This is one of those films that had passed me
by for a good many years. But after discovering it was based on the old HP Lovecraft story The Colour Out of Space,
which had also been adapted into a feature film in 2019, I was curious to see how it compared.
The film stars Star Trek's Wil Wheaton as young Zack, who lives on a farm with his younger sister Alice (played by his real life sister Amy), along with his Mother Frances (Kathleen Jordon Gregory), his over bearing, religious zealot step-father Nathan (Claude Akins) and inbred step-brother Cyrus (Malcolm Danare, who was also the fat bully in "Christine").
When a meteorite crashes down in the nearby fields, then promptly dissolves into the soil, they are extremely surprised to find all their produce growing extremely large and ripening much sooner than expected. But when they discover it's rotten on the inside, Zack realises the meteorite must have had an adverse effect, as the well water also tastes off and their livestock becomes diseased and even starts attacking them.
His step-father though, seems to think it's a Curse put on them as they have sinned and upset god, but when he and Cyrus start developing boils, facial lesions and start exhibiting psychotic behaviour, Zack has to try and find a way of getting him and his sister away to safety before anything unsavoury happens to them too.
Obviously low budget, this isn't a bad movie, but it's VERY 1980s and the scenes with the dodgy miniature model work are very obvious. The film also bombed at the box office, but gained popularity on home video, spawning a number of unrelated sequels. Overall, I'd say it's worth a watch if you like cheesy 80s horrors, although before doing so you might want to look into some of the controversial allegations made about the film's production by Wil Wheaton, and why he will never sign any posters or merchandise from this.
