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Simply Perfect

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

OK, so the suburban families as the American perfect middle class are cockroaches, NO, lower than cockroaches.. As the cockroaches themselves are more regular, less lustful, and real truthful, united unlike the lousy human race ! It's fun and bold satire that had been done as a little skit which was a cross between black comedy and gory horror. Although it got its talented inner sarcasm, and its superficial coherence, but it also got some funny and bold weak points : How in god's name did they, the cockroaches, transform into humans ? Organize as a military and intelligence ? Put a complicated plane ?? How they happen to be this size as bugs in the first place ? And now be ready for the big one : how could they build their earth after the end of the humans since the nuclear explosion would destroy them and the humans together ??!! Actually, being such an obvious satirical skit may not allow it to be that easy (or stupid !) but treat it in well-meaning behavior like it does with its cases.I loved the perspective to look into materialistic society urges addiction (drugs, sex, shopping, etc..) with no way to admit any of its faults (hide it is the best way), so how we all such a monsters masquerading as happy ideal "family of the year" kind of huge lies ! It was truly painful as well as ironic watching the scene of receiving the honorable award like the best of this community is its worst, and the falseness is on. Look at its deeper meaning : the human body oozes inferiority and degeneration yet with some cockroaches' ethics every thing would go right. I told you earlier it's the movie where the human must emulate the more perfect creatures : the bugs ! what an acrid criticism for a movie that is.(Stockard Channing) exceeded everybody, (Ed Begley Jr.) was good but lacks charisma and looks always cold plus he didn't add anything to his role, (Dabney Coleman) was disgusting for no reason but being odd ! The special effects weren't bad at all according to the movie's condition as so Independent Film. Aside from not making a real comic situations (just scary or sardonic ones) the scriptwriters just skipped (rather escaped from) writing very important scene in which the family return to their origin at the jungle in a reunion for more connection and peace after the hard clash where the hidden truths uncovered.. As all what we've seen was couple of naive silent shoots ! Maybe the writers don't know the cockroaches' language ?!.When I first watch it, I didn't know the year it came from, but I guessed the 1980s, so initially I thought how it might be so mean metaphor for the Soviet communists ! But thank god, as it moved on I discovered it was something more balanced and sane.Well.. With so zerotic budget, it handled itself fine. True, it canceled the imagination a bit since it considered itself kind of adult comic-book mainly to deride, yet despite everything it got wicked meanings and a way-of-its-own enjoyment.After 2 years there was (Coneheads - 1993) another similar joke, and although it was more imaginative but wasn't as dark and malicious as this one. (Meet the Applegates) will be memorable not for its strength or comedy but for its wild outrageous metaphor.

Low-rent comedy that probably made a better impression on its release in the early 90's alongside a spate of similarly timed Eco-romps that included the creatures themselves to a large extent ("Honey I Shrunk... ", "Ferngully", etc). In 2007 however, it just looks tired, when people such as Tim Burton are capable of handling these things with far more subtlety.The satire is misjudged here because the wellspring itself is from other movies rather than anything close to real-life. If this is an attack on American values then it adheres strictly to movie convention, because I refuse to believe that EVERY family over there contains the requisite sex-object daughter and pothead son.This takes aim at small screen morality on a bigger budget, and it's very rare that TV is a microcosm, so almost all of the jabs feel watered down when filtered through an entertainment medium. If you want cockroaches arriving on earth without feeling the need to have a 'social conscience', then check out "Men in Black" - it's far wittier and doesn't find itself resorting to lame 'drag' gags that pad out the story...

MEET THE APPLEGATES is a comedy horror movie and I guess on that level it works very well as a bunch of giant praying mantis disguise themselves as an all American family and live in middle America while planning to sabotage a nuclear power plant in order to save their jungle environment So far so good as far as the premise goes but you quickly find yourself asking the question as to what the film is trying to say . Is it an anti racist parable or a satire on present day dysfunctional American family life ? Surely if the movie has a green conscience it should appeal to children but within 20 minutes we've already seen an attempted rape while more and more bad language and adult situations like adultery and drug taking are introduced into the story and long before the movie ends you notice that there's a very uneven feel between scenes which makes for a very strange movie Okay I'll be generous and take it as entertainment in which case MEET THE APPLEGATES just about succeeds if that's what it's intended as . I wasn't exactly falling out of my chair but there are some amusing moments while the climax featuring a couple of giant bugs in a fist fight did bring a perplexed smile to my face

Angered by a logging company encroaching deep into their natural forest, a family of large insects camouflage themselves as humans and blend themselves into a small American town. Dick gets a job with the nuclear power plant in order to sabotage it and wage war on the human population. However the family finds that their attempts to blend in are working a little too easy and they endanger their own mission. Despite being a little too gory for my tastes, this comedy is actually quite sharp in it's main satire on American life. The main joke for me was the way the family of bugs are sucked into the lifestyle of American mores – the mother gives in to commercialism, the son to drugs, the daughter to teenage sex and the father to adultery. It's comical to watch their descent and works pretty well. Where's it's all going is less clear and the message is not so clear in regards whether becoming `normal' is for the best or not. What is clear is the eco message which pokes fun at those who would make war on nature (whether bug or human) without respect for other life forms.For a 90 minute film it all works pretty well and is actually quite imaginative. The gore put me off a little, in the gore of the eggs and bugs generally and I would have preferred if they had just had the bugs without all the slime and stuff. The cast do a good job carrying the material – their performances generally help keep up the mood of weirdness! Begley Jnr and Channing are both good in the leads – each giving in to their human environment. The kids are OK but the best performance is an outrageous performance from Coleman as the queen of the species – complete with full drag and moustache!Overall this never quite delivers as many laughs as it's clever and funny pitch but it is still worth a watch. It has a surreal picture book image of `normal' America that it slowly explodes. For me, you could take or leave the eco message and still enjoy the film. Not great but different enough to be worth a try.