Review of Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988) by Ian D — 21 Oct 2018

It's really more like a series of sketches than it is an actual movie. It's almost like something you'd see as a recurring sketch on a f***ed up version of SNL. The story, such as it is, doesn't really seem to matter that much.

The origin of the clowns is never explained, they just show up and boom killer clown aliens you have to deal with. And hey, you know what? If godamn works! If the central gag of killer clowns doesn't work for you, the movie won't work for you.

But for me, it did, and I had fun. Having them go around with their twisted versions of clown technology terrorizing the town was fun, and seeing the young people try to take them on was enjoyable. It's simple, but it works.

The film hardly seems to care about nuance and continuity details, and will even acknowledge this, it's not going for high art, so you just sort of go along with it. The only thing that did sort of bother me about the movie is some of the relishing of murder of innocents, especially the first kill of a dopey farmer.

Killing the dopey farmer in particular is really a trope that always got under my skin and I just find unpleasant. Stuff like that and other mean-spirited kills ruin some of the movie's fun, but most of the kills and the sheer absurdity of the concept are enjoyable enough that I did really like the movie.

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