Tags:
Film: Bad Taste
Year: 1987
Director: Peter Jackson
Writer: Peter Jackson
Starring: Terry Potter, Pete O’Herne and Craig Smith
Review:
This film begins with people that are in shadows. We know that there are aliens attacking a city. A person is told to call in someone to put a stop to it. The person has robotic hand and pushes a button for ‘The Boys’.
We then shift a man walking through the countryside; he is played by Pete O’Herne. He is attacked by a man with an axe. He pulls out a handgun and then blows off the top of his attacker’s head. We hear a voice speaking to him and this person turns out to Peter Jackson. They are part of an elite unit trying to gather data on these aliens and figure out what they want and are doing. They have an alien captured; being tied by his foot over a cliff, this alien is also played by Jackson.
O’Herne does more investigating and gets attacked by a group of 5 aliens. He loses his gun and the talking piece to his radio. He runs and hides from these ones, trying to get back to his weapon. One of the aliens picks up his microphone. It should be pointed out that these aliens are not too bright.
Jackson attacks the alien Jackson by hammering a bayonet into its foot and the alien screams. His brothers hear it and leave O’Herne alone. It turns out the human Jackson has a machine gun in his bag. He uses this gun to fight off the aliens, but he falls over the cliff in the end. The alien Jackson also gets away.
In addition to them, there is Terry Potter and Mike Minett, who are both members of this unit. They are on their way out to help Jackson and O’Herne. There is also a relief worker coming to collect donations, played by Craig Smith.
Smith is attacked by some aliens and he is kidnapped and taken to their base. It turns out that these aliens are here to collect humans. We learn this from their leader, Doug Wren. He is going to turn humans into Crumb’s Crunchy Delights. Smith is going to be their celebratory dinner main course before they leave.
The boys get suited up to save Smith. They have machine guns and elite training, can they get inside and save him? It also turns out that the human Jackson isn’t dead after all. He landed on a bird which shot up the blood and the back of his skull is cracked open. He has to secure it with a hat and then finally a belt, but he keeps going. He also brings out his favorite weapon, the chainsaw. Can they stop these aliens?
I have to say that I personally liked this film. There isn’t much to it. The acting isn’t that great and the story looks quickly thrown together. With that said though, this film is still pretty good. You can see things that Jackson does in this film that has made him an award winning director making great films. He uses interesting camera angles and when he knows he doesn’t have a lot to work with, he just decided to ramp up the gore. Now as I had said, the story does seem to be thrown together quickly, but I love the concept. I think it’s great that aliens have a fast food market like we do and these aliens are here to get top notch ingredients, humans.
I would say not to take this film seriously though. This is a comedy. There are some slapstick things that go on, things the characters say and do. I think Jackson had to go comedy, because he knew he didn’t have the budget to make this too serious and realistic. That is a great move for a film like this, but I do think that it does create some of my issues as well. The aliens also have peanut shaped heads and look ridiculous, but that just added to the comedy for me.
Now with said, I would recommend giving this film a viewing, if you can stomach gory horror films. This isn’t the worst one out there, but there is a lot of blood, some brains and even people drinking vomit. The acting isn’t that good and the story is thrown together quickly. The concept is great though. This is a comedy so keep that in mind and I would say not to expect much. If you’re a Jackson fan, I would recommend seeing this to see his early work.
My Rating: 6 out of 10