The 1980’s were a great decade for horror and monster movies, many films were released and some just went under the radar for a lot of fans and Night of the Creeps is one of those that passed me by in my youth but turns out to be a lot better than most of the low budget fare released at the time.
A young couple on a date in 1959, see a meteor plummet to Earth and explode not far from them. The boy decides to investigate but gets infected by an alien virus. Fast forward to 1986 and two freshmen roam the college campus and stumble across the corpse of the boy cryogenically frozen in a lab. Once thawed out, the corpse comes to life and sets off a series of events that may turn the whole campus into zombies.
While the low budget shows at times, its the characters that make the film very likeable, plus great writing and dialogue. Tom Atkins stands out as the alcoholic detective who has more reasons than most to bring down the alien invasion. At one point he says “What is this…a homicide or a bad B-movie?” which just shows the fun tongue in cheek attitude of the whole film.
The special effects are not bad considering the budget and the film moves at a great pace, especially in the second half. The Blu ray is the directors cut the only difference is the ending scene with the spaceship returning.
The Blu Ray released by Eureka in the UK is sourced from an older Sony master but still looks great with a very clean print, filmic grain and solid colour palette. Audio gives you DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and LPCM 2.0. stereo. The DTS track is the one to go for with much more going on in the action scenes especially and the soundtrack comes across very clean.
Great selection of extras as follows –
- Audio commentary by writer/director Fred Dekker
- Audio commentary by actors Jason Lively, Tom Atkins, Steve Marshall and Jill Whitlow
- Thrill Me: Making Night of the Creeps – an hour-long series of video pieces on the making of the film featuring new interviews with cast and crew
- “Tom Atkins: Man of Action” featurette
- Video Interview with Fred Dekker
- Deleted Scenes
- Original theatrical ending
- Trivia track subtitles
- Theatrical trailer
- PLUS: A limited-edition booklet featuring a new essay by critic Craig Ian Mann [First Print Run Only]
A fun, well-written sci-fi horror from director Fred Dekker and this release is recommended not just for the film but the great selection of extras.
FILM: 7.5 PICTURE: 8 AUDIO: 7.5 EXTRAS: 9
