Yeah, its almost Halloween. I know because Gregg's has put out all their fancy bat biscuits and vampire doughnuts or whatever else they sell there this time of year. With that in mind, and being that I haven't done that many blogs lately, I'm gonna attempt to review a different random horror film each day for the next week. Netflix often suggests I watch films that I haven't seen or even heard of, most of which seem like they would be absolutely awful, but have also massively piqued my interest, because I secretly love shit films. I even have Freddy Got Fingered on DVD. Anyway, the first film I am going to watch and give an in-depth synopsis of is something called...
Grabbers (2012)
Okay, so this is a whimsical Irish tale about a strange alien menace that lands in a sleepy island town and starts eating people and whales. Two police guards are posted on the island, one of whom is a belligerent pisshead bloke, and the other is a plucky young woman, but the film is filled with the kind of colourful characters you would expect. In the first scene, three fishermen on a trawler are attacked and killed by the creature which seems to have landed from the sky, and in another early moment a local man discovers large eggs on the beach and then gets sucked into the sea.
Early doors the local residents encourage the belligerent pisshead to make a move on the young woman, so there is a romantic subplot here. In the same scene, another older drunken man at the only pub on the island claims to have caught a sea monster, with such glorious dialogue as "That ain't no feckin' lobster!", and he keeps it in his bathtub.
We see another couple at home who get a knock at the door. When the husband opens it, another old man is swinging from a porch light and is dropped to the floor. The husband is then grabbed by the alien and plucked into the air. The wife then gets sucked up the chimney. What a way to go.
The belligerent pisshead gets more pissed and asks the girl to go for drinks. He tells her he will ride a horse home because "the horse is sober". He knocks some of her stuff over and appears to fall asleep standing up. Then the old man with the monster in his bath finds that it has laid an egg and left a gooey mess on the mirror. Then the grabber finally appears in all its glory, and attacks the old man, who we see stamping on it during the melee.
We hear there is a storm coming, so we instantly know the final scene will involve this storm. Then we hear the belligerent pisshead is widowed, so now the girl will have a bit more sympathy towards him. The woman who runs the hotel they are staying at tries to encourage the girl to take the honeymoon suite, as a stag party is coming next week from Dublin. We then see that the girl put the belligerent pisshead in a prison cell for the night, because he passed out.
The old man who found the monster is still alive and demands a finders fee. Also on the island is a doctor who specialises in marine life and all that, he also fancies the police lady. The doctor isn't sure if the creature is actually dead, so there's the customary scene where he opens it up in his lab, before he tells them that the creature drains all the blood from its victims and is "something alien", and that "all it needs to survive are blood and water". The crazy old man asks if he can sell it on eBay. The doctor opens up one of the eggs and we see some disgusting mess inside.
The police (or "garda") find the car of the other guy who was swinging earlier. They explore the remote house where he and the married couple were killed, and she pulls a severed head from the chimney. They bring the head to another more conventional doctor, who suggests they may have been mauled by a tiger. We see the old man who discovered the creature now has a huge hole in his bathroom wall. The garda and the old man explore the beach where he first found the grabber and go into some caves. They wander around with torches until they come across a discarded fisherman's uniform. The old guy finds more eggs, one of which shows signs of life.
A fucking massive grabber appears in the cave, so the guards run from it. The grabber shoots a tentacle towards them and they all leg it off the beach. Naturally they can't call for back up because of the impending storm. In the lab, they set fire to the grabber. A sprinkler goes off and the marine doctor says "Get it wet...you really are Irish" - he is English, you see, hence the butt of a lot of jokes here. They slowly approach the creature, which sprays something at the pisshead police guard and attacks him, the others eventually get him free. The pisshead screams "vicious little fuck" and they beat it to death with brooms and shovels. The old man is still around, and claims he is still alive because of diet and exercise.
This is the major turning point of the film - they theorise that the aliens that act like leeches didn't kill the old man or the police guard due to the alcohol in their systems. They suggest having a lock in at the hotel pub where everybody drinks. They don't tell the woman who runs the hotel what is actually happening, and instead act like its a surprise party for her. The belligerent pisshead promises not to drink though, and promises the woman that he can do it. She tells him she has never been drunk, and he tells her she can do it in a touching moment.
They all watch as the girl gets hammered and applaud her efforts. The old man brings some home brew and distributes it to her, but she reacts very badly to it. They take her blood test and inject it into a pint glass before feeding it to a grabber they are keeping in a tank. It dies. They breathalyze her and its a .2 reading, so all the men agree they will need to do shots as well as pints.
Firstly the two garda go to the island church, and he tells everyone they are invited to the pub for a "great night's craic". The hotel woman questions it, and the drunk girl says its her welcome party. She threatens to arrest anyone who doesn't turn up - he then says it'll be a free bar and everyone is bang up for it. Even the priest.
As the storm brews up outside, we see general merriment inside. The main characters get some weapons together, including flare guns, a board with a nail in it and a super soaker they will fill with petrol. The two garda are in the police vehicle where he is drinking a thermos of coffee, but they flirt all the same. She says she fancies him, but he says now is not the time.
The English doctor drinks on his own and is lagging badly. The island doctor laments having to wait to use the toilet so he goes outside and pisses on a wall. The garda are still chatting away, and she starts crying and says she is sorry that his wife died. The guy says nobody died and it just didn't work out - she met someone else which drove him to excessive drinking. Meanwhile, a whole army of small grabbers appear and attack the island doctor. The garda try to help him out - she kicks some of them around and the doctor gets free. Then another huge grabber appears and devours him, severing his head.
The grabber then attacks their vehicle as they run back into the pub. They try to light the super soaker and the pub owner runs outside with it, but the gun totally fails. He narrowly avoids being eaten. The reformed belligerent pisshead then says the party is moving upstairs and says nobody can go home. The suspicious hotel lady wonders what it going on, and some of them nearly come to blows. The marine doctor demands more booze and goes outside. He wants to get a photo with the grabber while the others protest - he snaps a few pictures but then the creature, which doesn't eat him due to the alcohol, instead flicks him wth a tentacle and he goes absolutely flying.
Inside, everyone goes upstairs as the small creatures have managed to get into the building. The others think of ways to kill the grabber - the pissed police woman suggests lifting it into the air and leaving it until the sun comes up, drying it out and killing it. The crazy old man refuses to go and do it ("feck off!") so the pissed police woman volunteers. They arm her with a nail gun, but she falls down the stairs. The old man says "she's a goner", and then suggests making a dummy to confuse the creature.
The baby grabbers ransack the pub and act much like drunken people would. The woman nails one of them to the bar then kicks one into the jukebox, which plays an old 50s rock 'n' roll song. We see the huge grabber has got inside the building and as you would expect, the fuses are blown. The woman manages to set fire to the bar and is dragged along by the grabber briefly. Everyone upstairs smells the smoke - the sober police guard climbs out of the window as the grabber tries to get him. The drunken woman turns up in a car and they speed off, pursued by the creature.
They drive out to an industrial park, where the creature manages to attack the guy with its tongue. The drunken woman turns up in a JCB now and tips it over a rock face, trapping it. They both climb out but the grabber gets hold of him still , but the guy tips some of the homebrew into its mouth (she had the bottle on her the whole time and had just handed it to him). She then says "shut your hole" and shoots a flare at a load of oil barrels, which explode and burn the grabber to a crisp.
The next day the old man and the hotel owner agree the last night was actually fun. They share a good laugh despite people they know and love being dead. The two police guards are walking down a hillside road together, and both are covered in dirt. They share a kiss and seem to agree on moving to the island together. We then see a nice shot of the beach and the seafront, until we see one of the eggs start to hatch again, ending things on an ominous note.
Okay, that was a pretty detailed description of the film, but hopefully you got the idea from it all - this is essentially "Tremors" meets "Waking Ned" - at times it is derivative of similar horror comedies but is actually quite an endearing and at times funny film. I thought it was going to suck, so what do I know. Maybe the next one will.
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