Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5495 in DVD
• Released on: 2000-06-05
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Dubbed, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 102 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
When his absent-minded father gives young Billy Pelzer (Zach Galligan) a new pet, he warns him to abide by three rules. The rules get broken, of course, and the pet--a cute Mogwai named Gizmo--unwittingly gives birth to the vicious Gremlins who proceed to terrorise the town.

Although the long shadow of Producer Steven Spielberg hangs over Joe Dante's 1984 comedy Gremlins almost as much as it did over Tobe Hooper's Poltergeist (1982), Dante doesn't allow it to overwhelm his own quirky style too much. Glimpses of Robbie the Robot and The Time Machine (which promptly disappears) at an inventors' convention reveal his passion for old-movie references (which culminated with Matinee, 1993). Aided and abetted by Spielberg's guidance and a script by Chris Columbus (who would go on to direct and produce the Home Alone franchise) and a music score by Jerry Goldsmith, Dante had all the help he needed to make the biggest hit of his career.

Much of the humour derives from Dante's playful handling of the setting in Smallsville, USA, whose inhabitants are as much the target of his satire as they are of the Gremlins' unwanted solicitations. The xenophobic neighbour who warns prophetically of "gremlins" in foreign cars and machinery provides a subtext for the attack on homely American values, as does showing Invasion of the Body Snatchers on TV while the wicked Gremlins hatch. The sight of the little tykes cavorting in a bar, getting drunk and even dancing in pink leggings looks suspiciously like a satirical dig at the whole 1980's culture of selfishness: with their destructive impulses and overindulgences the Gremlins are the ultimate egotistical yuppies. As with many Spielberg projects, the bland hero saves the day for nostalgic, old-fashioned values, but there are plenty of laughs along the way--for example in the now-classic scene when the hero's mother fights off Gremlins in the kitchen by stuffing them in the blender and microwave. Dante's 1990 sequel is even more satirically pointed, and he effectively remade the original with Small Soldiers (1998), replacing Gremlins with toys.

On the DVD: Disappointingly, there are no extra features at all here, aside from subtitles and "interactive menus"--which simply means there is an onscreen menu and it works. --Mark Walker

Amazon.co.uk Review
When his absent-minded father gives young Billy Pelzer (Zach Galligan) a new pet, he warns him to abide by three rules. The rules get broken, of course, and the pet--a cute Mogwai named Gizmo--unwittingly gives birth to the vicious Gremlins who proceed to terrorise the town.

Although the long shadow of Producer Steven Spielberg hangs over Joe Dante's 1984 comedy Gremlins almost as much as it did over Tobe Hooper's Poltergeist (1982), Dante doesn't allow it to overwhelm his own quirky style too much. Glimpses of Robbie the Robot and The Time Machine (which promptly disappears) at an inventors' convention reveal his passion for old-movie references (which culminated with Matinee, 1993). Aided and abetted by Spielberg's guidance and a script by Chris Columbus (who would go on to direct and produce the Home Alone franchise) and a music score by Jerry Goldsmith, Dante had all the help he needed to make the biggest hit of his career.

Much of the humour derives from Dante's playful handling of the setting in Smallsville, USA, whose inhabitants are as much the target of his satire as they are of the Gremlins' unwanted solicitations. The xenophobic neighbour who warns prophetically of "gremlins" in foreign cars and machinery provides a subtext for the attack on homely American values, as does showing Invasion of the Body Snatchers on TV while the wicked Gremlins hatch. The sight of the little tykes cavorting in a bar, getting drunk and even dancing in pink leggings looks suspiciously like a satirical dig at the whole 1980's culture of selfishness: with their destructive impulses and overindulgences the Gremlins are the ultimate egotistical yuppies. As with many Spielberg projects, the bland hero saves the day for nostalgic, old-fashioned values, but there are plenty of laughs along the way--for example in the now-classic scene when the hero's mother fights off Gremlins in the kitchen by stuffing them in the blender and microwave. Dante's 1990 sequel is even more satirically pointed, and he effectively remade the original with Small Soldiers (1998), replacing Gremlins with toys. --Mark Walker

Special Features
1.85 Wide Screen
DVD 9
French\Italian
English\Italian
English
Region 2
Dolby Digital 5.1 English French Italian
Dolby Digital 5.1
Interactive Menu
Scene Access
Arabic\Bulgarian\Dutch\English\French\German\Italian\Portuguese\Romanian\Spanish

Customer Reviews

Some schmaltz but a lot of fun!
This has some really funny bits in it and is great entertainment! I thoroughly enjoyed this.

What's green and red? - A gremlin in a blender.
Gremlins is one of those fantastic Christmas films which can be watched anytime - but has an added magic when watched during the Christmas season.

It's a film that nearly everyone has seen and so unites the land in the knowledge that a gremlin can only survive for so long in a microwave. The film is playful and fun, so as a child I loved it. It courted controversy when it first came out as it was deemed too violent to warrant a PG rating, but it is essentially a family comedy and the violence is basically cartoon style and adds to the general naughtiness of the film. As I get older I can recognise the more sad aspects to this film, such as the death of Kate's dad one previous Christmas making it a time of great unease for her.

I'm not going to mention any of the plot as it is so well known, and for those who don't know it - they have the good fortune of being able to experience it for the first time.

The film was a marketing success with the cute Gizmo and a few Gremlins with distinct individuality (such as Stripe), I always wondered when you could safely feed a Mogwai to ensure it didn't turn into a gremlin, after all any time of day is after midnight!

The humour and the frenetic pace of the film was typical of the emerging comedy-horror genre of the `80s, with other blockbusters such as Beetlejuice, Critters and Ghostbusters. The film was always going to be a success and a family favourite, but a key factor in ensuring this went down so well is the fantastic award winning score by Jerry Goldsmith, the main theme remains one of my all time favourite pieces of film music.

To hear, one only has to listen...
With hindsight (and a point expounded by a close friend of mine), I had a deprived childhood: it's worrying that I have somehow made it into my twenties, and have only just seen "Gremlins". I had the strangest dream the other week that I was looking around ASDA for Gizmo in a santa suit (don't ask), a dream which I later related to my partner who subsequently went out and bought the boxset as a present for me (bless him!).

"Gremlins" is one of those rare films that manages to combine comedy with horror (and I don't just mean jump-out-of-your-seat horror, I mean the horror that characterises the human condition - such as unemployment and suicide). Briefly, "Don't ever get it wet. Keep it away from bright light. And, no matter how much it cries. No matter how much it begs...never, ever feed it after midnight. With these instructions, young Billy Peltzer takes possession of his cuddly new pet. Billy will get a whole lot more than he bargained for".

"Gremlins", once you get past the "Beetlejuice"-like soundtrack, and the "Murder She Wrote" - esque clothing, has an undeniable "feel good factor" about it. Like much of the so-called family films of the 80's, there is a panto feel about the way in which the story is presented to us: there is the mad professor with his ludicrous inventions, the over-the-top sound effects, the Christmas theme, the wicked witch who inevitably gets her comeuppance, the love story, the adorable relationship between the lonely young boy and the animal (Gismo is for the '80's, what Boo from "Monsters Inc." was for the '90's - cuteness embodied), and finally, the climatic moral of the story that seems as relevant now (given the threat of global warming) as it did twenty years ago: that mankind has done to the mogwai what we do with all of nature's gifts - show a total lack of responsibility when it comes to looking after them. For those of you who like to take films for more than their face value - keep your eyes open for the product placement that Spielberg later became renowned for: Gremlin's did for Coca Cola what E.T did for Mars. Check out, in particular, the fore-warnings of the arrival of the Gremlins: not only in the horror film that Billy watches, but also earlier on in the film, when he walks parallel to a cinema board that warns us to "watch the skies". Cheekily, but cleverly, Spielberg also uses this film to bolster his own products - look out for the soft-toy version of E.T. that Spike hides behind on the department store shelf.

What has prevented me from giving this film five stars is the very reason I came to this film in the first place: because I haven't seen it before. Sometimes when we have nostalgic feelings for a film that we have seen from our childhood, our emotional attachment to the film prevents us from really seeing whether it is a good film in itself. Having my analytical head on my shoulders (rather than my emotional one), there were a few flaws in the story-line itself that began to irritate me: for example, why is it that nobody even seemed to batter an eye-lid when they initially saw Gismo (Billy didn't even seem that awestruck when he saw the gremlins emerge from Gismo's back)? We know that all of the gremlins came from Gismo, but where did Gismo come from in the first place? In the scene in which Billy's kitchen is covered in orange juice - can all of that mess REALLY only come from one orange? As another reviewer has already asked, when can you feed Gremlins if you can't feed them after midnight? And, should you really have a stocking hanging over an open fire-place?

Too scary for young children, but not scary enough for older children, the fifteen certificate does seem a little excessive: enjoy and share the warm glow you initially get from the film - just don't question it too much.