The Stories That Really Mattered

Keep them out of bright light, don’t get them wet and never, ever feed them after midnight.

Posted on December 13, 2010. Filed under: Movies to see before you die, Reviews | Tags: Christm, Christmas, Gizmo, Gremlins |

Guess what I’ve been watching?

I’m not going to write a full review, because there is already enough on the internet about why Gremlins is genius, but it’s going to get a quick post, mainly to explain why it doesn’t make it into my Christmas Top 12

I do love Gremlins. It’s a brilliantly bizarre movie, which brought us some of the cutest (Mogwai) and most destructively violent creatures seen on screen.  It is a standard monster movie-bad thing takes over defined area and must be stopped-but somehow setting it on Christmas Eve adds an element of sweet homeliness you wouldn’t expect.  I think the strangest thing about Gremlins is that it seems like a kids film, but it clearly isn’t.  At first glance, you have a nice little story about a boy who gets a magic pet for Christmas, but once you get into it you realise you’re watching a film where in the space of about 5 minutes you see a series of deaths involving a blender, a microwave, a snow plough and an out of control stair lift.

That’s why Gremlins falls just short of the top 12.  It is a fantastic film, and the inventive ways they came up with to kill off various characters, not to mention the fantastic characterisation of each Gremlin in the party scene, is sheer brilliance, but it’s not really one you can all watch round the fire together on Christmas Eve.  The Christmas setting of this movie is purely coincidental, it could just have easily have been Billy’s birthday.

Gremlins (and Gremlins 2 come to think of it) is definitely a movie to see before you die.  If only I could have a Mogwai for Christmas.

(Actually, I do have a little toy Gizmo. He dances and sings. I love him very much.)

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