This picture has the rank of being not just one of the earliest, but also one of the most whacked-out flicks that Full Moon ever produced, and it was one of their biggest ever hits. I do like it but not all that much. It's very cute but it's definitely nothing great. In fact, it's a wee bit of an endurance test! My first and primary annoyance: It isn't really about the ghoulies! They're mere window dressing for a strange and complicated story, and the ones that do appear are laughable! They look like s****y old diseased sock puppets, and that's not easy for me to say because the sequel is one of my all-time favourite horror movies, I'd strongly urge you to check out that one it you wanna see a Ghoulies movie done right. It's so horribly in-your-face and dead to-the-max 80s! From the wardrobe to the attitudes and practically everything, particularly when it comes to some of the more cartoony and obnoxious smaller characters, like that old guy who's constantly wearing shades.. What the hell was that asshole on at the time!? Break dancing scene, what the f**k!?! I really can't stand the red-headed Lisa Pelican as "Rebecca", she's so embarrassingly melodramatic with all of her lines and whenever the camera's focusing on her face she's always off in a fog and terribly posing as if like Sophia Loren! Awful actress. I also didn't like the two dwarf characters. Now I've nothing against those kinds of people, in fact to me their performances were actually very good, but they weren't monsters, and in my opinion to jerk around with the audience that they are when there's already supposed to be little monsters running around is just bogus. It's the same cheap gag that they would later base the entire rotten fourth 'Ghoulies' movie around. I positively adored the spirited performance of Michael Des Barnes as the delightfully fiendish "Malcolm Graves". He really gives it his all and even though he goes ridiculously grandiose with it, it sure works. I can't recall ever seeing another horror movie villain quite like him. I love all of his charmingly bizarre inflections, how he goes from softly-spoken to roaring in a second! And it's so awesomely wrong when he demands to kiss his son to steal his soul!! I thought he was far more charismatic than the guy who played his son, I just found iy plain cringe-worthy whenever he was trying to be commanding. They also should've ditched the silly and unnecessary narrating. It was like I was watching Troll 2 all over again.. I think that I may have liked this better if they'd have just done away with any pretence of it being about little monsters and made it a straight-up story of resurrected sorcerous evil battling against its estranged offspring it could've stood on its own merit surely! I mean they certainly should have kept the ghoulies in it, just not made it out as if the entire movie was about them.. And you know, I'm wrong in a way because the marketing did pay off big time for the studio, and if I don't quite get it then I'm still very glad because it allowed them to create some later gems that I do wholeheartedly love and regard as classics. It's such a weird little mish-mash of a flick. By degrees it's a crazy party horror movie, then a domestic drama, then it's an epic magical fight of good vs evil - it's everything except a solid horror that knows what it wants to be, and that's a bit of a shame. I'm not saying it isn't fun, but it's a mess. It's a fun mess! Everything about it is extremely tacky and rough but that could perhaps only add to the appeal for some fans. It's certainly not lacking in creativity. It's a fun and entertaining piece of horror trash if you're in the right frame of mind and is worthy of a watch every now and then. "Shut up, goddammit!"

The camp and cheese levels are off the charts with this effort from Charles Bands' Empire Pictures, one of a few movies (and subsequent franchises) to jump on the "Gremlins" bandwagon. This means combining comedy (which, in this case, is never really that funny) and horror (although the movie sure ain't scary at all) and trying to go for a playful approach. The result is a movie that does have some fun moments, but nothing special enough to make it compare to its inspiration.Eric Roberts lookalike Peter Liapis stars as Jonathan Graves, who moves with his girlfriend Rebecca (pretty Lisa Pelikan of the "Carrie" ripoff "Jennifer") into the mansion he's just inherited. Turns out his dad Malcolm (pop singer Michael Des Barres, in a hilariously unsubtle turn) was one of a group of Satan worshippers, and the mansion has been home to demons in the past. As any moron character in this type of genre movie would do, Jonathan lets his curiosity get the better of him, and he becomes obsessed with wearing robes and performing rituals. The title creatures show up to create mayhem, followed by an endearing pair of little people (Peter Risch, Tamara De Treaux).The Ghoulies themselves don't get to do all that much; they would be brought more to the forefront for the sequels. The human cast - including Scott Thomson ("Police Academy"), Ralph Seymour ("Just Before Dawn"), Keith Joe Dick, and Mariska Hargitay in her film debut - is amusing, but it's the Ghoulies who are the most fun. Jack Nance of "Eraserhead" fame is wasted as the wise old caretaker of the mansion. Bobbie Bresee ("Mausoleum") has a bit as a temptress. Special effects and makeup by John Carl Buechler and his company are generally pretty good. The score, credited to both Shirley Walker and Richard Band, is catchy."Ghoulies" is indeed pretty ridiculous, but this viewer doesn't see that as necessarily being a bad thing. Just don't go in expecting anything resembling a serious genre film.Six out of 10.

Jonathan Graves (Peter Liapis) inherits his Satanist father's mansion. He throws a party and starts conjuring up Ghoulies, which are sort of demonic goblin things. This is a garbage Gremlins knock-off with no humor, charm, or entertainment value. The best thing about it is that it has one of the coolest movie posters of the 1980's, with the Ghoulie coming up out of the toilet. It's just not a fun movie at all. It's nasty and cheap. Avoid this mess. See Gremlins instead. Or you can just skip this one and watch the better Ghoulies part 2. But yeah, Gremlins is better than that too. So just watch Gremlins or even Critters over this dreck.

This must be the worst 80s movie ever. Because the acting is bad, the Ghoulies don't do much and its another Gremlins rip off. Let me give you a quick summary of the movie. Its about a young man who moves into his fathers house. Who somehow died, {we don't really know}. As he lives with his girlfriend. Later in the movie he goes down to his basement to clean up as he finds something strange in the basement. As he has a look into the box he finds some cloths I don't know. Then he takes it out of the basement he puts it on he starts to turn evil as he later on summons the Ghoulies, then turns into a bad guy summons his dad back to life as Wolfgang safes him. In the end everyone lives happily ever after. so I give this movie * out of ***** and also please no more gremlin rip offs.