The Stuff [Blu-ray]

A key instance of a great idea not executed to its full potential, here we have 'The Stuff'... an alleged horror movie about a disgusting-looking white yoghurt-like substance. It's discovered in a festering pool at a building site, and turns out to be absolutely delicious (despite its icky appearance). The product quickly sweeps America via cheesy advertising and irritating jingles, but when a young boy sees it moving in his fridge one day, he discovers it might not be so benign in nature after all...And so begins a very confused plot which attempts to alternately make you jump one second and laugh the next, but all it really succeeds in doing is grossing you out. The movie also tries its hands at commercial satire, with some intentionally awful adverts for The Stuff parodying real-life 80's television promotions. These are so on-the-nose though that the impact is irredeemably blunted. As for the 'special' effects... well, let's just give the technicians participation awards and move on, shall we? It's the polite thing to do.I can imagine 'The Stuff' garnering a significant cult following in the years following its release, a collective you can quickly rule me out of. The screenplay is too slapdash, the humour too wink-wink, the horror too inefficient for it to earn that sort of unique status. Not saying it isn't worth at least one watch for sheer incredulity value alone... but this would be one property where I'd be eager to see a remake one day (for a change). 5/10

A cult B-Movie favourite with one of the most eye-catching poster’s in the genre. The Stuff sees a delicious, mysterious goo that oozes from the earth, become marketed as the newest dessert sensation, but the treat rots more than teeth when zombie-like snackers who only want to consume more of the strange substance at any cost begin infesting the world.When it comes to these cult/shlock favourites I often find myself in the minority in terms of reviews, as to me they mostly are boring or ignore ‘it’s good’ part of ‘so bad it’s good’. Whilst not awful and certainly having its entertaining and standout moments, The Stuff is a largely messy, dull and cheap affair.The overarching premise and how the film presents and markets ‘The Stuff’ is definitely its strongest aspect. The sickly, in your face over-marketisation and the substance’s one goal to consume is very on the nose thematically but it gets the job done here. Unfortunately the plot itself is a clunky and choppy almost road trip style adventure at times, with an industrial saboteur, advertising executive and a young boy teaming up to stop The Stuff. Aspects aren’t explained and details are left out, the film wildly jumps all over the place and the characters motivations are all over the place at times.The film is far more comedic than it is scary, however there are some excellently disgusting practical effects for The Stuff victims and the gallons of ooze itself creeping, bubbling and spraying its way around looking for its next victim. The utterly ridiculous explosive filled finale feels very out of place but is impressive in its destructive nature. The green screen is extremely poor throughout, with outlines around the characters clearly visible and in terms of cinematography, editing and direction the film varies from fine to dodgy.The characters are ok but none of them are interesting or particularly memorable and don’t have any arcs. Michael Moriarty’s Mo seems to waver from being genuinely deadpan and dry to him coming off as just giving a poor performance. The same goes with everyone else really, aside from Goodfellas own Paul Servino who delivers as a slightly crazy militaristic radio presenter.Whilst The Stuff didn’t taste bad, I certainly don’t feel the need to try it again. The practical effects are goofy and gory fun and the presentation of The Stuff itself is clever as much as it’s on the nose. However the plot is a mess, it has stretches of dullness and a jumpy presentation and not very interesting characters with hit and miss performances and dialogue.

I’m only calling this a horror because well I don’t really know what else to call it. The scariest thing about this film is seeing the film crew’s shadows throughout. Now I have to give this film some slack for being 35 years old, but it's dated horribly. I can’t decide if it’s the out of nowhere racist remark, the out of sync audio or guest appearances by the crew that make this film so unrealistic and tiresome to watch. The Stuff features unidentifiable white goo which is discovered upon a building sight bubbling away in the exposed ground, two male workers decide to eat it. This is where the unrealisticness begins within the first minute. Who in their right mind would eat white goo coming out of the ground! With money on the mind, the two capitalise off of the white goo and start selling and advertising it across America as a white dessert food aptly named “The Stuff”. This story follows the lives of two individuals who are suspect of this new crazed food, they band together to see its downfall. Kindly, I give this obviously 80’s flick, three stars. I give the first star for the amount of heads that exploded for no reason. The out of date special effects made this film, I’m a sucker for practical effects and the amount of head explosions in this film was unneeded but welcomed. The second star goes to how willingly the young boy Jason was keen to get into the car with stranger “Mr Tan Jacket” and fly across the country with him on his private airplane and follow him throughout the film… I give my third star not for this film, but for the remarkable remake that undoubtedly will be made and should be executed to a much higher standard of cinema and actualise this concept in the way it should have been done. I have never watched a film about food that I have not enjoyed until this day. I CAN get enough of “The Stuff”.