Tag line : One thing the aliens hadn't counted on was Derek, and Derek's don't run.

A surprising cult hit this one by Pre-"Lord of the Rings" director Peter Jackson. Filmed originally as a pet project on a shoestring budget, the film is set in a small coastal town in Jackson's native New Zealand, where a specialist government group called AIDS (oooerrrrrr!!!!!) have been called in to investigate the disappearance of all the towns folk, following a UFO sighting.

They soon discover the town has been taken over by aliens, who have killed the population, and turned them into their own favourite brand of fast food. What starts as a routine investigation, ends up in a massive gun fight as they discover the alien's space ship, cunningly disguised as a nearby building, and a massive battle erupts.

The amount of blood and gore in this film is quite phenomenal, even by Clive Barkers, or George Romero's standards. But, it's presented in such a way that it just makes you laugh hysterically. There's vomit eating, brain eating, cannibalism, exploding heads, EXPLODING SHEEP !!!!!!! Terrific stuff.

This one went down a storm when it got entered into the Cannes film festival, which took the cast and crew by complete surprise as Peter Jackson never intended this for general release. Whilst the acting and special effects aren't quite on the same par with mainstream Hollywood blockbusters, this film is an absolute scream and if you haven't seen it already, do so at once. I cannot recommend it enough. Prepare to be grossed out like never before.

Overall Marks : 8/10

Other Information.

• Alternate tag lines... "Watch out aliens...here comes Derek", "The Bastards have Landed", "Crumbs Crunchy Delights", "Human Meat for Intergalactic Hamburgers".

• The film took over four years to complete, the reason being because they could only film it at weekends, when the crew had time off work.

• All the props and special effects seem quite effective but, as mentioned earlier, where all done very cheaply. The Alien masks where made from special DIY moulding kits. The guns where all made out of pipe and bits of plastic glued together, and the gunfire was added on after filming (the actors had to stand there shaking the prop guns to make it look like they where actually being fired). Peter Jackson also constructed his own counterweighted steady-cam device for this film. It cost only $15.

• All the dialogue in the film was dubbed after the original sound tapes went missing.

• Craig Smith, who played Giles, got married and divorced in the 4 year time frame it took to shoot the film.

• There was a documentary made on the making of this film entitled "Good Taste". This was shown by the BBC, after the film aired on BBC 2 back in 1996. To date, the only other place this documentary can be seen is on a special limited edition US R1 DVD by Anchor Bay.

• The film was actually banned in the state of Queensland in neighbouring Australia right up until the early 90's when the Queensland censorship board was disbanded.

• Peter Jackson went on to make the equally gory "Braindead" and "Meet the Feebles" a rather violent version of the Muppets. It came as something as a shock to discover that in 2000 he was chosen to direct the highly successful "Lord of the Rings" trilogy.

Cast & Crew.

Theatrical trailer. (727KB)

Exploding Sheep. (82KB)

Buy the UK DVD.

Buy the UK DVD

Buy the US DVD (2-disc spec-ed)

Buy the US DVD (standard)

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