Little Shop of Horrors (1986)

This one came out in December 1986, and I remember watching it in the theaters. I would have been about 13, and I had no idea that it was a musical. Needless to say, I hated it, and although I'm okay with watching musicals now, I haven't watched it since.

What's it like watching it now, 40 years later? Well, I love it. Specifically, I enjoy Steve Martin as Orin, the evil dentist. Martin is a weird Elvis/Jerk hybrid on giggle juice. And the best scene is when he's working with Bill Murray, who plays a bizarre dental patient (Arthur) who gets off on the pain.

Orin doesn't know exactly how to handle Arthur, as the dentist lives to dish out the pain, but not to patients who like it.

As far as I know, this is the only film to feature Murray and Martin on screen together. I read that Murray did film scenes for The Jerk, but those scenes were cut.

It might seem weird, but I have sensitive ears when watching Little Shop of Horrors. That is, for whatever reason, the uses of "goddamn" really bother me in this one. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's simply related to the me being 13 when I originally watched it, and that language would have really offended me then. The movie is rated PG-13 for some reason, and the only real reason would be for language. This film should be, by any accounts, a PG or even a G-rated film...

Anyway, the special effects used to create Audrey II are very well done. These days, you just know they'd use CGI or something instead of making a working model. And it just wouldn't be the same.

The ending almost leaves it open for a sequel, although I have no idea where they'd go with this story... I think it's funny that Audrey boasts that it's a better monster than The Thing or Stephen King's "It." I also enjoyed some of the references I wouldn't have registered in the song lyrics at age 13 -- such as the mention of Hedy Lemarr.

Oh, and if you're interested, be sure to check out the alternative ending. The ending with the film is the "Happy Ending," and it makes sense to end with the focus on Seymour (Rick Moranis) and Audrey (Ellen Greene). The alternative ending, however, just goes completely over-the-top and we get to see what happens when the plants go on full rampage mode.

Rating: 4/5 stars

Comments

"Digging for the Truth" Experiment #4 -- The Federalist Radio Hour

I first heard of Sean Davis last week. He created an online magazine called The Federalist in 2011, and he currently has about 500,000 followers on X. It was about last week that he posted something amazing. He suggested if the Supreme Court doesn't rule the way they should, not only should Trump just ignore the ruling, if they keep obstructing the administration, he should just dissolve the Court altogether. And I thought, wow. This guy is saying outrageous stuff like that, and there's an audience for it. So, I decided I'd listen to an episode of The Federalist podcast: April 17, 2025 -- Deportation, Due Process, and Deference to the American People (40 minutes) https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deportation-due-process-and-deference-to-the/id983782306?i=1000703904873 In the 40-minute conversation, the host and guest discussed why due process wasn't required for illegal immigrants. The case of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia was mentioned for a brief second, but...

In Utero

In 1994, I wore my In Utero shirt to college. I’d walk down the hall, and people would look at the shirt. I still remember a professor looking at it, not apparently hip to the scene. She asked, “Bret, is there something you’re trying to tell us?” I had no idea what I was trying to say. Kurt Cobain had just shot his head off with a shotgun. Before that life-changing event, I hadn’t been the biggest fan of Nirvana, but I did recognize the immediate impact “Smells Like Teen Spirit” had on music, or at least on MTV. Nirvana had seemingly killed and buried Hair Metal, and they had done it single-handedly. What exactly was this “Alternative” sound? It was weird, because soon it felt like everything was “alternative,” and that didn’t make any sense. Once everything is the same, how can it be anything but standard, normal? Nirvana was okay, but at least at the time I was wearing the merch, I was much more into Offspring and Green Day and Tool. And that’s about as far as I went into...

I Must Betray You -- Ruta Sepetys

I appreciate the pacing. The author's epilogue includes her mission statement -- historical fiction as a way to keep history alive. Romanis is an obscure place, but she hopes people reading the book will take an interest in its history. She also makes the point that there are no clean endings. So, the evil dictator and his wife were killed, but the problems they created didn't magically go away, the country still had to find its way and move forward, and it was a process.

The Writer's Poke

Search This Blog