There's been many "little monster" movies over the years, but the best still remains Joe Dante's classic, Gremlins. It really is timeless. Executive producer Steven Spielberg, yes he did work on this movie, allowed Dante to use his creativity to construct a movie that can withstand evolving special effects and the changing views on what's scary and what's not.
Welcome to Kingston Falls, the spitting image of a happy, quaint little northern town where it actually does snow on Christmas day (unlike here in Texas). Enter Billy Peltzer, well played by Zach Gallagher, who really didn't go on to do anything significant other than Gremlins 2 The New Batch. Billy lives at home and holds down a job at the local bank. He's constantly harassed by his elderly neighbor, Mrs. Deagley, and dreams of going on a date with the town hottie, Kate played by Phoebe Cates. In the opening scene set in Chinatown, Rand Peltzer, Billy's dad, is in a local curio shop when he stumbles upon a furry little creature known simply as Mogwai. He buys the Mogwai from the shop owner's grandson, against the shop owner's will, and takes the creature back to Kingston Falls. There are three simple rules: 1) don't expose him to sunlight, 2) don't get him wet, and the most important rule of all, 3) never, ever feed him after midnight. Of course, being the ignorant folks that they are, they don't follow any of these rules. And then we see the terrible consequences of neglecting the third rule. Hideous creatures, Gremlins, are birthed and begin terrorizing the town. A night of chaos ensues, and the intensity builds up. A fight to the death between Billy and the lead Gremlin, Stripe, climaxes the movie.
It's quite rare to find a quirky, campy movie like Gremlins to succeed and do as well as this has. It has all the major elements of Hollywood success though; comedy, action, romance, scares, and drama. It's a little sad too. I would recommend this movie to most anyone I think. Anyone with a little imagination and enjoys a fun movie.
My rating: 8 stars