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Pretty Good

hyped garbage

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

Something toxic and ravenous is lurking beneath the Big Apple and it's up to a police captain, a photographer, and a "paranoid hippy", to expose the dirty government secret that's been popping out for a bite to eat before it's too late! C.H.U.D. is one interesting and different 80s monster movie to me for a few reasons. The opening scene of the lone woman walking the dog down a dark and deserted city street in the middle of the night until a manhole cover opens itself and something monstrous and unseen quickly drags her down into the sewer, really sets the tone for the rest of the movie and really captured my young imagination and stuck with me, there's something primordially frightening about that kind of scene. It also had one of those kinds of VHS covers that was very memorable and caught the eye and was fascinating along with the title. I like how they give the classic acronym a more realistic definition in the story. It totally hits that special gritty New York 80s vibe and atmosphere which always worked just as well with crooks or a monster horror slant like in Q: The Winged Serpent, Maniac Cop or Alligator to name but a few. The underground scenes in particular have a terrifically grungy and dank quality to them that makes you feel a bit grubby just by watching! It's pretty cleverly written in a way that compensates for its nagging lack of monster action, with there being three main characters with separate stories that all tie into the mystery of the Chuds and that all come together and play out as the existence of the monsters is discovered. And that helped to keep the underground aspect of the movie alive without actually showing too much.. But on the other hand this movie isn't as effective and great as it could've been, as you really don't get what you pay for with it and although I like this movie a lot that's probably it's big flaw, you're really watching to see a gruesome monster movie and while that's what it is at heart it doesn't focus on the damn Chuds enough, they annoyingly take a complete backseat to the characters. Towards the end they kind of fizzle out of the movie altogether as the focus of the story becomes all about stopping mean old pompous Wilson, the villainous bloated toady boss of the irresponsible government toxic waste disposal agency that inadvertently created the Chuds in the first place. I very much prefer the version of the movie where the attack on the diner occurs right at the end, even though the final act revolves around its aftermath(!), because it at least ends the movie with a satisfying scream as opposed to the actual ending which is flat and disappointing as hell. You don't end your monster movie that way, everyone knows that! They should have just tried out something small like the good old classic gag of some sinister eyes glowing in the dark, something to show that the terror of the Chuds wasn't over.. Hey they did earlier show to be fireproof! Despite their limited screen time the Chuds are menacing and memorable, the design is somewhat simplified but effective, the glowing eyes are weird and spooky and they're your basic bloodthirsty Morlock type creatures. It'd be sad if they weren't so ugly, the Chuds were once wretched homeless people forced to live under the ground where most regular folks probably viewed them as monsters, until one day through no fault of their own they became monsters! I don't agree with everything Daniel Stearn has to say about them on the audio commentary, but I do think that something else for the Chuds could have worked out better, the scene where the injured bum is more Chud than man is damn scary. It's definitely a great creepy concept, just one that's not as fleshed out as it could have been, and for me it's a very good movie, it only needed a few more Chuds in it! Regardless of any faults though I still have a big soft spot for this flick and enjoy sitting through it from time to time, it's a well acted compelling and straightforward good old fashioned piece of work and a solid low key classic in its own right with a tone and idea that sets it apart from being just another forgotten monster movie.

C.H.U.D. = Cannibalistic Human Underground Dweller. Nuclear Waste Sewer Monsters (N.W.S.M) Is what the the film is really about - and some political garbage. The film starts out a real bore-fest. We have an uptight photographer and his girlfriend model with drama between them over a photo shoot for a perfume ad. This photographer did a story on the homeless in the area and apparently gave them his phone number during the photo shoot & story on them - so yea they call him (and he seems a bit irritated about it). We also have a policeman who is now a police captain with lots of boring police stuff happening. There is a man that works in a soup kitchen who considers the homeless his family and they start to come up missing. Yea the getting to know the characters for about the first 25 minutes of the film is really boring. About the 25 minute mark it starts to pick up a little bit with boring scenes in-between. The last 30 minutes of the film gets pretty good - not too bad - this is when we see the C.H.U.D.s and the story picks up. The best most likable character by far is A.J. 'The Reverend' Shepherd (Daniel Stern). Two other somewhat likable characters are Captain Bosch (Curry) and Lauren Daniels (Greist). The rest of the characters I didn't care about (I'm not talking about the actors themselves - I mean the roles they play). I loved the cameo by John Goodman who plays a small part as a cop in diner - that was good. 5/10

Captain Bosch (Curry) starts an investigation when his wife doesn't come back from a walk one night. People have been disappearing near this city block for awhile and Bosch meets A.J. Sheppard (Stern) who runs a soup kitchen. He notes that a lot of his regulars who live underground have also come up missing. The city has dumped toxic waste below the streets and the Homeless people are turning into mutant monsters. A photographer (Heard) gets mixed up in the mess while trying to do a story on the homeless people. This low budget horror film has a very good cast for a B movie monster flick. The monsters have a cool look to them but we don't see much of them. There's a lot of rubbery clawed hands pushing doors in and pulling people out of frame, instead of them showing full on monster attacks. There is a decent amount of gore all though it is pretty fake looking. The cover-up by the city is an interesting storyline and Stern as the dirty revolutionary is a lot of fun. Unfortunately the movie never gets scary at all and seeing the mutant monsters more would have helped this. The movie has developed a cult following through the years, but as a monster flick it is pretty tame.

Ah! The 1980s! The era of crazed mutants and rubber masks! Radioactive waste disposed of in the sewer system brings about a New York infestation of C.H.U.D.s (according to one version Canibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers). The ensuing bloody mayhem, starting off from hobos turning into hors d'oeuvres, before expanding into the premium meat from above ground level. When the wife of police detective George Cooper (John Heard) goes missing the escalating missing person endemic becomes personal, making him join forces with ever-greasy A.J. Shephered AKA The Reverend (Daniel Stern), devoted to feeding homeless, in an attempt to get behind the ravenous outbreak of mutated freakoids."C.H.U.D" is essentially unclassifiable. Brilliantly bad gonzo filmmaking, which will have you reeling in the guilty pleasure of absurd acting, directing and storytelling. Based on a screwball script with little intent of ever being self-indulgent, "C.H.U.D." is a movie, which seems to have only been possible in the 1980s, where adequate technical capacity coupled with gung-ho filmmaking churned out substandard gems full of witty crappiness, never aspiring to be anything other than a chaotically anarchistic joyride. According to audio commentary the movie was conceived under conditions of total turmoil. This ultimately shows, but somehow never takes away from satisfactory, if ridiculous, watching. Funnily enough the whole movie exits without ever really dealing with the cannibal menace, instead side-tracking into a bad government official plot. Absolutely wacko, but somehow so fitting...All in all I found it impossible to truly assess the movie. Just so bad, but so so so good...