You’d be excused for thinking the world was coming to its exhaust-choked, living dead end last night, particularly if you were in the vicinity of the Alamo Ritz on Sixth St. Not only was the ever-ear-splitting Republic of Texas motorcycle rally in town — think Roger Corman‘s The Wild Angels meets Akira, with ribcage-rattling sound design courtesy of Satan himself — but also the Alamo’s long awaited (and long sold-out) director’s cut and cast reunion of the criminally under-seen Night of the Creeps, which went off like a fistful of firecrackers shoved in a dead man’s mouth. Bang!
In anticipation of the cult classic’s coming October 20th DVD release from Sony Home Entertainment, director Fred Dekker (Monster Squad) and stars Tom Atkins (Escape From New York), Jason Lively, Steve Marshall, Jill Whitlow spent the day recording commentary tracks and marveling over the splendid chaos that is the annual ROT Rally.
After a brief intro from Aint It Cool News’s Quint, the house lights dimmed on what Dekker dubbed his “special director’s cut” of the film and the audience, many of whom had never seen the film before, went dead…silent. That’s not surprising, because Night of the Creeps, released in 1986, is one of the best horror/comedy/noirs ever made. Dekker’s film is a loving ode to the genre, snappily scripted and smartly shot, and featuring slug-like alien body snatchers, undead frat-rats, flamethrowers, and the brilliant character actor Tom Atkins (recently seen in My Bloody Valentine 3-D) doing his best Philip Marlowe as Greeks versus Geeks versus gore galore explodes around him. Hands down, it’s one of the most original and fun genre movies the 80s produced.
“This is the first time any of us have seen the movie together, on the big screen, with an audience,” enthused a giddy (and slightly sloshed) Lively.
“If you liked this movie,” added Dekker, “it’s the best it’s ever looked. If you don’t like this movie…it’s the best it’s ever looked,” and Sony’s print was indeed flawless. (Although you got the feeling from the fan-friendly crowd that Sony could’ve delivered a washed-out wipeout of a print and still received a standing ovation, so enamored of the film was the audience.)
Atkins, asked what it was that kept him coming back again and again to the horror genre, wryly noted “It’s a job, really. Anybody invites me to do a job, I usually do it. I’ve never had the luxury of looking over 20 scripts and deciding which one I wanted to do. But I love horror! I guess John Carpenter got me started [with 1980’s The Fog]. I think I always wanted to be Vincent Price. But he was much more elegant than I could ever be. But I was always a huge fan of his horror films and, too, his films that weren’t genre pictures.”
Character-actor elegance aside, Atkins flair for hard-boiled panache is no mean feat, and Creeps benefits tremendously from the rough-hewn actor’s drolly dark and world-weary performance. “Thrill me,” his Detective Ray Cameron says time and again — it is the movie’s catchphrase, after all — and the Alamo Ritz audience, including yours truly, was thrilled to the boneyard and beyond.
This article appears in June 12 • 2009.