Day 7: The Stuff (1985)

The Stuff (1985)
Starring: Michael Moriarty, Garrett Morris, Paul Sorvino, Danny Aiello
Category: Boxes that scared me as a kid
Plot Tags: something from another world?, disease, cult classic
Original release: June 14th, 1985
Format viewed: VOD - Netflix
Directed by: Larry Cohen
Written by: Larry Cohen
Distributed by: New World Films, Anchor Bay

"Are you eatin' it, or is it eatin' you??"

Oh, young Charlie, why were you afraid of this movie? Well, as you can see by the image above, the box is freaky. The image of a guy who is wholly unhappy with the glowing gook coming out of him was well enough to unnerve a young version of myself. The movie, however, is just goofy and fun and all together ridiculous.
The story revolves around a mine owner (I think, that part is a little fuzzy not only in my memory but in the movie itself) who discovers a white, bubbling substance coming up from the ground in/around some snow. Like any normal thinking person he tastes it and is amazed at its flavor. <note to self, make sure to NOT eat random bubbling white stuff coming up from the ground> The film fast forwards (kind of) to where it has been retail packaged and sold as The Stuff to great acclaim and popularity. There are a few highly amusing TV commercials and jingles that surround the marketing campaign and packaging that reminds one of that creepy pink and white combination found on marketing for circuses or clowns or other God-awful things.

Anyway, The Stuff has become very sought after, much to the chagrin of ice cream executives who are seeing their business shrink in the face of this 'zero calorie treat'. A clandestine meeting of executives on a boat introduces us to Mo Rutherford (Michael Moriarty of Law and Order fame) who was once an FBI agent and now serves as a corporate saboteur (which I didn't know was a viable career option - interesting).
Mo takes the case and begins to try to figure out who makes the Stuff and how to destroy the company. Simultaneously a story surrounding a young boy accidentally discovering the Stuff is actually alive in an amusing scene involving hearing a sound in the fridge and being met by a glob of it crawling across the fridge rack back to its container (I wonder what it was doing, running errands?). He attempts to warn his family but they ignore him. At this point it becomes evident that the Stuff is actually some kind of alien goop that possesses the eater, messes with their head in a slave/zombie sort of fashion then eats them from the inside out. Bleah. The young boy is arrested at a supermarket for vandalizing a large display of the Stuff which catches the attention of our saboteur hero Mo. Mo also crosses paths with Chocolate Chip Charlie (Garrett Morris - Saturday Night Live), a treat maker forced out of business by the Stuff who is also looking for answers in the town in which it is supposed to have originated. When the young boy is arrested, it catches the attention of Mo and with he, CCCharlie, the young boy, the ad exec who expresses very little disbelief over the whole thing (gotta love 80s horror cardboard characters) set about trying to thwart the Stuff's taking over the world.

A lake of it is discovered and a plot is hatched to destroy it. Paul Sorvino shows up as a militant type of guy who aids in blowing it up. There is a series of logical leaps one must take, one of which is that the stuff is defeat-able by fire which, considering people are cooking with it and eating it with all manner of other foods, somebody might have noticed this. But anyway, there is a whole subplot about mixing it with other substances to minimize the lethal properties and selling it but that is more fun just to see how it unfolds at the tail-end of the movie (not unlike the end of the wonderful Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale).

So all in all, this is a very goofy, campy and fun little romp ('keeping the world safe for ice cream' - !!!) that, while gross at a couple parts here and there, overall plays into the monster/50s cult type mold more than an actual scare. So I give the younger me credit for being creeped out by the cover but some teasing considering how silly and not scary the whole thing is.