Well, it's easy to describe this movie. What Wes Craven's SCREAM was to the slasher-movies, MONSTER! is to monster-movies in general. It's an enjoyable spoof that first explains the rules of the genre and than plays with them. M. Emmet Walsh plays Lloyd Reeves, a local movie-hero who has starred in one too many monster-movie. He gets released from the hospital and his son is there to take care of him for a while. But at that same time teenagers begin to disappear and turn up dead. Lloyd is convinced that a monster is terrorizing the town. A monster which returns every three years. Could that be true, or is Lloyd finally losing it himself? M. Emmet Walsh is a lot of fun as the determined Lloyd Reeves, who constantly refers to his legendary film rolls in monster-movies. It's also fun to see almost everything he predicts, come true (because he knows the rules of the genre). The rest of the cast is decent but rather forgettable. The film moves at a fairly fast pace and is as well a parody on as a homage to the entire monster-genre. The monster, which we do get to see near the end, is a bit silly and made out of pretty bad CGI (think Playstation 1 graphics). But it didn't bother me at all, 'cause this is a spoof after all. And a fun one it is.So, you can easily program this movie as the first of a triple-feature monster-movie night, to lighten up the audience. But you can also watch it on a rainy Sunday afternoon with the kids, since there's no nudity or real violence in it. You can pop open a beer and poor in some hot choco-milk for the kids and than enjoy this silly monster-spoof.

I like this movie; I always like bad creature features, so I rented this one. As it turns out to be, it's one of the better onces I've seenTo me it watches like an ode to the (early) 50's monster movies (e.g. the Blob, with Steve McQueen) so instead of having the cliché's dragging the movie down, the writer(s) turn(s) the effect of the clichés around, by putting them to good use; kind of like Wes Craven did in "Scream". SO in this case: the hero drives a Hot Rod and wears his school' Jock jacket and so...Next to that , the acting is good, the pace is fast, tension is built as tension should built, the special effects look great (given the age, the budget AND the fact that it's a TV movie). I'll be honest: it's not "predator" , it's not "the eye". it's a small flick with good acting, good story with a great pitch that makes it stand out from the rest. All you need as a good evening's entertainment!

This is one of those movies that could only happen in a town where they filmed a 1950s Horror movie and it's sequels. The director is in a local psyco ward of the hospital. Every 3 or 5 years (please forgive my memory) the monster re-emerges and goes on a 2 day killing spree. Well a only few days before the monster is scheduled to come out of hibernation, the grandson comes and gets his grandfather out of the looney bin, of course he doesn't believe his story but says he will care for him. Gramps keeps trying to convince him things will keep happening according to the original old movie script(of course he doesn't believe him, it's still according to the script). Well if you put your brain in neutral for a bit you can actually find it has a sort of twisted logic(kind of). But, the whole thing is it's meant to be a Horror B-movie, so enjoy it for what it for what it's meant to be and enjoy it you will. My husband and laughed and had got a bit nostalgic(ok maybe we're a bit twisted), but I really would give it 8 Stars. Eat popcorn and enjoy.

Playful, funny, lovingly satiric, action filled story about a retired, aging B movie star, Emmet Walsh and his straight laced Grandson, Travis. Emmet lives in the small town of "New Purgatory." He is a local legend, having filmed all of the "Monster" movies there, then settling down as a resident. He is seen as slightly mad because he believes the monster from his series of movies is real, and coming to attack the town. Thing is - he's right. It's a rite of passage as he hands over the "town hero" role to his Grandson and they save the town once more.