Critters
Released in theaters on April 11, 1986
Stream on HBO Max
Runtime: 1 Hour 26 Minutes
Rated PG-13
An army of man eating aliens escape an extraterrestrial prison and end up hiding on earth where they eat everything in sight and terrorizing a farm family. Not too far behind the “critters” come two shape shifting bounty hunters that plan to bring them back in. This movie, like many “army of small monsters” movies, came out after seeing the success of Gremlins.
Themes:
Family, extra terrestrials, doppelgangers, prison, space travel, bounty hunters, conspiracies, invasion, farm life, dating, parents, protecting your children, appetite, destruction, guns, and boyfriends.
Language:
If you watched this one on cable you missed a lot of the language. Here is what I counted: da-n 6 times, sh-t 6 times, hell 4 times, a-s 2 times, and 4 religious exclamations. When the critters talk it is translated at the bottom of the screen. One time one of them says the F-word. There is also name calling such as jerk, snot, dork, and baby.
Stuff to be aware of:
This is pretty much your stereotypical 80s horror dark comedy. Expect people to die. A guy gets drug under a car and eaten, a cow is cut in half, a critter bites a man’s fingers off, another man gets bitten and you can see blood on his clothes, characters get shot with quills, blood can be seen on the critter’s mouths, and one critter eats a firecracker and dies, but he does not explode. Some critters get blown up by a shotgun.
There are a few sexual things in the movie. Parents reference talking to their daughter about sex. A teen girl squeezes her boyfriend’s leg under the table and they go out to the barn to make out. There is no nudity.
Overall:
This movie came out years before Lilo and Stitch, but it is hard not to watch this movie and say, “this is a badly made adult version of Lilo and Stitch.” There are multiple aliens, however like in Lilo and Stitch they escape prison, they steal a ship, they are hunted down by two other aliens, and they destroy a ton of stuff. It is also hard not to compare it to Gremlins, since it came out not long after.
Gremlins and Lilo and Stitch are far better movies, but this one isn’t all bad. It is very much an 80s B movie and a product of its time. It is worth a watch if you are looking for something campy, however if you decide not to watch it you’ll still be okay.