Review: "Tremors"

UNDERWOOD, Ron (Dir.), “Tremors”, Universal/No Frills Film Productions, 1989.

I have no love for vampire films: after 1933 and Lugosi’s interpretation, the whole genre falls, for the most part, into a seamless homogeneity until every new movie becomes a copy of the previous outing. This isn’t always the case: “Near Dark” is a very special confection, as is “Cronos” and “The Reflecting Skin”, but these tend to be the exceptions which prove the rule. Nevertheless, “The Lost Boys” is a vampire film for which I have some affection, however it has nothing to do with the genre.

At the time when “The Lost Boys” came out, horror movies were turning from fright-fests into comedy routines – if the film didn’t serve up comedy and horror in more-or-less equal proportion, then the studios didn’t want to know about it (which is why “Evil Dead 2” is simply a slapstick re-make of the first Evil Dead flick). If you watch “The Lost Boys” very carefully you will see that there’s enough junk DNA of the original screenplay left behind in the final take to show what the writers’ original intentions were: the video-store owner was not supposed to be the head vampire; the Frog Brothers were not supposed to be there; the grandfather was to be revealed as the top leech at the end of the third act (remember his ‘special off-limits refrigerator shelf’?). The script wasn’t re-built from scratch to accommodate the studio’s demands (which included showcasing the Coreys); instead, it was patched and tweaked, with a lot of clues for the original format becoming red herrings in the final version. From a scriptwriting perspective, this is a very revealing movie about the workings of Hollywood.

How much better then, is a film where the original concept doesn’t get broken and re-worked after the fact to conform to a producer’s expectations? “Tremors” is a film with a solidly-written foundation that knows where it’s going and what it’s doing every step of the way. Nothing happens by accident; practically every line of dialogue does one of two things – it moves the plot forward, or it underscores a character’s motivations or personality. This is a movie that has universal appeal and that appeal is due to the fact that it is so tightly constructed. 

As an example, have you noticed that the beginning and the climax of the film form a complete circle? In the opening scene, we see Val (Kevin Bacon) pointing his – um – “worm”, off the edge of a cliff; in the final confrontation with the Graboid called “Stumpy”, it’s another instance of Val doing the same thing, only this time it’s not his manhood, but his wormy Graboid nemesis. (I never said this was a high-brow film!) Thus, the plot forms a perfect loop from beginning to end.

Every element that adds to the drama is flagged and activated at precisely the right moment. When the refrigerator unit complains in Walter Chang’s store, there’s a discussion about a worn ball-bearing and who’s going to fix it; later, while trying to remain deathly quiet in the same locale, the machine kicks up again and the Graboid targets the ruckus. The gag is flawlessly set up and executed, and not just in this instance. Pogo-sticks, basketballs, generators and jackhammers all get the same treatment.

The slow-reveal of the monsters at the heart of the story is another element which is precisely monitored. At first, all we see are flickering readouts in the seismographs and slowly moving patches of dirt; when Old Fred and his flock get attacked, it’s borne in upon us that he’s been thumping the ground with his hoe. We, the audience get our first hints that the problem comes up from underground way before the characters do, but we’re still in for a surprise:

Our first glimpse of the Graboids are their tentacular “tongue-things”, and, while these seem suitably snake-like and ominous, it’s nothing compared to the big reveal of the creatures on the other end. Having seen the tentacles grab and bury an entire car, the full horror of the rampaging beasties is a second-wave shocker in a two-step monster deployment. Very satisfying stuff!

Also satisfying is the quiet moment on the residual boulders where Val, Earl (Fred Ward) and Rhonda (Finn Carter) contemplate the origins of the critters. Rhonda muses upon their absence in the fossil record; Val posits their source in a government laboratory, “a big surprise for the Russians”, while Earl opts for an alien invasion scenario – “no way these are local boys”. In the final analysis, they get nowhere and the topic is dispensed with as pointless, just as it is for we movie-goers: the monsters just are. No more time for thinking; let’s move on.

All of the characters we’re presented with are treated with affection. Like the various plot points and gags, they too have their purpose within the milieu and a contribution to make towards the story’s resolution. Walter (Victor Wong) provides the group with sandwiches, horses, and bullets as well as a CB radio. He’s also the one who names the creatures and underscores Val and Earl’s hopeless business planning. Melvin the slacker is a universal target for contempt whose only talent is for unifying the rest of the characters against him. Mindy and her mother provide nervous responses and querulous questioning as to what can be done, as well as opposing the gung-ho assertions of the survivalist Gummers. Not all of the characters survive; however, each time one of them is taken, they demonstrate some other wicked wrinkle of the Graboids’ cunning. In the meantime, despite having varying quantities of screen time - from the ‘almost-in-every-scene’ level to a handful of seconds - there’s not one for whom we don’t feel some degree of sympathy. Except for Melvin.

(I should just state here that there should be a retroactive Oscar given to whomever had the brilliant idea of casting Reba McEntire as Heather Gummer. Sublime work! “Lord, honey! You didn’t even get penetration with the elephant gun!” – kills me everytime!)

There’s another ‘character’ too, which deserves mention, and that’s the location – Perfection, Nevada. Although not actually filmed in Nevada, the countryside and the town are as described on the box – perfect. We get to see quite a lot of the landscape throughout the course of the film and it works a treat. For starters, the planning of the town – from the junkyard, to the water tower, to the single road access through its rocky pass – serves a purpose in defining the narrative (“it’s one long smorgasbord!”); secondly, it’s spectacular to look at. Soaring skies, rocky ridges and precipitous mountains: it’s a beautiful backdrop.

Produced with a budget of US$11,000,000, this film racked up US$3,731,520 in its first weekend, finally raking-in US$16,667,084 in the USA across its opening cinema run. Outside the US, the film made US$48,572,000 before being consigned to video; I dare say video, DVD and BluRay sales have kept investors quite comfy since then!

There have been no less than three sequels to this film (that I know of) and each of them is a lesser creation. The second film features Fred Ward again as Earl, along with Michael Gross returning as Burt Gummer, but the concept is creaky and the writing less than stellar. The next two films are even more patchy, with the fourth film being a ‘prequel’ to the first movie, revealing that the Graboids have been menacing Perfection since at least the late 1880s (in the days when it was called “Rejection”). None of these films shine any new or beneficial light on the original concept, nor do they substantially reward any repeat viewing – they’re for completists (and Burt Gummer fans) only.

The full five Horrors from me!