Gremlins (1984)

In Joe Dante's and Warner Bros.' mischievous, PG-rated fantasy horror-comedy executive-produced by Steven Spielberg, it told about a small town besieged by a group of sadistic, malevolent reptilian creatures that were unleashed when three rules about their care were neglected. Its tagline described the pets: "Cute. Clever. Mischievous. Intelligent. Dangerous" that wreaked havoc on a small town on Christmas Eve. The animatronics and puppetry employed for the film pre-dated CGI, and the results were incredible, as was the script (his 2nd) by a young Chris Columbus before he became famous as both a writer and director.

The black comedy was deliberately meant to spoof B-level alien-monster horror movies, animated cartoon comedies, Childrens'/Family Films, and Christmas Movies. Its themes were responsibility (following the rules), anti-Christmas commercialism and consumerism, and the value of friendship. Some vocal critics claimed that the film was racist for its negative associations and characterizations of the unleashed pet animals as African-Americans, who loved rap music, fried chicken, sadistic crimes, and "boom-box" break-dancing. There were additional concerns about the stereotypical anti-Asian depictions in Chinatown.

In this black comedy (and family Christmas film), there were many references and echoes of:

1. the classic Christmas film It's a Wonderful Life (1946) (the towns of Bedford Falls and Kingston Falls, the mean and miserly characters of Mrs. Deagle and Mr. Potter, and the concluding moral to the story)
2. and the alien invasion classics such as the Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), the cheap sci-fi B-film The Blob (1958), and Spielberg's E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial (1982).

[Note: Both E.T. and Gremlins inspired tremendous marketing campaigns for 'creature' merchandise; after Tiger Electronics (a division of Hasbro) debuted Furby toys in 1998, Warner Bros' settled out of court with the toy-maker for a 7-figure amount following complaints about how Hasbro's popular stuffed toy looked too much like Gizmo.]

Director Joe Dante's two previous films, both horror films, were the B-movie cult film Piranha (1978) (exec. produced by Roger Corman), and the werewolf-themed The Howling (1981). There were numerous cameos in Gremlins: Steven Spielberg (as a Man in an Electric Wheelchair) plus the film's composer Jerry Goldsmith (as a Man in Telephone Booth Glancing at Camera), and Robby the Robot (from Forbidden Planet (1956)), WB animator Chuck Jones (as drawing mentor Mr. Jones), and many others. However, this semi-violent film (and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) released about the same time) were both targeted as the two films that prompted the MPAA to establish the PG-13 rating (in-between PG and R).

With a budget of $11 million, the unexpected hit grossed $153.6 million (domestic) and $165.4 million (worldwide), and became the 3rd highest-grossing domestic film of the year. A similar sequel was released 6 years later, Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990), with a higher budget of $50 million, but it was much less successful. The more comedic and less violent follow-up film only earned $41.5 million at the box-office. In the new version, the Gremlins' (led by Brain Gremlin) new target in NYC was the headquarters of eccentric, wealthy media mogul Daniel Clamp.

• in the pre-titles opening, folksy yet struggling inventor-father Randall "Rand" Peltzer (Hoyt Axton) from Kingston Falls was in a crowded, outdoor marketplace in Chinatown (NY); in a voice-over introduction, he described how he was led by a young Chinese boy (John Louie) to his pipe-smoking grandfather Mr. Wing's (Keye Luke) exotic junk store; at first, Randall was attempting to sell his latest unreliable gadget - a "Bathroom Buddy" to as he put it: "revolutionize travel"; however, when demonstrating it, toothpaste squirted onto his shirt; he called his business: "Fantastic Ideas for a Fantastic World"
• Randall inquired about an ornamental box (with melodic trilling and singing emanating from within) for his son Billy Peltzer; inside the box was a Mogwai - but not yet revealed; although Randall offered $200 dollars to purchase it, Mr. Wing refused: "Mogwai not for sale...With Mogwai comes much responsibility. I cannot sell him at any price"

Chinatown Store Owner Mr. Wing (Keye Luke)

Randall "Rand" Peltzer (Hoyt Axton)

Young Chinese Grandson (John Louie)

• however, outside the shop, Mr. Wing's teenaged grandson secretly sold the Mogwai to old-fashioned white businessman Randall without his father's knowledge, but specifically warned about three important rules:
  • "There's three rules you've gotta follow...Keep him out of the light. He hates bright lights, especially sunlight. It'll kill him. And keep him away from water. Don't get him wet. But the most important rule, the rule you can never forget. No matter how much he cries, no matter how much he begs, never, never feed him after midnight"
• the film's title screens and opening sequence were set in the idyllic, small snow-covered American suburb of Kingston Falls (in the Northeast US) during the Christmas season, introduced with the soundtrack playing Darlene Love's rendition of "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)"; the town had been hard hit by tough economic times and high unemployment rates
• on a cold December morning, the Peltzer's next-door neighbor Mr. Murray Futterman (Dick Miller) pulled up in a Kentucky Harvester snow plow as Randall's son Billy Peltzer (Zach Galligan) - on his way to work at a bank job (to help his family make ends meet) - was having trouble starting his foreign-made VW Beetle; Futterman - a xenophobic believer in durable US made products, made one of his typical deprecating comments about cheap, foreign made products: ("God-damn foreign cars!")
• Billy was forced to walk to the town's Courthouse Square to the Union Savings and Trust (accompanied by his dog Barney), where Barney laid down at Billy's feet under his teller window; one of Billy's co-workers Kate Beringer (Phoebe Cates) passed him a petition to sign, to save the town's Dorry's Tavern; the owner Dorry was being threatened about losing his lease by the building's landlord; the petition would make the tavern a town landmark and save it; she mentioned the long-standing reputation of the establishment: "That's where everybody's Dad proposed to their mom"

Billy Peltzer (Zach Galligan)

Kate Beringer (Phoebe Cates)

Mrs. Ruby Deagle (Polly Holliday)

• the town's cold-hearted, crabby, miserly but wealthy cat-lady realtor-spinster Mrs. Ruby Deagle (Polly Holliday), who wanted the tavern shut down, was seen outside marching toward the bank; the character of the detestable, bitter and widowed Mrs. Deagle was revealed when she confronted Mrs. Joe Harris (Belinda Balaski), one of her indebted clients (with a Hungry Child), and denied her request for a two-week extension on a payment: "Mrs. Harris, the bank and I have the same purpose in life - to make money. Not to support a lot of deadbeats!"
• Mrs. Deagle arrived at the bank carrying a large, artificial snowman's head, where she angrily accused Billy's dog Barney of breaking her imported Bavarian lawn ornament; she wouldn't accept payment for damages, but threatened to have the dog removed to the town kennel to be euthanized, or she would personally put the dog in her "spin-drier on high heat" for a "slow painful death"; Barney reacted to the threats by untying his own rope leash and charging at the frightened, dog-hating Mrs. Deagle on the other side of the counter; she dropped the ornament that shattered, and had to be helped to her feet by Mr. Corben (Edward Andrews), the bank's upset president, as she complained about a bad heart
• later after work in Dorry's tavern, aspiring young cartoonist Billy showed off his art-work talent (a picture of a Knight fighting a Deagle-headed dragon) to his admiring art teacher Mr. Jones (WB animator Chuck Jones in a cameo); Billy's 23 year-old detestable co-worker Gerald Hopkins (Judge Reinhold), the bank's stuck-up junior vice-president, entered and told Billy that he was lucky that the boss Mr. Corben didn't fire him
• Kate - who also worked (without pay) on weekends as a part-time bar-waitress to help the proprietor Dorry (Kenny Davis), brought drinks to Billy and Gerald sitting at one of the tables; she curtly rejected a dinner-date request from Gerald
• after returning home, Billy volunteered to help in the kitchen and cook dinner with his mother Lynn Peltzer (Frances Lee McCain), who was watching It's a Wonderful Life (1946) on a small portable TV, but his father's kitchen egg-cracking appliance failed him (all of his time-saving gadgets failed spectacularly throughout the film)
• when Randall arrived home in a jolly mood (singing: "Fa la la"), he presented Billy with a wrapped gift box, even though it was still a few days until X-mas; he insisted that Billy open the gift-wrapped box - because of the living creature inside; with great fanfare (with the lights dimmed), Billy opened it and inside found the cute Mogwai creature; the Mogwai was an elfin-eared, big and wide-eyed, tune-trilling, four-toed, fuzzy, brown and white fur-ball about 11 inches tall, already named Gizmo (voice of Howie Mandel) by his father
• Lynn's snapping of a flash picture broke one of the three rules by subjecting the creature to a bright light; Randall was reminded and prompted to repeat and re-emphasize the rules he had heard from Mr. Wing's concerned grandson:
  • "There's some things I forgot to tell you guys, and they're really important. Number one, he hates bright lights. We know that. But you gotta keep him out of the sunlight. Sunlight'll kill him. Number two, keep him away from water. Don't give him any water to drink. And whatever you do, don't give him a bath. And probably the most important thing, don't ever feed him after midnight."
• the next morning in the kitchen, Billy was sprayed with orange juice by his father's malfuncitoning orange-squeezer; Billy's young friend Pete Fountaine (Corey Feldman) came over to deliver a Christmas tree; Gizmo was upstairs in Billy's bedroom watching the Clark Gable action-romance film To Please a Lady (1950) - observing (and learning) that the star's character Mike Brannan was driving a midget race-car
• but then Pete accidentally spilled a glass of water (used to hold Billy's paint brushes) onto the furry creature, causing Gizmo to scream and squirm around; he multiplied into five more tiny fur-ball creatures that popped out of his back: ("One, two, three, four, five new ones...Look, that one's got a cute stripe on its head") - Billy and Pete didn't realize what they had unleashed; all five of the other reproduced pets quickly grew into full-sized Mogwai
• one of the five new creatures was nicknamed Stripe (voice of Frank Welker) (because of the white Mohawk-stripe of tufted hair down the middle of his head); he was aggressive, threatening and mean, and snapped back when Pete attempted to pet him; the five new Mogwai were unfriendly and nasty, but Gizmo remained playful and cute
• soon after, Billy admitted to his Dad that the Mogwai multiplied when they came into contact with plain water; always thinking of a monetary angle, Randall proposed capitalizing on the creatures by selling the additional pets to children: ("You know what?... I'll bet every kid in America would like to have one of these. They might even replace the dog as the family pet"); he would call them "The Peltzer Pet" - "This could really be the big one!"
• there was a foreshadowing of the coming terrorizing invasion and menace of the five furry creatures; later that night in the freezing cold outside, Barney was found wrapped up and dangling from a string of Christmas lights - Billy naturally blamed Mrs. Deagle, although Stripe was responsible
• at his high school in one of the classrooms, Billy showed off one of the new Mogwai in a cardboard box to his ex-science teacher Roy Hanson (Glynn Turman), and demonstrated how putting one drop of water onto it created another fur-ball out of its back; Roy asked to keep the additional Mogwai to observe it
• that evening, as Kate helped a drunken, out-of-work Mr. Futterman from the tavern that was closing up, Billy helped her, and both of them assisted him outside, where he ranted and raved about "Gremlins" and the sabotage of technology products and parts manufactured and exported by foreign entities to the US, in particular TVs and automobiles:
  • "Gremlins... You got, you gotta watch out for them foreigners, cuz they plant Gremlins in their machinery. It's the same Gremlins that brought down our planes in the big one...Good old W-W-I-I. Y'know, they're still shippin' 'em over here. They put 'em in cars, they put 'em in the TV. They put 'em in the stereos and the radios you stick in your ears. They put 'em in watches, they have teeny Gremlins for our watches!"
• afterwards, as Billy accompanied Kate on her walk home, she told him how many people disliked Christmas and became depressed, and that the suicide rate was higher over the holiidays; she admitted: "I don't celebrate Christmas," but postponed explaining why; they were becoming a romantic couple when she accepted a date request for her next Thursday night-off; meanwhile, back at the high school, Mr. Hanson was subjecting his Mogwai to a hypodermic needle to take a blood test

Kate Accepting a Date Request From Billy - Start of a Romance

• later that night in his bedroom, Billy was sketching and watching the sci-fi B/W classic Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) on TV, while Gizmo was reading a 3-D comic book with polatized glasses; the five hungry Mogwai in a box (Stripe and his four followers) were able to fool Billy into thinking that it was before midnight (his bedside alarm clock read 11:36 pm) as they demanded to be fed some left-over fried chicken; simultaneously at the high school, the caged Mogwai also ate Mr. Hanson's half-eaten sandwich left behind at 2:20 am - breaking one of the cardinal rules; on Billy's TV in the movie, Dr. Miles Bennett called out stark warnings about the appearance of large alien seed pods that were replicating humans:
  • "Can't you see? They're after you! They're after all of us! Our wives, our children, everyone! They're here already! You're next! You're next! You're next! You're next!"
• the next morning, Christmas Eve, Billy noticed how the five Mogwai (except for Gizmo) had formed cocoons and were encased; he realized that his bedside alarm clock still read 11:36 pm - and saw how the furry Mogwai had ripped the electric cord out of the wall; it was really past midnight when they had been fed; in the school classroom with Billy and Pete in the afternoon, science teacher Roy Hanson noticed how his Mogwai had similarly transitioned into a pupal stage, and formed a cocoon
• the next stage in the Mogwai's development after being hatched was to morph into hateful, vicious, predatory, red-eyed green reptilian beasties (or gremlins) - but not yet seen on-screen; Hanson phoned Billy with concern over his morphed Mogwai hatchling, and soon after, Billy raced into the school and discovered that the teacher had been murdered and was face-down on the floor; the teacher's blood-test syringe - often used on the Mogwai - had vengefully been stuck into Hanson's rear end (or upper leg); as Billy reached for a phone, he was bitten on the hand
• after visiting the Nurse's vacated office to wrap his own hand, Billy had his first jump-scare view of the larger, sharp-toothed, mean, scaly and clawed reptilian creature as it popped out of an upper cabinet, and then retreated through a door vent; Billy was continuing to worry that his mother might be attacked in the Peltzer household where she had been left with the five other monstrous creatures (from their hatched cocoons)
• his mother was seen hearing strange noises in the house's attic where the transformed Gremlins were torturing Gizmo (tied to a dartboard) in the attic, and then tossed into a laundry chute; Stripe called out: "Gizmo ca-ca!!"; she approached the attic stairs with a long kitchen knife, climbed up, and saw the five smoking and hatched cocoons; Billy called her to alert her to evacuate from the house, but then the gremlins yanked and disconnected the phone wire and the call went dead; she proceeded downstairs after hearing Johnny Mathis' "Do You Hear What I Hear?" on the record player, and then entered her kitchen

On a Dart-board, Gizmo Was Tortured by Gremlins in the Peltzer Attic	One of the Gremlins Chewing on a Gingerbread-Man Cookie in Peltzer Kitchen	Gremlin Chewed Up in a Kitchen Blender
Gremlin Stabbed With a Knife	Gremlin Zapped in a Microwave	Decapitated Gremlin Burning Up in Fireplace

• Lynn crept into her kitchen where she saw one of the five Gremlins greedily eating her one of her freshly-baked and frosted gingerbread-man cookies; as she was pelted with cookies and dinner plates, she yelled out: "Get out of my kitchen!," and fought off and killed three of them - spewing green blood (with a switched-on blender, with a knife stabbing, and with a microwave); a 4th one hiding in the Christmas tree in the living room attacked her and clawed her face, but Billy returned and decapitated it with a sword - sending its head into flaming logs in the fireplace; Billy and his mother were able to eliminate all four Mogwai and save Gizmo, but they both watched as Stripe, the white-tufted leader and sole-remaining deadly-morphed creature (except for the one at the school) broke through a window and fled
• after Billy took his mother to be cared for at the nearby house of Dr. and Mrs. Molinaro (John C. Becher and Gwen Willson), he returned to the house to rescue Gizmo in the laundry chute, and protectively placed him in his backpack
• meanwhile, Randall was still at a science-inventor's convention, where earlier, there was a cameo in the scene of Steven Spielberg (as a Man in an Electric Wheelchair), and the film's composer Jerry Goldsmith (as a Man in Telephone Booth Glancing at Camera); now, Randall was phoning home with Robby the Robot standing next to him (from Forbidden Planet (1956) and speaking: "The question is totally without meaning..."
• Billy followed Stripe's tracks that led into the vandalized local YMCA building; as Billy turned off the activated fire alarm, Stripe jumped out and scratched him, and then jumped into the YMCA swimming pool - causing bubbles, color changes to the water, and the multiplication of the number of mischievous Gremlins who would continue to terrorize the town of Kingston Falls
• at the police department, Billy attempted to warn the town's hapless and clueless police officials Sheriff Frank (Scott Brady) and Deputy Brent (Jonathan Banks) about the threat of gremlins ("little monsters"), but they denied that there was a problem, even though the town was becoming a "disaster area" as they were soon to be called out to attend to many pranks, freak accidents, multiple injuries, car wrecks, power outages, and fires; at the Futterman house, Murray was complaining about his static TV reception: ("Oh. God-damn foreign TV. I told ya we should've got a Zenith. Foreigners!"), not realizing that the gremlins were messing with his roof's antenna; when he went outside to investigate, he discovered the creatures hijacking his snow plow; he reacted and cried out: "There's a real gremlin in my cab!" - as it steered into his house and demolished it
• in another part of town, Mrs. Ruby Deagle (who had named her cats after different kinds of currency: Kopeck, Ruble, Peso, Drachma, and Dollar Bill), became startled and annoyed by the sound of Christmas carolers outside her door: ("I hate Christmas carolers. Screechy-voiced little glue-sniffers"), similar to Ebenezer Scrooge's possible reaction; she was going to toss water on the singers, when she was shocked by the sight of gremlins outside her porch; she rushed back inside, locked her door, and then fearful of dying cried out: "What are they? They're here. Oh, they've come for me!...I'm not ready! I'm not ready yet!"; then she suffered a mild heart-attack
• one of the Gremlin creatures had snuck in through a cat door, and had tinkered with and modified her motorized chair-elevating stairlift; via jet propulsion, as she sat on her gremlin-modified, sabotaged chairlift to take her upstairs, it sent her careening up her long circular staircase's bannister at high speed, and by a picture of her dead husband mounted on the wall; she was ejected through the second-story skylight window like a cannonball, and launched head-first into snow; she died there, as Police Department Sheriff Frank noted to his partner Deputy Brent in a patrol car: "My God, Frye! That was Mrs. Deagle"

Mrs. Deagle Terrorized by Gremlin Christmas Carolers - Ending With Her Screaming Death on a Stairlift Mechanism - Crashing Out Her Second Story Window
Christmas-Caroling Gremlins	Gremlin Tinkering with Chairlift	Propelled Up Staircase
Screaming During the Bannister Ride	Propelled Through Window	Headfirst Into Snow

• afterwards, at Dorry's Tavern, the marauding creatures were seen drinking, smoking, cheating at poker, playing arcade games, break-dancing (homage to Flashdance (1983 to the tune of Michael Sembello's "Gremlins...Mega-Madness"), and trashing the place while their hostage Kate was forced to serve them; realizing that they were vulnerable to the bright light of lit matches for their cigarettes, she used the flash of a Polaroid camera to stun them so that she could escape; outside, she met up with Billy who had driven his car to town (with his bright car headlights helping their situation), but then when his car wouldn't restart, the two retreated and made a run for it by foot to the bank for safety

Kate Beringer's Disbelief in Santa Claus Speech

• while evading the creatures in the already-vandalized bank, Kate Beringer told her friend Billy the tragic, vivid and downbeat story of how she found out that there was no Santa Claus - when her father died one evening dressed as Santa Claus; it provided another reason to hate the holiday Christmas season:
  • "The worst thing that ever happened to me was on Christmas. Oh, God. It was so horrible. It was Christmas Eve. I was 9 years old. Me and Mom were decorating the tree, waiting for Dad to come home from work. A couple of hours went by. Dad wasn't home. So Mom called the office. No answer. Christmas Day came and went, and still nothing. So the police began a search. Four or five days went by. Neither one of us could eat or sleep. Everything was falling apart. It was snowing outside. The house was freezing, so I went to try to light up the fire. And that's when I noticed the smell. The firemen came and broke through the chimney top. And me and Mom were expecting them to pull out a dead cat or a bird. And instead they pulled out my father. He was dressed in a Santa Claus suit. He'd been climbing down the chimney on Christmas Eve, his arms loaded with presents. He was gonna surprise us. He slipped and broke his neck. He died instantly. And that's how I found out there was no Santa Claus."
• after her story, and things appeared to quiet down, Billy and Kate found the raucous group of Gremlins attending an indoor theatre showing of the animated Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) ("They're watching Snow White. And they love it"), where they were singing along to "Heigh-Ho, Heigh-Ho"

		Massive Blast Destroying the Theatre And All of the Mogwai - Except Stripe
Movie Theatre Filled With Gremlins Watching "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs"

• Billy and Kate went back-stage behind the screen, where Billy opened the boiler room's trap door; he tampered with the gas pipe controls to cause a natural gas leak; then, he lit a fire with a piece of cloth at about the same time that the film reel came to an end, and the Mogwai saw their silhouetted presence behind the screen; they were chased but escaped through an exit door, just before a massive blast destroyed the theatre building and killed all of the Mogwai; only Stripe survived because he had left the theatre for Candy bars in the Montgomery Ward department store across the street
• Billy broke open the front window to enter the store; he kissed Kate and then armed himself with a baseball bat; Kate discovered the store's intercom PA system and turned it on, but wasn't aware that she had also turned on a water-fountain in the Garden Center area of Montgomery Ward's
• in the Tools and Sporting Goods Departments, the vicious and red-eyed Stripe assaulted Billy with a hurled circular saw blade, boxes, a tennis ball launcher, arrows from a crossbow, and a chainsaw (homage to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)); Stripe began sawing through Billy's bat, but was saved when Kate turned on the lights in an electrical panel, and Stripe was forced to retreat
• Stripe discovered the lit-up fountain and put his finger in the water, as he fired shots at Billy with a gun; he began to again replicate and spawn more gremlins (eggs bubbled up on his back); Gizmo (who had crawled out of Billy's backpack) came to the heroic rescue to save Billy's life; race-car driving in a Barbie toy Corvette (having learned from watching the earlier Clark Gable film on TV), Gizmo crashed into the garden center area, and grabbed onto the cords that controlled the window-shade blinds - they opened, causing sunlight to pour into the area
• during Stripe's long and drawn-out death scene, as he decomposed and turned to goo, he twitched and convulsed and his eyes turned white; green mucus flowed and drained from his mouth and nose; as he melted, his body fell apart and he fell into the pool of water, causing further smoke and light to emanate; with one last jump-scare, his skeletal remains emerged one more time from the water, jumped out onto the floor, but then completely collapsed

Stripe's Gooey Melting Death - Exposed to Sunlight

• the local TV news from WDHB by Lew Landers (Jim McKrell) described the tragedies and destruction of the town, during his live report from the former site of Dorry's Tavern:
  • "...officials are now blaming mass hysteria for the escalating series of unexplained accidents, fires and explosions that rocked this once-peaceful town on Christmas Eve. The bizarre demise of Mrs. Ruby Deagle, widow of convicted stock-swindler Donald Deagle...
• the news had reached the distressed and scolding Mr. Wing, who suddenly appeared in the Peltzer's living room (where the TV report was also airing) to take back Gizmo; after returning Randall's $200 dollars (by throwing the cash on the couch), he reprimanded the family for their negligence, incompetence, carelessness and irresponsibility: ("I warned you. With Mogwai comes much responsibility. But you didn't listen. And you see what happens")

The Sudden Appearance of Mr. Wing in the Peltzer Residence

Mr. Wing Leaving with Gizmo In His Original Box

• he also criticized arrogant and Western society as a whole for not respecting the Eastern culture's ground rules: "You do with Mogwai what your society has done with all of nature's gifts. You do not understand. You are not ready"; as he left with Gizmo in his original box, and Gizmo gave Billy a final good-bye ("Bye, Billy"), Mr. Wing paused to tell Billy that hopefully, he might someday be able to properly care for his adoring Gizmo:
  • "Perhaps some day, you may be ready. Until then, Mogwai will be waiting"
• to shift the blame, Randall's narrated voice-over warning in the epilogue were the film's last lines of dialogue before the scrolling end credits:
  • "Well, that's the story. So if your air conditioner goes on the fritz or your washing machine blows up or your video recorder conks out, before you call the repairman, turn on all the lights, check all the closets and cupboards, look under all the beds, because you never can tell. There just might be a Gremlin in your house."