Editor's Note: This was originally published for FANGORIA on November 3, 2009, and we're proud to share it as part of The Gingold Files.
Back in August 1986, two horror movies debuted on the same Friday in New York-area theaters. The film that got more publicity, and that most of the genre fans I knew wanted to see, was The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2. But one pal and I were more interested in checking out the one that promised a “Free Creep Prevention Mask” to the first patrons on opening night.
So we paid our admission, were each handed a paper surgical mask with the Night of the Creeps logo emblazoned on it, took our seats—and enjoyed one of the year’s most surprisingly entertaining fright features, one that homaged practically every subgenre imaginable, yet kept a sure hand on its tone and never descended into spoofery. Those who caught Creeps in its limited theatrical run (during which it played a few cities as Homecoming Night) formed the beginnings of a cult following that grew as the film hit VHS and cable TV (the latter with the original, superior ending)—yet for some reason, only now has it arrived on DVD and Blu-ray from Sony Pictures. But the long wait was worth it.
The debut feature by writer/director Fred Dekker, who had previously received a story credit on House, Night of the Creeps opens on board a spaceship from which a little alien blasts a capsule containing something horrible into the void; continues into a black-and-white 1959 sequence in which a collegiate couple encounter the contents of that capsule and an ax murderer; then settles onto a party-hearty campus in the “present day” (i.e., ’86, when party-hearty campuses were all the rage on the big screen). Dekker’s cinematic stew comes to encompass other standards such as zombies, parasitical creatures, exploding heads, frat-boy jerks, a somewhat dorky young hero, his wisecracking best bud, the beautiful girl he pines for and, most notably, an alcoholic detective with a past—and yet the filmmaker manages to stir the pot in such a way that the final meal is fresh and tasty, with plenty of effective gags and gross-outs. He may wear his love for genre cinema on his sleeve (naming practically every character after a prominent director—though he was one of the first to do so), but it’s clear he’s got the chops to match his passion.
And for all the hijinx, critters and splatter, Night of the Creeps’ secret weapon is Tom Atkins as Detective Ray Cameron, who investigates the odd goings-on at Corman University and comes to discover they’re tied directly to his troubled past. The complexity of this plotting is rare for a lighthearted ’80s genre lark, and Atkins perfectly embodies the hard-bitten, hard-drinking Cameron, mixing a world-weary tough-guy attitude with pathos and cynical humor. He also plays well off of Jason Lively’s likable lead turn as lovelorn Chris Romero, as do Steve Marshall as his sidekick J.C. (James Carpenter) Hooper and the adorable Jill Whitlow as Cynthia Cronenberg, the object of Chris’ desire. In the midst of all the grisly, goofy chaos, Lively also has at least one unexpectedly moving moment, involving a message on a tape recorder.
Red Shirt Pictures’ Michael R. Felsher, who previously helped usher Dekker’s The Monster Squad to disc, has corralled a terrific batch of supplements to accompany Sony’s 1.85:1 transfer, which on either disc is very fine and sharp. Dekker notes on one of the two commentaries that high definition allows you to see new details you never could before, and the image does justice to his eye-catching use of color as well. He’s joined on his talk track by Felsher, who does a great job moderating as Dekker covers a whole spectrum of topics, from technical to personal—even admitting to an actress who turned him down for a date. He’s also honest about the parts of Creeps he’s unhappy with, particularly when it comes to pacing, and drops a number of surprise revelations—like his just-offscreen placement of war atrocity photos to get Lively in the right melancholic mood for the aforementioned tape-recorder scene.
Lively, Marshall, Whitlow and Atkins team up for a second commentary that doesn’t contain nearly as much hard information, but is still fun to listen to, akin to crashing on the couch and watching the movie with the gang. They recall laughing throughout the shoot and do so through their track as well, bantering, recalling who was into whom on set and sharing inside jokes. One of the latter involves zombie performer Beal Carrotes, who is also brought up by Dekker and Felsher, yet no one seems to want to discuss him in detail. You do, however, learn his secret on a feature-length subtitled trivia track, which doesn’t have much to add to what’s covered in the other extras, but just enough that it’s worth running while you’re listening to one of the commentaries.
The cast’s camaraderie is equally apparent in the hour-long, multipart documentary Thrill Me: Making “Night of the Creeps”; in the “Casting the Creeps” section, one of them is sometimes seen front and center while the co-stars yuk it up in the background. It’s fun to see how the central trio look today, and their enthusiasm for the film is as strong here as it is on their commentary. All five segments convey plenty of info not covered in the commentaries: “Birth of the Creeps” reveals the film’s genesis—in the beginning, there was Cameron’s signature “Thrill me!” line—while in “Creating the Creeps,” the FX artists (including two-thirds of the future KNB), who did double duty as onscreen Beta House guys/zombies, recall that the tightly scheduled shoot wasn’t nearly as much fun for them as it apparently was for the actors.
“Escape of the Creeps” explains how all their effort never got seen by enough of a theatrical audience, as Dekker, producer Charles Gordon and editor Michael N. Knue discuss the previews, the resulting reshoots and the altered ending, which the writer/director considers a “betrayal” of the rest of the movie. But it all has a happy ending with “Legend of the Creeps,” which celebrates the film’s enduring appeal, complete with testimonials from fans at an Alamo Drafthouse reunion screening.
Dekker’s preferred conclusion (the one that played those cable airings) accompanies the feature itself, with the theatrical closer included separately on the discs, along with other deleted scenes. While these are fun to watch, it’s easy to see why they were trimmed, though at least two—both set in the sorority house, one in ’59 and the other in ’86, have also been visible in TV airings. (Oddly, the one sliced sequence mentioned on both commentaries, in which J.C. surreptitiously tapes a frat guy and later plays it back to get himself and Chris off the hook, is nowhere to be seen.) Finally, there’s “Tom Atkins: Man of Action,” a solo interview conducted in the actor’s hometown of Pittsburgh, in which he reveals that, just as Chris attempts to join Beta House to win over Cynthia, he first joined a college drama club to be closer to a girl he was sweet on. He shares great stories about several of his other movies, including a few with John Carpenter, and even this off-topic stuff just adds to the rich tapestry that is the Night of the Creeps DVD/Blu-ray experience.
