Squirm |
  • USA • 1976 • 92m •    • Directed by: Jeff Lieberman. • Starring: Don Scardino, Patricia Pearcy, R.A. Dow, Jean Sullivan, Peter MacLean, Fran Higgins, William Newman, Barbara Quinn, Carl Dagenhart, Angel Sande, Carol Jean Owens, Kim Iocouvozzi, Walter Dimmick. • Music by: Robert Prince.      A vicious storm is ravaging Fly Creek, Georgia. Power lines collapse and the electrical current they transmit provides power to the denizens of the underground, a burrow of worms. Now, these powerful worms terrorize the town while a southern belle and her city slicker boyfriend must battle the empowered creatures.
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Review:
It also seems redundant to put this movie through the satire of MST3K anyway, because it's already so tongue-in-cheek. Come on...does anybody really think the people who made this film were serious? Of course the characters are stereotypes--I think that was meant to be a gag, and Jeff Lieberman gets a lot of quirky performances out of his actors. In particular, I loved Jean Sullivan's terrific homage to Jessica Tandy in "The Birds", a film that "Squirm" takes great pleasure in satirizing.
But the best thing about "Squirm" is that it was so firmly entrenched in the 1970s drive-in aesthetic. It was campy, gross, and often scary. For a cheap 70s exploitation flick, especially one that was so derivative of other films, it also had some startling original ideas. The image of the house filling up with worms was one that really made an impression on me, as well as the nightmarish scene where the much-abused R.A. Dow is sucked underneath a sea of writhing worms in the living room. Although these things seem silly in the light of day, so do a lot of great horror films. In terms of drive-in shlock, you can't get much better than "Squirm", and making fun of it for being a "bad movie" is sort of missing the whole point. Casual viewers will probably be very turned off by the movie's quirks and production values, while fans of drive-in sleaze probably already know and love the movie for what it is.
Moment of personal indulgence: When I was a kid I used to own a Super 8 highlights reel of this movie, in sound & color, and one of my most cherished memories of childhood is the time I showed it at a church-group sleepover where I was one of the only boys. I think the worm-face scene permanently scarred those little girls, and I'm sure the adult chaperones were mortified.
Review by GroovyDoom from the Internet Movie Database.
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