Thirty years after the success of The Blob in 1958, Jack Harris was involved in the remake. The first Blob was an alien entity which came to Earth as a meteor and then proceeded to gobble up as many lifeforms, including people as it could find. This new Blob came from a different source, perhaps an even more sinister source. Frank Darabont wrote the screenplay for this new and different Blob movie and Chuck Russell directed. Keving Dillon and Shawnee Smith are the young duo who are confronted with a menace not only to their own lives, the safety of their own town, but arguably to the soul of their nation.
As in the first movie a meteor heralds the return of the menace of the Blob and again a poor man on the outskirts of town finds it. It's up to our young hero "Brian Flagg" (Dillon) to help. Flagg is a disaffected young man, a Huckleberry Finn type who is alienated from the people of his school and the town at large. "Meg Penny" (Smith) is a cheerleader who like most folks fails to understand Flagg. But she's not so smug as to not see him doing good when he brings the poor man into to town. He is fortunate not to be around when the Blob begins its terrifying reign and begins to dissolve and gobble up the town folk. As in the original it falls to two youngsters to shout the message and confront the creature. They both relieved when the United States military arrives. But what they don't know is that the menace is only just beginning.
The 1988 movie reflects the cynicism of the time. Reagan was President and not Eisenhower, and while we've learned that all leaders sometimes have to hold back the truth from the people, the trust between the population and its government was especially strained in this era with scandals and the suggestion that the President might not have all his faculties. (Wait! That sounds familiar!)
The special effects this time are truly gruesome and unlike the original Blob movie we get to see the absorption process. It's a pretty hideous process. The Blob of 1988 is like its predecessor of its time, and that realization saddens me. God only knows what another remake might have reason to comment on. It's well past time to find out.
We wrap things up with the totally strange Blobermouth.
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