For yesterday's Cinema Saturday post, we looked at a movie where a small town is under assault by forces from beyond this world and the kids know bad shit is happening but the adults just will not listen.
That was Ghostbusters: Afterlife.
For today's Cinema Sunday post, we're going to look at a movie where a small town is under assault by forces from beyond this world and the kids know bad shit is happening but the adults just will not listen.
From 1958. we present....The Blob, an American science fiction horror film starring Steve McQueen in his first leading role.
Before we get into the details of the movie:
There is (duh! duh! duh!) the BLOB!
It eats people!
Kids tell cops.
Cops do not believe kids.
The BLOB keeps eating people.
OK, it's really not a hard movie to follow.
Anyway, first thing's first: the theme song!
"Beware of the Blob" was written by Burt Bacharach and Mack David and was recorded by a studio group who adopted the name The Five Blobs.
The group was actually just one person, singer Bernie Knee, overdubbing himself.
The song became a nationwide hit, peaking at #33 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts.
So our film begins in a small Pennsylvania town with teenager Steve Andrews (played by Steve McQueen) is....
<PAUSE>
Let me take a moment to address this. Steve McQueen was a cinematic icon of his generation and worthy of all the accolades he would go on to receive in his career and a life that was cut short when he died in the 1970's.
And although The Blob is a silly sci-fi/horror trifle, McQueen does good work in this movie.
But....
Steve McQueen is NO teenager.
By the time he made The Blob, Steve McQueen had seen things, lived a hard life, did time in the army, worked in manual labor. Life was hard for Steve McQueen and it showed. It's established in the film that his character Steve Andrews is 17 years old. There is no way I can buy Steve McQueen as 17. I can't even accept him as 29 which was his age when he made The Blob. Seriously, I would pegged him as age 35 at least.
<PLAY>
So our film begins in a small Pennsylvania town with teenager Steve Andrews ("Have you seen my little blue pills?") making out with his girlfriend Jane Martin at a lovers' lane when they see a meteorite crash beyond the next hill.
Steve ("Oh, my back!") and Jane goes to look for it.
Meanwhile Barney, an old man living nearby, finds the meteorite first.
He pokes it with stick.
And out comes a bubbling goo!
The Blob, it is!
An alien threat!
Steve and Jane find Barney writhing in pain as the Blob has attached itself something fierce to his hand. Jane helps Barney to the car (Steve's arthritis is acting up) and they drive through the night ("I hate driving at night" OK, we get it! Steve McQueen is old and I'll stop the old age interjections) to get poor old Barney to Doctor Hallen and his nurse Kate. After they drop off Barney with the Doctor, Steve and Jane leave to run an errand for the doc.
Long story made short: the Blob grow and absorbs all of Barney.
The Blob creeps and leaps and glides and slides across the floor and it eats Kate!
Oops! There goes Doc Hallen!
Steve and Jane return to the doctor's office for Steve to witness the doctor trying to escape through the window with the Blob covering him.
They go to the police station and return with Lieutenant Dave Barton and Sergeant Jim Bert, but they find no sign of the Blob nor its victims.
Man, Bert really doesn't like teenagers (or whatever Steve is) and instantly figures it's part of some prank these punk teenagers like to pull on cops.
The Blob creeps and leaps and glides and slides across town and it eats a mechanic at a repair shop.
Steve notices that his father's grocery store is unlocked so he and Jane go inside to investigate. The janitor is nowhere to be seen.
But oh crap! It's... (duh! duh duh!) the BLOB!
Steve and Jane run away the Blob into a walk-in freezer.
The Blob creeps and leaps and glides and slides away from Steve and Jane.
Away?
(HINT! That's a clue!)
Steve and Jane gather their friends and set off the town's fire and air-raid alarms.
The responding townspeople and police still refuse to believe them.
What the fuck? Really?!?!
The Blob creeps and leaps and glides and slides into the local movie theater and eats the projectionist then oozes into the auditorium.
Screaming people fleeing the theater in a panic finally convinces the cops there's some shit going down and...
Fuck! Steve was right It's... (duh! duh duh!) the BLOB!
Steve and Jane run into a local diner but damn!
The Blob creeps and leaps and glides and slides over the local diner.
(The Blob has gotten quite big now!)
Dave and Bert plan to electrocute the Blob by felling an overhead high-voltage power line.
The Blob is unaffected.
The diner is set on fire!
Great job, heroes!
Steve, Jane and everyone else in the diner have retreated to the cellar where a carbon dioxide fire extinguisher is usedon the encroaching fire.
Steve notices that the Blob recoils.
Hey, didn't the Blob recoil from the freezer at the grocery store?
SCIENCE!!!!
Everyone in town gets their hands on every CO2 fire extinguisher they can find and that is that for the Blob!
The Air Force drops the frozen Blob in the Arctic and everything will be fine ("as long as the Arctic stays cold").
The "It's That Person Who Was In That Thing" Department
Aneta Corseaut (Jane Martin) would go on to become Helen Crump on The Andy Griffith Show.
The Blob was distributed by Paramount Pictures as a double feature with I Married a Monster from Outer Space.
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