SWAMP THING-1982-This adaptation of the DC comics character takes place in “the unexplored reaches of an un-mapped swamp”. Adrienne Barbeau (who was in a segment of George Romero’s CREEPSHOW the same year) is Cable some kind of government liaison assigned to the secret lab of Dr. Alec Holland (Ray Wise) who’s experiments involve recombinant DNA and making plants more aggressive. Unfortunately a thought to be deceased evil genius Arcane (over acting Louis Jordan) is alive and takes over the compound. Holland is accidentally doused with is own rejuvenation formula and goes up in flames. He’s reborn however as a big green galoot (Dick Durock) who’s very strong, impervious to bullets and can bring people back to life! Cable escapes into the swamp and gets help from a young black kid named Jude (Reggie Batts).
While it’s certainly no classic SWAMP THING is ok especially for a comic book adaptation. Most of the SFX are pretty cheesy. The monster Arcane turns into at the end for the final battle is horrible and many of the scenes seem all to deliberately to be spotlighting Barbeau’s breasts but it is cool to see Nicolas Worth and David Hess (as Arcane’s lead henchmen) have decent speaking roles!
Writer/director Wes Craven was still 2 years away from NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET and he still had his roots planted in low budget exploitation.
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4 comments:
I'm with you. It's an OK movie. Could have been better, could have been worse. The sequel was pretty damn awful, though.
I do however love how MGM screwed up the U.S. release by accidentally issued the "European" print while retaining the PG rating. Apparently, parents rented the DVD for their children and the wee ones were subjected to topless shots of Barbeau and even an orgy scene!
As I recall the sequel was mostely an intentional comedy. I didn't know about that mix-up! The studio probably considered a movie "based on a comic book" fairly harmless. They should have watched it before releasing it!
Don't forget that it also spawned a cable series!
I actually did forget! I even watched it for a while!
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