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Blu-ray Review Squirm Blu-ray Review (1 Viewer)

Todd Erwin

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Squirm Blu-ray Review

There haven’t been many movies made about killer worms, yet Jeff Lierberman’s directorial debut, Squirm, may have been the first. Made on an ultra low budget in 28 days on location in Port Wentworth, Georgia, the film is better than it deserves to be, thanks to its quirky and off-beat sense of humor and never taking itself seriously.

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Studio: MGM

Distributed By: Scream Factory

Video Resolution and Encode: 1080P/AVC

Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1

Audio: English 2.0 DTS-HDMA

Subtitles: English

Rating: R

Run Time: 1 Hr. 33 Min.

Package Includes: Blu-ray

Blu-ray keepcase with outer paperboard sleeve

Disc Type: BD50 (dual layer)

Region: A

Release Date: 10/28/2014

MSRP: $29.93




The Production Rating: 3/5

A major thunderstorm has knocked down electrical lines in the rural town of Fly Creek, Georgia, isolating the citizens from civilization. So much so, that tourist Mick (Don Scardino) has to find his way to town by foot through the woods after the bus drops him off by the side of the road due to flooding. After apparently getting lost, he is found by his girlfriend, Geri (Patricia Percy), a country girl he met at an antique show. She takes her home to meet her mother (Jean Sullivan) and sister Alma (Fran Higgins), and along the way meet the townspeople, including worm farmer Willie Grimes (local Carl Dagenhart), his son Roger (R.A. Dow) who has a crush on Geri, and Sheriff Reston (Peter MacLean) who doesn’t like city folk visiting his town. But the downed power lines have caused the flesh-eating worms residing in the earth to migrate to the surface, attacking and devouring any living thing they can crawl their way onto.Jeff Lieberman’s Squirm may have been fodder for MST3K as one of the last movies featured on that series, but the film is just quirky enough to stand on its own as a fun, B-grade horror film that never takes itself seriously. Don Scardino, who went on to have a fairly successful directing career, is well-cast as the fish out of water antiquity nerd who has to muster up the courage to find a way to stop the onslaught of killer worms. Patricia Percy is a delight as Mick’s love interest and attractive country girl. Jean Sullivan and Peter MacLean are over the top in their roles as the older single mother trying to hold it together and the bigoted bully man of law, respectively. But the real surprise is Fran Higgins as younger sister Alma, who holds her own and gives a very believable performance, despite this being her only screen credit. Trivia fans will get a kick out of the early makeup effects work by a very young Rick Baker on this film.


Video Rating: 3.5/5 3D Rating: NA

Squirm wriggles its way onto Blu-ray courtesy of Shout! Factory, via their Scream Factory label. The transfer provided to them by MGM is actually fairly solid, with accurate and consistent colors that are never over saturated, decent black levels (although there are a few instances of black crush in many of the darker scenes), and a surprisingly high level of detail for a film of this age and budget. The 1080p transfer has been compressed using the AVC codec, and retains the film’s intended aspect ratio of 1.85:1.



Audio Rating: 4/5

Although the menu lists the soundtrack as DTS-HD MA 2.0 stereo, the packaging lists the track as 2.0 mono, which is correct. For a nearly 40 year old mono soundtrack, it’s pretty good, free of hiss, pops, and distortion, with clear and understandable dialogue and never gets drowned out by the music score by Robert Prince or sound effects.


Special Features Rating: 3.5/5

Audio Commentary by Jeff Lieberman: The writer/director has a lot to say about this film, but does make some serious flubs. His dissing of “Mystery Space Science Fiction 2000” for not understanding the opening crawl as a joke and mentioning that he never read any screenwriting books by “Ted Fields” are glaring errors.Digging In: The Making of “Squirm” (1080p; 33:11): Writer/Director Jeff Lieberman and star Don Scardino discuss making the movie.Eureka! with Jeff Lieberman (1080p; 7:04): Lieberman discusses the genesis of the movie and takes the viewer to his childhood home where it all began.Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 1:56)TV Spot (1080p; 0:55)Radio Spot (1080p; 1:01)Still Gallery (1080p)Reversible Insert Cover: Choose between the new Scream! Factory artwork or artwork based on one of the film’s original posters.


Overall Rating: 3.5/5

Squirm is a movie that is better than it ever deserves to be, a tongue-in-cheek homage to movies like Hitchcock’s The Birds. Shout! Factory’s presentation is, as expected, quite good, with some nice bonus features.


Reviewed By: Todd Erwin


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Radioman970

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1976

It was made in my home state and we are proud of that. And I have to say I had no cotton pickin idea what an "egg cream" was until seeing this thing. :P
 

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