Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988)
Rated PG-13
Score: 3 out of 5
The title just says it all, really. Killer Klowns from Outer Space is a throwback to, and parody of, old '50s alien invasion B-movies, only here the evil aliens are, well, circus clowns with all the associated imagery. The film itself is now something of a go-to punchline for jokes about bad horror movies, and somehow, I doubt that the filmmakers necessarily mind given that that was exactly the kind of film they were setting out to make -- except now, with the best creature effects the '80s had on offer. The plot and characters are often as dumb as the film's inspirations, but its creative and highly inspired special effects work, combined with a tone that isn't so much winking at the audience as it is pointing a pair of finger guns at them and going "heyyyyyy!!!" at them with a giant grin on its face, makes this one that I had a lot of fun with. It's family-friendly enough that you could watch it with your kids (who will probably have a blast), while at the same time having enough meat to it to make it a fun ride for the grown-ups too, even if they shouldn't expect too much out of it.
The plot, lifted from any number of '50s films, concerns aliens landing in the all-American town of Crescent Cove, where they get right to work abducting people while the townsfolk fight to survive and send 'em back where they came from. All the stock characters are here: the hunky yet chaste teenage hero Mike, his damsel girlfriend Debbie, the goofball classmates, the skeptical cops, the farmer who is the first to encounter and get killed by the aliens, the curious little girl, the "bad kids" who try to pick a fight with the aliens and get what they deserve, and various screaming extras. Despite the presence of contemporary '80s cars and technology, this film is otherwise committed to fully replicating the aesthetic of its vintage inspirations. The violence is all bloodless, the focus put on creative creature effects rather than gore. The characters are one-note and their actors give pretty hokey performances, but they didn't need to be anything more, especially given the kinds of films this is homaging. It was a film made by people who, just a few short years later, would become the target audience for Mystery Science Theater 3000, people whose love of cheesy old sci-fi horror movies fluttered between ironic and sincere and decided to have a go at making one of their own, and fortunately had enough talent as filmmakers to back it up.
That comes through mostly when looking at the actual villains, the one part where this film conspicuously diverges from its inspirations. They are clowns. Not metaphorical clowns, in the sense of aliens with a darkly humorous streak that like to prank their victims and are using the invasion of Earth as an excuse to goof off and have a good time, like the Martians in Mars Attacks!. No, they look and act like circus clowns, and all of their sci-fi gadgets and weapons are based on circus imagery. They have a spaceship that looks like a circus tent. They pack ray guns that wrap people in cotton candy so that they can be eaten later, and guns that fire popcorn-looking particles that turn out to be small creatures that eat their prey and grow into monsters. They get around in clown cars that are much, much bigger inside than out. They use balloon animals to hunt. And that's before you get inside their spaceship. All of this goes hand-in-hand with the actual design of the Killer Klowns themselves, vaguely human-looking monsters with grotesque features that resemble an exaggerated parody of clown makeup: big lips, unnaturally-colored hair, and bright red noses are just the start. This isn't Pennywise we're talking about here; these guys barely pass for human. Each of them is distinctive and memorable, lending tons of personality to the invaders such that they can be genuinely creepy at times, most notably in a scene where one of them uses a human corpse as a ventriloquist dummy to taunt one of the main characters. Like the remake of The Blob, this is a '50s story brought into more contemporary times with '80s creature effects that stand as one of the film's high points in terms of both production values and comedy, not surprising given how the filmmakers, the Chiodo Brothers, are best known as special effects artists.
It helps this film immensely that the comedy works so well, because from a storytelling standpoint, there's really not a lot here. It's a movie that's carried by a whimsical atmosphere more than any real scary sequences or even jokes; for the most part, it's about as straight-faced as its '50s inspirations, only this time, it's meant to be deliberately cheesy. Any actual horror is an afterthought outside a few scenes, the scarier elements used to set up goofier gags rather than try and scare the audience, and as noted earlier, there really weren't many interesting characters to root for as opposed to rooting against the Killer Klowns, who were clearly the ones that the film was most focused on. This is the flip side of the film's '50s B-movie homage, as it replicates quite a few of their vices along with their virtues. To go back to Mars Attacks! and the remake of The Blob, this felt like it existed in a space somewhere between those two films, lacking the interesting human characters and legitimate scares of The Blob but not fully committing to going broad and outright rooting for the aliens to kill all the humans the way that Mars Attacks! did.
The plot, lifted from any number of '50s films, concerns aliens landing in the all-American town of Crescent Cove, where they get right to work abducting people while the townsfolk fight to survive and send 'em back where they came from. All the stock characters are here: the hunky yet chaste teenage hero Mike, his damsel girlfriend Debbie, the goofball classmates, the skeptical cops, the farmer who is the first to encounter and get killed by the aliens, the curious little girl, the "bad kids" who try to pick a fight with the aliens and get what they deserve, and various screaming extras. Despite the presence of contemporary '80s cars and technology, this film is otherwise committed to fully replicating the aesthetic of its vintage inspirations. The violence is all bloodless, the focus put on creative creature effects rather than gore. The characters are one-note and their actors give pretty hokey performances, but they didn't need to be anything more, especially given the kinds of films this is homaging. It was a film made by people who, just a few short years later, would become the target audience for Mystery Science Theater 3000, people whose love of cheesy old sci-fi horror movies fluttered between ironic and sincere and decided to have a go at making one of their own, and fortunately had enough talent as filmmakers to back it up.
That comes through mostly when looking at the actual villains, the one part where this film conspicuously diverges from its inspirations. They are clowns. Not metaphorical clowns, in the sense of aliens with a darkly humorous streak that like to prank their victims and are using the invasion of Earth as an excuse to goof off and have a good time, like the Martians in Mars Attacks!. No, they look and act like circus clowns, and all of their sci-fi gadgets and weapons are based on circus imagery. They have a spaceship that looks like a circus tent. They pack ray guns that wrap people in cotton candy so that they can be eaten later, and guns that fire popcorn-looking particles that turn out to be small creatures that eat their prey and grow into monsters. They get around in clown cars that are much, much bigger inside than out. They use balloon animals to hunt. And that's before you get inside their spaceship. All of this goes hand-in-hand with the actual design of the Killer Klowns themselves, vaguely human-looking monsters with grotesque features that resemble an exaggerated parody of clown makeup: big lips, unnaturally-colored hair, and bright red noses are just the start. This isn't Pennywise we're talking about here; these guys barely pass for human. Each of them is distinctive and memorable, lending tons of personality to the invaders such that they can be genuinely creepy at times, most notably in a scene where one of them uses a human corpse as a ventriloquist dummy to taunt one of the main characters. Like the remake of The Blob, this is a '50s story brought into more contemporary times with '80s creature effects that stand as one of the film's high points in terms of both production values and comedy, not surprising given how the filmmakers, the Chiodo Brothers, are best known as special effects artists.
It helps this film immensely that the comedy works so well, because from a storytelling standpoint, there's really not a lot here. It's a movie that's carried by a whimsical atmosphere more than any real scary sequences or even jokes; for the most part, it's about as straight-faced as its '50s inspirations, only this time, it's meant to be deliberately cheesy. Any actual horror is an afterthought outside a few scenes, the scarier elements used to set up goofier gags rather than try and scare the audience, and as noted earlier, there really weren't many interesting characters to root for as opposed to rooting against the Killer Klowns, who were clearly the ones that the film was most focused on. This is the flip side of the film's '50s B-movie homage, as it replicates quite a few of their vices along with their virtues. To go back to Mars Attacks! and the remake of The Blob, this felt like it existed in a space somewhere between those two films, lacking the interesting human characters and legitimate scares of The Blob but not fully committing to going broad and outright rooting for the aliens to kill all the humans the way that Mars Attacks! did.
The Bottom Line
A film that's definitely a bit of an acquired taste but still deserves its cult classic status, Killer Klowns from Outer Space promises some ridiculous fun and delivers, even if there's not a whole lot more to it than that.
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