To countdown to this year’s Halloween, Luke Owen reviews a different horror film every day of October. Next up, wacky horror comedy Killer Klowns From Outer Space…
Don’t you just love it when a movie’s title tells you everything you need to know about it?
Killer Klowns From Outer Space does exactly what it says on the tin and it’s never ashamed by just how stupid it is. It homages classic horror tropes and pays tribute to classic movies like The Blob and even Gojira. It’s a movie that is hard to take seriously but, like Chopping Mall, it’s all part of it’s charm.
When discussing Killer Klowns From Outer Space, it’s almost impossible to know where to begin. Do you start with it’s title? It’s insane plot? Do you talk about the great costume designs? The corny dialogue? Or the hilarious moments like the killer shadow puppet show, the balloon sniffer dogs and the Popcorn guns? It’s all so beautifully asinine and ridiculous that it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what makes the movie so fun to watch – it all just comes together perfectly to create a hilarious and enjoyable viewing experience. It should come as no surprise that the movie has picked up a massive cult following and it’s this kind of support which has kept it in the public eye for all of these years. Much like Evil Dead 2: Dead By Dawn, Killer Klowns From Outer Space is the ideal movie to become cult fodder, with its quotable lines, laugh out loud deaths and completely wacky story.
Creating a horror comedy is a very tricky task and only few movies have ever truly gotten it right. Ones that don’t hit the mark are either not funny enough to be a comedy or not scary enough to be a horror and the genre is littered with incredibly poor attempts. But just like Shaun of the Dead and Stalled got it right with zombie comedies, Killer Klowns From Outer Space nails it with alien invasion flicks. More or less every joke works and it revels in its own madness and idiocy that it just becomes such it a joy to watch. You could argue that the movie isn’t scary enough to be a horror, but that all depends on how you feel about clowns (or should that be Klowns) and the movie’s make-up work.
The budget of the movie was said to be around $2 million and every penny of that was spent on the production and cast with all of the make-up and special effects done by the writers and creators Stephen and Charles Chiodo. Credit where credit is due, the designs of the Klowns are superb and each has their own distinct personality, even though they are never identified by names or given dialogue. One of the true highlights of the movie is towards the end with Klownzilla, a great tribute to the suitmation work of Eiji Tsuburaya and a testament to the creativity of the Chiodo brothers. Much like Pinhead from Hellraiser, the Klowns have taken on a life of their own with each year bringing a new group of people dressing up as them for Halloween as well as their own SOTA toy line in 2006.
Gather round some friends, open a few beers and enjoy this truly bizarre and out-there horror comedy. It is far from perfect and has not aged well at all, but there is so much on display here to enjoy that it’s almost impossible to hate or criticise. If you’ve not seen Killer Klowns From Outer Space before, don’t expect it to change your perception on the values of the horror genre, but prepare for it to become one of your all-times favorites.
Luke Owen is one of Flickering Myth’s co-editors and the host of the Flickering Myth Podcast. You can follow him on Twitter @LukeWritesStuff.
Originally published October 11, 2013. Updated November 7, 2019.
