Rating: - A True Underground Film If I Ever Saw One
Tremors is everything a monster movie should be. It's an ode to 50s monster movies without shoving the "ode" part down your throat and constantly wink, wink, winking at you the way Rob Zombie and Quentin Tarantino have done. Homage or not, it's a very good movie in it's own right. In fact it's better than a movie like this should be. Most everyone is familiar with the plot involving underground wormlike creatures terrorizing a small town in the Nevada desert. Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward are two handymen who stumble onto the monsters and then team up with the remaining townspeople to take a stand(only after the plan to flee fails). Along for the ride are Michael Gross as the gun toting Burt(who would later become the central character of the movie and tv series'), and his equally weapon crazy wife played by Reba McEntire. Be on the lookout for Big Trouble In Little China's Victor Wong as an unfortunate general store owner and David Lynch regular, Charlotte Stewart.
Everything about this movie is above average. The acting is all around good, the comedy is dead on and kept in check without going overboard, the creature FX look very good(though some folks from the CGI generation may say they look silly, but what do they know?), the story is engaging and it's never boring. This is a PG-13 rated horror film that sacrifices nothing for the sake of getting that rating. It isn't meant to be a blood bath or sex romp anyway. In fact, the amount of profanity and gore is more than you'd expect, but PG-13 actually meant something in 1990. Practically all onscreen bloodletting is of the monster type anyway, not human, which is easier to get away with.
Most likely you've seen this before, but it certainly doesn't hurt to give a good thing another whirl(just ask my wife). Probably one of the best horror flicks of the 90s and more fun than practically any horror film made in the last ten years.