How do you fight undead robbers?  With undead cops, of course!

Treat Williams plays L.A. police detective Roger Mortis (No, really, that’s his name) with partner Doug Bigelow (Joe Piscopo!) as they investigate why they can’t seem to kill the bad guys as effectively as they used to.  These investigations lead them to Dante Laboratories, which has developed a process for resurrecting the dead for twelve hours.  After a losing fight with the fattest zombie this side of Zombieland, Mortis is killed.  But, then brought back to life by his coroner ex-girlfriend (Clare Kirkconnell) and the most user-friendly resurrection machine ever.  Now, Mortis has twelve hours to solve the case and avenge his own death in a Hawaiian shirt.

Written by Terry Black , Shane’s brother, Dead Heat has a similar action/comedy feel to his brother’s Lethal Weapon, but with zombies.  And such zombies they are!  The opening jewelry store heist features two punk zombie robbers wearing BDSM leather masks!  (Their safe word is “Braaaaaaiiiiinnnnnssssss.”)

But this is nothing compared to the undead hijinks that occur at a Chinese restaurant.  You know all the dead ducks that are hanging in the window?  Or the pigs?  Or the sides of beef?  Yeah.  Good times.  Wait, no, I mean gross times.  Very, very gross.  How do you kill zombie animals with no heads?

Throughout, Williams grounds the whole movie with the ability to take anything that is thrown at him seriously.  The man is not phased by anything.  This is a valuable skill when Joe Piscopo (with an 80s mullet) is delivering some of the best wise-ass remarks in the history of motion pictures.  Watching this film, it’s hard to understand why Piscopo did not fare better in Hollywood.  The man is a scream.  Especially during an exchange with Williams that shows the deep, profundity of cross-dressing jokes between two partners.  Police partners, I mean.  Heterosexual police partners, I mean.  You get the idea.

Added into the mix are performances by the always entertaining Vincent Price(!), Darren McGavin, Keye Luke , and Robert Picardo.  These appearances are almost cameos but they’re all memorable.

In fairness, the movie does play more like it was made for TV, as opposed to a big budget feature but I think this adds to its charm.  Similar to Creepshow .  Dead Heat is a great little horror flick to enjoy on a Saturday afternoon.

This is precisely the sort of movie I would make if I wanted something kids could watch in awe, while the adults laugh themselves silly.

Starting out with some SETI-style researchers-who only took the job because they wouldn’t have to do anything-end up having their plans foiled when they detect a U.F.O. It turns out to be a meteorite that crashes into Earth, specially on top of Susan Murphy (Reese Witherspoon), turning her into a 50-foot-tall woman.

Oh, and ruining her wedding.

In short order, the usual black helicopter goons show up and whisk Susan off to the secret government lab, where she meets all the great b-monsters of the 1950’s. B.O.B the blob (Seth Rogan)-a lovable pile of sentient goo, Dr. Cockroach (Hugh Laurie )-a not-too-subtle reference to The Fly, The Missing Link (Will Arnett)-who is more Creature from the Black Lagoon than walking ape, and Insectasaurous-the requisite giant monster that resembles nothing less than the product of an unholy union of a gerbil, a puffer fish, and a ladybug. These characters are wardened by the hysterically funny Gen. W.R. Monger, played with verve by Keifer Sutherland-who, quite frankly, sounds like he wrestled a bull by the horns, took said horns, and carved them into the microphone he used to record his voice over.

Apparently the Monster crew has been sequestered for some time, only to be released when the world is accosted by the (slightly) intelligent alien warlord, Gallaxhar (Rainn Wilson ). Their mission: Defeat Gallaxhar’s terrifying probe robot, then his army of very stupid clones, and finally Gallaxhar himself. I’m not really spoiling anything when I tell you they win. It’s a kids movie after all. That’s not really the point, it’s not that they win, but how.

Full of hysterical sight gags, clever bits of dialogue (“This place is an X-file, wrapped in a cover-up and deep-fried in a paranoid conspiracy!“), a dash of satire, and a surprising number of adult contemporary hits. Phrases like “Code Nimoy! Code Nimoy!” are frequently mixed-in with references to Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Beverly Hills Cop-nevermind the fact that the entire movie is a nod to Dr. Strangelove. Even so, there’s a good balance between the referential pop-culture humor and jokes that stand on their own. It doesn’t hurt that the supporting voice cast is top notch as well, with Stephen Colbert, Paul Rudd, and Ed Helms all contributing.

The icing on the character cake is Susan, who does the full Sarah Connor/Ellen Ripley Hero’s Journey: going from delicate flower to destroyer of robots and stomper of alien ass. More importantly, she realizes she doesn’t need a man to make her happy. You go, girl!

We don’t do “family” movies on the Cavalcade often, but when one comes down the pike that has so many nods to the movies that inspired our love of schlocktacular cinema, we have to take a look. Fortunately, this movie’s great on all levels. If you were to Cavalcade it, feel free to mix and match it with one of the fore-mentioned 50’s romps, Monsters Inc., or Bolt-which has even more nods to Hollywood b-movies.

Remember The Blob ?  How it would seep through any crack or crevice and envelope its victims, dissolving them into a mess of goo that would add to its ever-growing mass?  Remember how difficult it was to defeat?  Can you imagine how much more difficult it would be if it tasted delicious?

These are the questions writer/director Larry Cohen asks in The Stuff.  As with Q: the Winged Serpent, Cohen knows the exact amount of ridiculous to put in any situation, such as in what is perhaps one of the greatest opening scenes in cinema history:  A random miner walks off-site to have a smoke when he notices a white goo oozing out from mother Earth herself.  Our intrepid nitwit reaches down and touches it with his bare hand.  Brings it close to his nose and gives it a sniff.  AND THEN HE EATS IT!  It bubbled out of the ground and it was all he could do to stop from diving mouth-first on the ecological eruption.

His fellow miners join him,  asking the crucial question: “What the hell is it?”  Well, Miner No. 1 certainly doesn’t have an answer.  What he does have, is a plan!  Thus the mass-marketing campaign of The Stuff™ begins.

As the tagline “Are you eating it or is it eating you?” suggests, the main theme here is consumerism.  Cohen demonstrates how easily it would be for a motivated corporation to get their product approved by the government, and then easier still to convince the American populace to buy it.  Granted, The Stuff™ Corporation has the edge in that their product forms a biological addiction within its customers that will eventually destroy their organs and leave them a hollow husk of a human being.  Fortunately there’s nothing like that in the real world on the market today.

What?

After The Stuff™ has extracted all the nutrients and proteins from “The Stuffies’” ™ bodies, the white goo exits the nearest convenient orifice, and goes on an 80s-effects-fueled rampage.  The F/X run the gamut of miniatures, stop motion, reverse photography, upside down photography and puppetry.  Though, it should be pointed out that Garrett Morris is not a sophisticated Muppet but an actual person.

Morris plays “Chocolate Chip” Charlie, the founder of a rival dessert franchise who teams up with “Mo” Rutherford (Michael Moriarty), corporate espionage expert.  Never one to put less than 100% into a film, Moriarty is sporting a southern accent with a moderate degree of success and total silliness. More often than not, however, Mo has to rescue Jason (Scott Bloom), our “plucky” young hero who knew that The Stuff was evil long before everyone else.

I hate this child.  He just personifies annoyingness.  Normally, one has to suspend disbelief that a group of actors that don’t resemble each other are blood relations. Here we’re trying to figure out why the rest of the family can act and this kid can’t.  There’s a truly wonderful moment when the family who, up to this point, had merely been awful to him, overtly turn against him as The Stuff™ has taken over their brains.  When the father actually shouts “GET HIM!” … I get goosebumps.

There are a slew of random cameos, the most notable being Paul Sorvino in one of his funniest performances as the great Colonel Malcolm Grommett Spears, a survivalist, retired, racist military commander that saves the day.

Overall, The Stuff is a great send-up of 80s consumerist culture in a similar vein, but with less effect, as George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead.  It lacks subtlety, but these are still important concerns:  why do we as a culture accept things so easily?  Why don’t we question those in power?  And where can I get more Stuff™?

Seriously, I’m jonesing pretty bad here.