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| Released: |
1990 |
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| Genre: |
MONSTER
UNDERRATED
BLACK COMEDY
HORROR
SCIENCE FICTION
SEQUEL
COMEDY
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| Origin: |
US |
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| Length: |
107 |
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Nasty little varmints trash a New York skyscraper. |
Reviewed by Chris Tookey
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| | Even more entertaining than the original. Where the first film was over-laborious in building up an image of small-town America for its anti-heroes to destroy, this picture quickly and gleefully establishes the environment which is to become Joe Dante's inferno: a horrible New York office building incorporating an offensive conglomeration of cable TV stations, and - more improbably - a grisly genetic laboratory under the direction of the sinister Dr Catheter (who else but Christopher Lee?). | | The owner of this Tower of Babble is Daniel Cramp (John Glover), a nightmarish amalgamation of Donald Trump and Ted Turner. It is Cramp who happily claims responsibility for transmitting a new, improved version of Casablanca: "in colour, and with a happier ending". It is he too, presumably, who is responsible for soothing public address announcements throughout the building which end in "Have a powerful day!" and talking lavatory doors which say "Hey, pal, I sure hope you washed those hands!" You can't wait for the gremlins to strike. | | The satire on modern New York life is spot-on. There's the casual rudeness and relentless vulgarity; the female workaholic who even attempts seduction in business jargon; the endless quest for new restaurants with an ethnic theme, culminating here in an only slightly far-fetched Canadian restaurant "where they clean the fish right at your table", and where for dessert they serve a gigantic chocolate moose. | | The heroes (Zach Galligan and Phoebe Cates) are no more interesting than they were in the first movie, but the real stars are the gremlins themselves: now too familiar to be scary, perhaps, but funnier and more varied than before. My favourite is the one which drinks brain hormone, undergoes a Jekyll and Hyde transformation, and turns into a loathsomely pretentious cross between William Buckley and Loyd Grossman. | | There are cinematic sideswipes galore at targets from Busby Berkeley to Batman. The speed, intricacy and sheer number of the sight-gags is reminiscent of the best silent comedies. It's much too knowing and grown-up for the teenage market at which the first Gremlins was aimed, but I laughed and laughed. It received mixed reviews. | | |
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