Oliver & Company (1988)
Disney Animation/Talking Animals
One of the more forgettable Disney animated film of the 1970s/80s lull, this draws heavily on Lady and the Tramp for a talking animals retelling of Oliver Twist
Films of 1988
On the Silver Globe (1988)
Colonisation of a Alien Planet
Andrzej Zulawski, known for the demented Possession, makes an SF film about planetary colonisation. The spirit of Andrei Tarkovsky hangs over the film, which is long and philosophically rambling. What you cannot deny is the film’s epic scope and the mad splendour of Zulawski’s visuals
The One Game (1988)
Reality Games
Mind-twisting mini-series where videogame designer Stephen Dillane is wound into a series of reality and illusion games
Peacock King (1988)
Wu Xia Film
Hong Kong-made Wu Xia based on a Japanese manga about warrior monks fighting to stop the opening of portals to Hell. This seems uninspired when it comes to the flights of fantasy the genre specialises in, although picks up when it comes to the vigour of its cheap makeup effects scenes
Phantasm II (1988)
Dream Horrors/Other-Dimensional Grave Robbers
The first and best of Don Coscarelli’s Phantasm sequels, one that creates an eerie twilight zone ambience that sits between dream and reality
Pin (1988)
Man's Disturbed Relationship with a Sinister Anatomical Dummy
Creepy and surprisingly well-made Canadian horror film in which a mentally disturbed David Hewlett has a strange relationship with an anatomical dummy that directs him to kill.
Poltergeist III (1988)
Haunting
The third of the Poltergeist sequels, which moves the locale to an apartment building and is better than its predecessor thanks to a series of eerie mirror effects
Pulse (1988)
Malevolent Electrical Appliances
Modest and underrated film where the electrics all around start conspiring against people with murderous intent
Pumpkinhead (1988)
Demon Unleashed
Makeup effects artist Stan Winston takes the director’s chair and creates one of the truly original monsters of the 1980s. Several sequels followed
Purple People Eater (1988)
Cute Musical Alien
An inanely awful film based on the Sheb Wooley song. This is a really lame copy of E.T. in which a young Neil Patrick Harris forms a band with the title alien
R.O.T.O.R. (1988)
Android Cop Amok
An astoundingly bad low-budget RoboCop copy about an android motorcycle cop that goes amok
Rat Man (1988)
Mutated Rat Being
An Italian exploitation film about models in the Caribbean being hunted by a vicious rat-monkey hybrid. Some occasionally gory deaths but not much happens
The Rejuvenator (1988)
Rejuvenation Serum Creates a Monstrous Mutation
This is essentially a 1940s mad scientist film having been given a workover with an arsenal of gory and gooey 1980s makeup effects. The plot concerns an aging movie star who obtains a rejuvenation serum
Remote Control (1988)
Alien Mind-Control Video
A film that comes with a lame premise about aliens distributing a video of a 1950s SF film that turns people into mind-controlled killers all as prelude to an invasion
Return of the Killer Tomatoes! (1988)
Genre Spoof
The first of the sequels to Attack of the Killer Tomatoes. Featuring the first screen appearance of George Clooney.
Return of the Living Dead Part II (1988)
Zombie Comedy
Dan O’Bannon’s Return of the Living Dead came with a cheerfully black cynicism that was a wonderfully fresh alternative to George Romero amid the 1980s zombie fad – this sequel has a painfully unfunny lameness that could not sit at more removed extreme to that
Roboforce (1988)
Hong Kong Android Comedy
A Hong Kong take on RoboCop with Sally Yeh as crimefighting android. Though produced by and also starring Tsui Hark, a very silly slapstick element comes to dominate what are otherwise imaginative action sequences
Robowar (1988)
Amok Cyborg
From Italy, a blatant copy of Predator – only where instead of a military unit being hunted through the jungle by an alien, they are hunted by a copycat of RoboCop
Rock and the Alien (1988)
Rock Singer Meets Alien Girl
Completely obscure, this is fairly terrible on almost every level – an effort about a rock singer given the gift by an alien woman of a special frequency that creates peace when he sings. This would be a guaranteed bad movie classic if anybody else had ever heard about it
Rowing With the Wind (1988)
Mary Shelley-Lord Byron Meeting
One of the better of several films depicting the famous meeting between Mary Shelley and Lord Byron at the Villa Diodati that led to her writing Frankenstein. With a then unknown Hugh Grant as Byron
Saigon (1988)
Vietnam War Psycho-Thriller
Vietnam War film where the setting makes a unique and surprisingly effective backdrop for a modern film noir psycho-thriller
Scarecrows (1988)
Field of Undead Scarecrows
An overlooked effort from the direct-to-VHS era concerning itself with a field of undead scarecrows. Amid the numerous zombie and splatter effects efforts of the day that were being churned out, this settles in with an unusual atmosphere that is often hard to shake
Scrooged (1988)
Modernised A Christmas Carol
A modernised version of A Christmas Carol that seems to have been construed in the shadow of Ghostbusters right down to casting Bill Murray as Scrooge
The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988)
Voodoo/"True Story"
One of Wes Craven’s best films. Loosely based on true-life book by botanist Wade Davis who set out to find the drug that creates zombies, Craven delves into Haitian voodoo in a striking blend of dream and horror
The Seventh Sign (1988)
The Biblical End of the World
A much more elevated version of an Omen-styled Biblical End Times film with Demi Moore worried if her child can save the world
Short Circuit 2 (1988)
Cute Robot
Sequel to the cute robot film pushes the cutsie elements to a nauseatingly anthropomorphished extreme, having it spout smartass colloquialisms and erasing even basic credibility
Sleepaway Camp 2: Unhappy Campers (1988)
Slasher Film
Sleepaway Camp with its unforgettable twist ending stood out in the wasteland of most 80s slasher films. This was the first of four sequels where Bruce Springsteen’s younger sister inherits the role of Angela. While the original stood out, this merely slips into unmemorable formula
Slugs: The Movie (1988)
Killer Mutant Slugs
Killer slug movie from hack Spanish director Juan Piquer Simon where the sole notable aspect amid the cheapness of the production is some very gory deaths
Something is Out There (1988)
Cop and Alien Partner vs Body-Hopping Alien
Mini-series that was a popular hit in its day, which largely steals its premise of a human and alien cop hunting a body-hopping alien from The Hidden. What makes the show work past its rather ordinary story, is the two leads and their wittily sparring Lethal Weapon-type relationship
Space Mutiny (1988)
Space Opera
This is widely regarded as a classic bad movie. A South African-made space opera where the corner-cutting cheapness of the production proves frequently hilarious
Spellbinder (1988)
Pursuit by Satanic Cult
Modest 1980s video release that builds with some unnerving effect as Timothy Daly grants shelter to Kelly Preston only to earn the wrath of a pursuing Satanic cult
The Spider Labyrinth (1988)
Spider Cult
Italian giallo with a professor in Budapest investigating a cult of spider worshippers
They Live (1988)
Reality-Manipulating Aliens
John Carpenter makes an alien invasion film that works as a biting satire of Reaganomics in which aliens are manipulating reality to increase their profit shares in Earth
Three Dangerous Ladies (1988?)
Horror Anthology
Very obscure horror anthology re-edited from episodes of a Canadian tv series featuring names like John Hurt, Charles Gray and Keir Dullea.
Track 29 (1988)
Surrealism
This collaboration between Nicolas Roeg and Dennis Potter results in a mind-boggling blurring of dream, reality, symbolism and sexual obsession. A name cast are allowed their heads and go wild
Troma’s War (1988)
Troma Film
The nearest that Troma Films ever made to an epic, their biggest budgeted film ever, a satiric war film, albeit conducted with their usual cartoon splatter effects and bad taste humour
Twice Dead (1988)
Haunted House/Home Invasion
An 80s horror film that suffers a bizarre identity crisis and doesn’t seem to know whether it wants to be a haunted house film, a home invasion film or a makeup effects vehicle
Twins (1988)
Mismatched Clone Twins Comedy
A one-note joke premised on casting Arnold Schwarzenegger and diminutive Danny DeVito as mismatched clone twins. Unexpectedly charming with Schwarzenegger and comedy director Ivan Reitman turning out what are probably their best works.
The Understudy: Graveyard Shift II (1988)
Vampire Actor
Sequel to Graveyard Shift with a vampire appearing on a vampire film set and taking over the role in the film
Unmasked Part 25 (1988)
Slasher Parody/Slasher Maniac in Love
A parody of the slasher film with an amusing central idea – what if a slasher maniac found a love interest and wanted to give up hacking and slashing to be with them?
The Unnamable (1988)
Demon in the Attic/H.P. Lovecraft Adaptation
One of the spate of H.P. Lovecraft adaptations that came out in the late 80s/early 90s. This feels like an effort by earnest amateurs but does take its Lovecraft seriously unlike most of the other films of this cycle.
Vampire’s Kiss (1988)
Man Believes He is a Vampire Comedy
Bizarre comedy where Nicolas Cage is a literary agent who believes he is a vampire. Cage gives the most absurdly over-the-top performance ever put on film
The Vanishing (1988)
Psycho-Thriller/Unexplained Disappearance
A grippingly good Dutch thriller about a husband who becomes obsessed following the disappearance of his wife, while at the tame time we also get a parallel plot about the comically jolly serial killer responsible
Vibes (1988)
Psychic Powers Comedy-Adventure
Psychic powers comedy made in the aftermath of Ghostbusters where Jeff Goldblum is upstaged by a kooky Cyndi Lauper
Vice Versa (1988)
Father-Son Bodyswap Comedy
One of a spate of bodyswap comedies in the mid-1980s where father and son Judge Reinhold and Fred Savage end up swapping bodies
Warlords (1988)
Post-Holocaust
B-budget director offers up a copy of Mad Max 2 and peppers it with plentiful tongue-in-cheek exploitation elements stirred with undeniable vigour
Watchers (1988)
Intelligent Dog/Dean R. Koontz Adaptation
Dean R. Koontz adaptation in which Corey Haim adopts an unusually intelligent dog unaware it is part of a genetically engineered killing machine. Produced by Roger Corman who spun out a series of sequels.
Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988)
Toon Detective Story
Groundbreaking film that hilariously imagines an alternate world where cartoon characters live alongside humans. The energy and creativity of the film is superlative
Willow (1988)
Epic Fantasy
Outside of the Star Wars and Indiana Jones films, George Lucas has not had much success. This epic fantasy was a big flop where Ron Howard’s lightweight touch fails to make a one-dimensional plot fly
Witchery (1988)
Haunted Hotel/Retribution from Hell
Italian horror film featuring David Hasselhoff and Linda Blair that has little going for it bar some imaginatively gruesome deaths
The Wizard of Speed and Time (1988)
Special Effects Wizard
Film based on the character created by Mike Jittlov about an amateur filmmaker/effects artist trying to make it
Young Einstein (1988)
Gonzo Comedy/Alternate Albert Einstein
Bizarrely surreal comedy directed by and starring Yahoo Serious who plays Albert Einstein as an Australian who discovers surfing and rock