Slugs (1988 Film)
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''Slugs'', also referred to as ''Slugs: The Movie'' (Spanish: ''Slugs, Muerte Viscosa'', lit. "Slugs, Slimy Death") is a 1988 English-language Spanish natural horror film directed by Juan Piquer Simon, and co-written by Simon with Ron Gantman. Based on the 1982 novel of the same name by Shaun Hutson, it tells the story of a small town whose locals are terrorised by aggressive carnivorous slugs.


Plot

In the fictional small town of Ashton, an alcoholic named Ron Bell is eaten alive late one night by a large swarm of carnivorous slugs in his living room. The following day, health inspector and sewer manager Mike Brady and Sheriff Reese head to Ron's home, preparing to deliver an eviction notice, only to discover his near-skinless body. Exploring the house, Mike finds multiple trails of slime leading from the basement, but he and Reese are unable to determine what exactly happened to Ron. Later that day, Mike and his friend and co-worker Don Palmer are called in to fix a blockage in the sewers, where Don discovers several animal carcasses stuck in the pipes. Meanwhile, local gardener Harold Morris puts on a gardening glove which, unbeknownst to him, has a slug hiding within, which starts eating his hand. As he thrashes about in pain, Harold accidentally knocks over some of his chemical jars, causing a fire which ignites a tank of gasoline, resulting in an explosion that kills him and his wife Jean. Upon returning home, Mike is informed of the deaths by his wife Kim, a high school teacher. They then both discover a group of abnormally large and aggressive slugs in their garden. Mike gathers some of the slugs in a jar and leaves them with the school's science teacher John Foley for investigation. During his investigations, Foley witnesses one of the slugs attack and eat the class hamster. Elsewhere in town, the slugs attack and eat two teenagers, and Mike's friend David unknowingly eats part of a slug that was hidden in a salad made by his wife. Mike and Reese are brought in to investigate the deaths of the teenagers the next morning, where Mike postulates that the slugs are responsible for the murders, only to be disregarded as crazy. Later, Mike is called over by Don, who has discovered that the locations of the murders line up with the layout of the town's sewer system. Don theorises that the slug's aggressiveness may be a result of chemicals being leaked into the sewer from a long-abandoned toxic waste dump that exists close by to the town. Meanwhile, whilst dining at a restaurant, an unwell David begins profusely bleeding from his nose and collapses, before multiple blood flukes abruptly burst from his eye sockets. Having learned of the death and witnessed slugs crawling through the sink in his own home, Mike approaches the town mayor, begging him to cut off the downtown water supply so that the slugs can be dealt with, but is once again dismissed as crazy, causing him to leave in frustration. Later, at the school lab, Foley shows Mike a
lithium Lithium (from , , ) is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol Li and atomic number 3. It is a soft, silvery-white alkali metal. Under standard temperature and pressure, standard conditions, it is the least dense metal and the ...
-based arsenic that Mike hopes to use to kill the slugs in the sewers, which he has discovered are the slugs' place of origin. Mike convinces Don to join him in helping getting rid of the slugs, as Foley creates a large batch of the arsenic. That night, Mike and Don enter the sewer system and locate the slugs' breeding ground, but Don accidentally falls in and is eaten alive. Mike then climbs out of a nearby manhole and gets Foley to pump in the arsenic from a firetruck hose into the sewer, causing an explosive reaction that successfully destroys the slugs, despite causing serious damage to the rest of the town in the process. Mike reunites with Kim as the emergency services arrive. It is revealed that, unbeknownst to the town's inhabitants, a single slug has survived the explosion.


Cast

* Michael Garfield as Mike Brady * Kim Terry as Kim Brady * Philip MacHale as Don Palmer * Emilio Linder as David Watson * Alicia Moro as Maureen Watson * John Battaglia as Sheriff Reese * Santiago Álvarez as John Foley * Manuel de Blas as Mayor Eaton * Kari Rose as Donna Moss * Kris Mann as Bobby Talbot * Juan Maján as Harold Morris * Lucía Prado as Jean Morris * Frank Braña as Frank Phillips * Andy Alsup as Officer Dobbs * Stan Schwartz as Ron Bell * Harriet L. Stark as Florence Fortune *
Patty Shepard Patricia Moran Shepard (October 1, 1945 – January 3, 2013) was an American film actress based in Madrid, Spain. She appeared in more than fifty Spanish, Italy, Italian and France, French films from the 1960s to the 1980s, notably several Cult f ...
as Sue Channing *
Silvana Mangano Silvana Mangano (; 21 April 1930 – 16 December 1989) was an Italian film actress. She was one of a generation of thespians who arose from the neorealist movement, and went on to become a major female star, regarded as a sex symbol for the 19 ...
as a diner in restaurant (uncredited)


Release

The film opened in the United States on 5 February 1988.


Critical reception

On review aggregator
Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...
, the film holds a 38% approval rating based on 8 reviews. ''
Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
'' praised the "convincing special effects and make-up and snappy direction" and said it "has enough thrills and spills in it to keep youth audiences alert".


Box office

The film flopped at the U.S. box office. It opened in seven theaters in the United States and grossed $15,842 in its opening weekend.


Awards

The film won a
Goya Award The Goya Awards () are Spain's main national annual film awards. They are presented by the Academy of Cinematographic Arts and Sciences of Spain. The first ceremony was held in 1987, a year after the founding of the Academy of Cinematographic Ar ...
for Best Special Effects by Gonzalo Gonzalo, Basilio Cortijo and Carlos de Marchis.


Home video

Anchor Bay Entertainment The revived Anchor Bay Entertainment is an American independent film production and distribution company owned by Umbrelic Entertainment co-founders Thomas Zambeck and Brian Katz. Anchor Bay Entertainment markets and releases "new release genre ...
released a DVD of the film in 2000. In 2011,
Image Entertainment RLJ Entertainment (formerly Image Entertainment) is an American film production company and home video distributor, distributing film and television productions in North America, with approximately 3,200 exclusive DVD titles and approximately 34 ...
released a DVD of the film under the Midnight Madness Series. In 2016, British home video distributor,
Arrow Films Arrow Films is a British independent film distributor and restorer specialising in world cinema, arthouse, horror and classic films. As Arrow Video, it sells Ultra HD Blu-rays, Blu-rays and DVDs online; it also operates its own subscript ...
, released a special edition Blu-ray of the film, which contained a commentary track and interviews with several people associated with the film.


References


External links

* {{Juan Piquer Simón 1988 films 1988 horror films 1980s English-language films 1980s monster movies 1980s Spanish films English-language horror films English-language Spanish films Films based on British novels Foreign films set in the United States Films shot in New York (state) Films set in New York (state) Films shot in Madrid Natural horror films Spanish monster movies Spanish splatter films 1988 science fiction films English-language science fiction horror films Films directed by Juan Piquer Simon