handymen who become reluctant heroes. The byplay between the two is a lot of fun.

Usually movies like this revolve around stupid people doing stupid things, just to raise the body count. Tremors is different: the characters react believably, and do smart things to try and escape and/or kill the Graboids. The creatures too are also fairly smart, and are not just mindless eating machines with no brains.

Given its premise, Tremors is not a gory or violent film (although it has a couple of minor gross bits), and has a very good sense of humor. The film-makers are aware of their far-fetched premise (a couple of key questions go unanswered), but they treat it with respect and a certain amount of affection.

Nevada desert ,around village named Perfection are happening mysterious deeds.There live a small misfit group(Michael Gross,McEntire,Tony Genaro,Charlotte Stewart,Victor Wong,among others).A pair handyman(Kevin Bacon ,Fred Ward)find a university graduate(Finn Carter) and appear spontaneously a fearsome wormlike burrow surrounding of them.The Perfection inhabitants are besieged by the giant killers predators with several tongues.Then they battle against the West's more creepy beasts that savagely stalking its prey ,the human bunch and developing a bloodthirsty hunger for men eating.The trio protagonist comes out through desolate plateu where are roaming while must to save them.

This is an enjoyable and amusing juvenile romp,campy fun,quite entertaining and slickly shot.Bemusing old-fashioned, fantasy-adventure from updating adaptation of 50s and 60s monster movies.The film relies heavily about sympathetic relationship both protagonists: Bacon and Ward.An ambitious production,interesting as movie and hokey FX .Graboids deliver the goods with hair-rising suspense and grisly chills when the weird creatures emerge from underground.It's remarkable for special effects -made by Animatronics,no computer generator like the sequels- recreating the carnivorous and ferocious monsters .It's followed by inferior movies aimed to video rental market: ¨Aftershock¨(S.S.Wilson)again with Fred Ward; ¨III Back to Perfection¨with Charlotte Stewart and Ariana Richards and TV series with Gladys Jimenez,Victor Browne,Marcia Strassman and as always Michael Gross.The essential particularities from the sequels are : A remote and desert location named Perfection ,a solitary small village with a small group pitting horrible Graboids and of course the usual presence of Michael Gross as Burt Gummer,besides all are produced by Brent Maddock,Ron Underwood and S.S Wilson.The motion picture is recommended for horror-action enthusiastic that will find pretty spectacular scenes and some humor and their appetite for gruesome shots will be satisfied.Rating : Better than average and entertaining.

Tremors fmovies. **VIBRATING SPOILERS**

This is a great movie and a fun ride. They went back to the basics and came out with one of my all-time favorite flicks.

There are two ways to make a good monster movie: slow-paced and suspenseful, or fast-paced and surprising. Tremors definitely opts for the latter method. The producers also managed to assemble an excellent cast, all of whom establish their invidual characters with admirable clarity. Only Mindy, the young girl, comes off as kind of a cipher. Plus, with the exception of Kevin Bacon and Michael Gross, they all look like REAL people.

The spotlight gets shared out pretty equally among the cast, as well. One particularly nice touch was the fact that our two main heroes weren't the only people in town who have any competency, at all. Fred Ward and Kevin Bacon DO carry the movie, but it's more because of the great screen chemistry between them. Miguel has the better ideas, and Burt contributes more to the actual destruction of the monsters.

While Tremors never really 'cheats' the audience, i.e. sets up a situation and then doesn't deliver, the movie does vary teasingly from the expected. One of the aspects I enjoy most about showing this film to first-time viewers - aside from the the pride I take in indoctrinating new members to the Cult of the Graboid - is how the movie fools them about things like who gets eaten and who doesn't, and how the worms actually operated.

My one bullsh*t call is the Cat loader. Any operator with any kind of experience could have used the loader bucket to lever the tractor up and out of the pit it fell into, and that impact wouldn't have knocked out the engine. Whether they could have pulled themselves out before the Graboids yanked them off the tractor is less certain (Every time I see the scene of Burt Gummer falling from the loader to the ground, I cringe and think: there's a stuntman with two broken ankles).

I also could have used more Victor Wong and less Reba McEntire. She's just hard to listen to, as an actress. As little as she contributes after Burt and Heather shoot up the Graboid in their basement, they could have fed HER to the monsters and let Walter Chang survive.

Ah, well. YOU try telling a Graboid who it can't eat.

Oh, and I love Val & Earl's truck. I think it's a late-60s Jeep J10 Warrior. Absolutely indestructible.

Tremors is a flawless film. The story is original and entertaining. The actors make it all the more fun, especially Kevin Bacon, Fred Ward and Michael Gross. Tremors is the kind of movie that can't be placed in a certain genre. It's a little bit of everything; horror, comedy, action, adventure, etc. Don't miss this very good movie!

What we have in this film is the atmosphere of some of the old 50's B movie classics with an 80's touch added,and very well done at that. We have unique and rather intimidating monsters,as well as a very unique cast of characters to battle them.While Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward may be listed as the leads,I think that Michael Gross practically steals the entire show.While it isn't flawless,it certainly is entertaining enough.I would recommend it to any fan of 1950's B horror films.It is well worth the rental and would be a good addition to anyone's library.