Terrorvision

It's Halloween and I haven't been doing nearly enough horror related articles, so y'know what? Here's an obscure one for you.

Terrorvision is the film that future generations will use as the sole basis of judgement of the decade known as the 80's. Every inch of the film screams it with a fucking megaphone. You have your egregiously cliche adolescent stereotypes such as the fashion explosion of a teenage girl and her "metal" head boyfriend, and the younger boy who's into monsters and horror movies. These are our three protagonists that accompany us through this quirkiness. Alongside them are the two BDSM/sex obsessed parents who look goofier than they sound and the over-passionate veteran grandfather who brazenly brandishes his many medals across his chest for all to see.

However the over-animated cast of this film is merely the icing on the cake. The plot begins when the irate father is struggling with their satellite dish, trying to gain free access to the pay-per-view channels while the unhelpful repairman stands idly by. It isn't long before malfunctions occur and the satellite inadvertently intercepts the broken up particles of that horrific abortion of a movie monster that you see below. He vaguely reminds of the singing poo guy from Conker's Bad Fur Day but whatever, this predated that by multiple years regardless and, in all honesty, I've never seen movie monster quite like this guy. He's hilarious looking and I love the way he's always got a weird crooked smile.

So apparently, this sort of creature is kept as a pet from an alien planet however from time to time, the bastards mutate into whatever that thing is. Whenever that happens, the aliens callously fire the poo monster's molecules off into space and apparently this comes at the cost of a very, very slight chance of those molecules getting transmitted through human television sets causing them to reassemble within our unsuspecting living rooms.
So the whole plot centers around trying to deal with this grinning pile of fuck. After it gluttonously gorges itself on the parents and the couple they invited over to get freaky with, it's up to the kids to figure out what the hell to do with it. They try calling the generously endowed, horror-host, Medusa but she ends up being no help at all as she unmindfully dismisses their pleads for help with a scoff.

Good God.

So they take it upon themselves to try and house-train the thing. It happens to be quite accustomed to liquifying it's victims and then slurping up their goop. They try to feed it people food and lay out all sorts of processed goods in a pile atop a table but it's to no avail as the monster throws a fit and tosses everything aside. They try teaching it to talk but all he manages to do is sneeze all over them.
I neglected to mention that all the while, the characters have been going about ignorant of the alien broadcasting across their television screens who is desperately trying to warn them all about the monster. He instructs them to turn off all of their TV sets for at least 200 years but naturally everyone says, "yeah, fuck that," and they go right on TV watching regardless. Eventually the alien himself transports himself through the TV and into the living room in order to put to rest what he refers to as an inconvenience and humorously notes that he "might lose his job over this." The alien looks hilariously cliche and is something straight out of a 50's b-movie. He totes a comic-looking laser gun and wears a goofy fishbowl helmet that reminds me of the Robot Monster from the movie Robot Monster.

And speaking of Robot Monster, there's a clip in this very movie where the characters are watching Robot Monster. That's pretty funny to me but it's far from being the only classic horror film that can be seen on the television screen. In one scene they're watching 1000000 B.C. and in another scene they're watching The Giant (fucking) Claw. The portion of the movie spent watching the television is generous but it's a fun touch and I like trying to guess at what's on the screen.
But anyway, simply out of her own random interest, Medusa decides to show up at their house only to find a lot of strange goo and a big mess everywhere. She presumably arrives at the conclusion that what the boy was telling her over the phone might actually be real. So who could blame her for taking matters into her own hands when she sees this otherworldly extraterrestrial waving around a futuristic weapon? She promptly puts a hefty crack across his dome the alien's head pulls a Prometheus and explodes all over the inside of his helmet.
The setting of the house is so bizarre just in of itself. There's strange, artful porn all over the walls, roman statues and the color schemes and layout seem to make no logical sense whatsoever. It's all around just such an odd movie. One of the things I think is really strange is the backyard set. Past what looks like a small jungle of ferns and other various plants is, well... nothing. It's just an infinite blue void; no hills, no roads, houses or anything.
And y'know what, this needs to be said but I can't find a place for it in the review. There's a random moment where Medusa is talking and the camera just zooms in on her cleavage until it fills up the whole screen (didn't take much zooming). I don't know what that's about.

But for all of the frames of this movie I could show you, or all the random bits and details I could pick out, I couldn't ever do it any justice. It's something that needs to be seen to really be believed. I can't describe to you how the poo pile moves around and kills people but it's a delight to behold. I actually would recommend this movie because it's just good ol' cheesy stuff and it's quite funny in it's own right. I found my self laughing aloud more times than I could count while watching it. If you want something funny, quirky, self-aware and kinda out-there, Terrorvision is the film for you.

7.5/10 - Funny and different.