Review of Beware! The Blob (1972) by James H — 03 Nov 2009

Slightly better than the original because all of the actors worked spontaneously making up their dialog as they went along. The awkward exchanges between characters is what makes this movie amusing to watch.

Why all the discussion of "cucumber sandwhiches", if ever there was an answer it is now lost to time. I imagine sobriety was also not a major factor on the set; there is a stoned looseness to all the improv's that makes everything much funnier that it would have a right to be.

Also the blob cam, which is a barrel painted red and kept directly in front of the camera is in full shlock effect here. Were the original tried to avoid showing it's budgetary constraints, "Beware! The Blob" revels in them.

The discovery of the Blob is a jokey non sequitter when a scientist brings it home from the Artic and leaves it in his freezer only to have the icky container removed by his wife (played all too briefly by Marlene Clark of "Ganja And Hess").

The black couple dies first naturally. And the king from Mel Brook's Spaceball's Planet Druidia, is present as a scout master. His comic skills are also omitted by early death. Between blob attacks there are a bunch of vignettes involving town life, man in a bathtub seconds later running the streets naked, couple getting stoned in a tunnel harassed by a cop until guess who appears, on and on until the climax in a bowling alley.

Better than I expected horror comedy, with a cartoonish score, and haphazzard performances. Beware the blob, indeed.