NIGHT OF THE CREEPS

1959. An alien spaceship drops a cylinder containing strange parasites on Earth: a young man is contaminated by the parasites while his girlfriend is torn apart by a psychopath armed with an axe who has just escaped from the criminal asylum. 1986. Two university freshmen, Chris and C.J., to join a fraternity must steal a corpse from the university laboratories; but fate will have it that the two clumsy young men choose precisely the corpse of the boy contaminated thirty years earlier by the parasites and kept frozen for years. From that moment, the parasites return in circulation, laying eggs in the brains of unsuspecting humans transformed into bloodthirsty zombies. It will be up to Chris and C.J., with the help of a policeman who had already lived this situation in the 1950s, to face and destroy the dangerous alien worms. "Night of the Creeps" is a small fantasy-horror film that mixes the classic themes of zombie horror with evident references to 1950s science fiction cinema, often using the language of John Hughes' youth comedies, very popular in the 1980s. Often underestimated or little known, "Night of the Creeps" has earned a place in the hearts of horror fans (especially those nostalgic for 1980s cinema), thanks especially to the genuineness of the staging, deliberately over the top, and the marked citationist taste. Director and screenwriter Fred Dekker had the idea of giving the characters in his film last names that refer to the great directors of the horror scene: we will thus have a protagonist with the fantastic name of Chris Romero, his friend C.J. has the last name Hooper, the inevitable girl to conquer is named Cynthia Cronenberg and so on. Even the name of the college does not escape the rule (Corman University, in honor of the great Roger Corman) and in one scene you can easily recognize "Plan 9 from outer space" by Ed Wood broadcast on TV. In short, the winks, sometimes easy and cunning, towards the expert viewer are there, but the curious thing is that these cinephile mechanisms have set a precedent! In addition to the citationist games that will see Wes Craven/Kevin Williamson for the "Scream" saga, "Cursed" or the science fiction "The Faculty" (directed by Rodriguez), the same mechanism of the famous last name will be taken up wholesale by James Wong for his "Final Destination" (and in part for "Final Destination 3"). The "absolutely 80's" atmosphere that is breathed in "Night of the Creeps" is introduced by a black-and-white prologue that transports us directly to the end of the 1950s, but this is not dictated simply by the photography, by the characters' clothing, by the vintage car they drive and by the hit of that period that constitutes the musical commentary, but above all by the situation of great familiarity in which the viewer, accustomed to mid-century sci-fi (continuously broadcast by American TVs of that period), will be involved. The couple parked in the car who see a luminous body fall from the sky is an obvious homage to "Blob", as well as the killer escaped from the asylum who approaches the victim while the radio broadcasts the news of the escape, has a lot of the taste of urban legend, those told in front of the crackling fire during summer camps. "Night of the Creeps", in addition to gaining some fame among genre enthusiasts, has also had the honor of receiving a heartfelt homage in the recent "Slither", a fantasy-horror with worm-like alien parasites for which director James Gunn has simply reworked the basic plot of "Night of the Creeps". Director Fred Dekker makes his debut behind the camera precisely with "Night of the Creeps", after writing the screenplay for "House – Who is buried in that house?" by Steve Miner, and subsequently he will only propose himself again in the fantasy comedy for children "The Monster Squad" (Monster Squad), the following year, and finally in the mediocre "Robocop 3" of 1993. In the cast, alongside the young leading actors, stands out Tom Atkins, a fetish actor of John Carpenter ("The Fog" and "Escape from New York") and of so much 1980s horror cinema, in the role of Detective Cameron, a crisis policeman with a cynical remark. The film also has an alternative ending in which both Detective Cameron and the aliens glimpsed in the prologue return.