The Creature Wasn't Nice (1981)
Posted: Tue Jan 31, 2023 7:44 pm
How can a piece of goo grow into a one-eyed killing machine? How could so many big name actors get suckered into starring in this film? How can one movie have three names? How can a good movie be so bad? How can a bad movie be so good?
During an unplanned stop to an unknown planet, the five-mamber crew of the Spaceship Vertigo bring back a small piece of "goo" that, unbeknownst to them, is about to grow into a big, deadly problem once back on the ship.
Four members of the crew, you'll instantly recognize: Capt. Jamieson (Leslie Nielson), Rodzinski the mechanic (Gerrit Graham), Dr. Stark (Patrick Macnee), and psychiatrist Annie McHugh (the late Cindy Williams). The fifth member of the crew, "John," is played by Bruce Kimmel, who weaseled his way into the role by writing and directing the film.
According to legend, Kimmel intended the film to be a "musical parody of Alien," which, I mean, it takes place on a spaceship and there is an alien, so... maybe? While the alien in Alien was a big scary creature that drooled and bled acid, the one in The Creature Wasn't Nice belts out a Broadway tune ("I Want to Eat Your Face") before dismembering the doctor.
According to legend, the film originally appeared in theaters under its original title, "The Creature Wasn't Nice." The film would have disappeared from history had it not been for a then fledgling cable channel named HBO, who picked up the film and aired it incessantly throughout the early 80s. It was during this time that the film was named "Spaceship," to make the title sound more like "Alien". It was known as Spaceship on HBO and when the film was first released on VHS. Years later, after Nielson had appeared in the Naked Gun films, Spaceship was retitled "Naked Space" and re-released on DVD, with Nielson's face prominently displayed on the cover in hopes that shoppers might mistake it for an entry in the Naked Gun series. A few years ago, the film was re-re-released on DVD under its original title (The Creature Wasn't Nice), complete with the entire soundtrack, a commentary track featuring Cindy Williams and Bruce Kimmel, and two different cuts of the film.
You're probably not wondering if this is a good film or not, so I'll go ahead and spoil the suspense for you -- it's not. There are scenes, like the ship's scheduled "talent show," that feel like painfully long time fillers. There's another scene where the crew is watching television and the movie turns into a UHF-style parody of film clips. The characters are so painfully one-dimensional (the captain's an idiot, the mechanic is horny, and the doctor is an egomaniac) that it doesn't take long before you're rooting for the monster. Actually, it DOES take long, because it takes the monster about an hour to show up in this 90 minute movie. This is essentially a 15-minute movie with 75 minutes of padding.
Except for the monster's music number, which you can watch in the above clip, there's not much reason to watch this one... which doesn't explain why I own Spaceship on VHS, Naked Space on DVD, and The Creature Wasn't Nice on Blu-ray.
During an unplanned stop to an unknown planet, the five-mamber crew of the Spaceship Vertigo bring back a small piece of "goo" that, unbeknownst to them, is about to grow into a big, deadly problem once back on the ship.
Four members of the crew, you'll instantly recognize: Capt. Jamieson (Leslie Nielson), Rodzinski the mechanic (Gerrit Graham), Dr. Stark (Patrick Macnee), and psychiatrist Annie McHugh (the late Cindy Williams). The fifth member of the crew, "John," is played by Bruce Kimmel, who weaseled his way into the role by writing and directing the film.
According to legend, Kimmel intended the film to be a "musical parody of Alien," which, I mean, it takes place on a spaceship and there is an alien, so... maybe? While the alien in Alien was a big scary creature that drooled and bled acid, the one in The Creature Wasn't Nice belts out a Broadway tune ("I Want to Eat Your Face") before dismembering the doctor.
According to legend, the film originally appeared in theaters under its original title, "The Creature Wasn't Nice." The film would have disappeared from history had it not been for a then fledgling cable channel named HBO, who picked up the film and aired it incessantly throughout the early 80s. It was during this time that the film was named "Spaceship," to make the title sound more like "Alien". It was known as Spaceship on HBO and when the film was first released on VHS. Years later, after Nielson had appeared in the Naked Gun films, Spaceship was retitled "Naked Space" and re-released on DVD, with Nielson's face prominently displayed on the cover in hopes that shoppers might mistake it for an entry in the Naked Gun series. A few years ago, the film was re-re-released on DVD under its original title (The Creature Wasn't Nice), complete with the entire soundtrack, a commentary track featuring Cindy Williams and Bruce Kimmel, and two different cuts of the film.
You're probably not wondering if this is a good film or not, so I'll go ahead and spoil the suspense for you -- it's not. There are scenes, like the ship's scheduled "talent show," that feel like painfully long time fillers. There's another scene where the crew is watching television and the movie turns into a UHF-style parody of film clips. The characters are so painfully one-dimensional (the captain's an idiot, the mechanic is horny, and the doctor is an egomaniac) that it doesn't take long before you're rooting for the monster. Actually, it DOES take long, because it takes the monster about an hour to show up in this 90 minute movie. This is essentially a 15-minute movie with 75 minutes of padding.
Except for the monster's music number, which you can watch in the above clip, there's not much reason to watch this one... which doesn't explain why I own Spaceship on VHS, Naked Space on DVD, and The Creature Wasn't Nice on Blu-ray.