C.H.U.D.
| release date | August 31 1984 |
| studio | Anchor Bay |
| director | Douglas Cheek |
| writer | Parnell Hall |
| starring | John Heard, Daniel Stern |
| rating | R |
| tagline | Ugly. Slobbering. Ferocious. Carnivorous. |
| trailer 1 | Trailer #1 |
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The city of New York is experiencing a rash of disappearances. These started within the homeless population, in particular, the homeless that dwell in the underground network of tunnels, subway lines and sewers that lie beneath the city. This is noticed by ex-con and soup kitchen worker, A.J. Shepherd (Daniel Stern), who notices that fewer and fewer of his regulars are coming up for air. A.J. reports this to deaf ears and cannot get anyone to take notice…but hell, these people are ignored when around, forgotten when they are not. But when reports start coming in of people being attacked and dragged into the sewers by monsters, the authorities can no longer ignore the problem.
Captain Bosch (Christopher Curry) of the NYPD is investigating these disappearances and the trail of clues lead him to A.J. Shepherd. Once they compare notes, they team up and head underground to do some looking around. At the same time, photographer George Cooper (John Heard), has been convinced by free-lance reporter, Murphy (J.C. Quinn), that there is something strange going on in the sewers and he convinces George to go with him to investigate. What they all find is that underneath the city, things live there that are far more terrifying than rats, gators and the occasional nut-job. There are also mutated, gooey, neck-stretching monsters with glowing eyes and sharp teeth who survive by eating human flesh. They are C.H.U.D.’s and they are running out of food below ground, and have started shopping on the streets above.
First time director, Douglas Cheek, knew his horror movies and implemented some tried and true horror movie tactics, to varying degrees of success, that have been used since the monster movies of the 1950s. Choosing not to reveal the C.H.U.D.’s much in the beginning of the film may have been have been done to build up tension or possibly because they didn’t have much to show. The score by English composer, David A. Hughes, is used in all the right places and does a decent job at letting you know what feelings you should be feeling, even if you are not. Some scenes do not work as intended, like a shower scene that is edited badly and seems out of place plus a pointless C.H.U.D. neck-stretch scene, but in all fairness, these were not choices by Cheek. Other scenes in C.H.U.D. do show some great originality. In one such scene a police crew, armed with flame throwers, are accompanying members of a EPA crew who are armed with Geiger counters. They are down in the sewer tunnels to make sure they wipe out any C.H.U.D.’s they encounter. Using a video feed, the NRC chairman and police captain Bosch are able to see their every move via a series of monitors. When the crews encounter a group of C.H.U.D.’s, you know they are coming, as do the two crews, as the Geiger counters are going crazy. You then see and hear a panicked crew become overwhelmed and slaughtered as each monitor goes to static. This entire scene was practically ripped off and used in a film to come out later, James Cameron’s Aliens. Douglas Cheek also keeps the films subject matter, both overlying and underlying, dealing with issues such as environmental damage, government distrust and class prejudice. All issues that work no matter what generation you live in and are constant headline mainstays thus helping extend the shelf life of the film.
Overall, the acting is decent throughout the entire film. Daniel Stern does a great job as the frustrated cook as does John Heard, even though his character is not your normal leading man type as on more than one occasion, he flips out. Realism may have been the goal with those scenes, but in a horror movie such as this, they actually have a more humorous effect. The true villain of the film is not any of the C.H.U.D.’s, but rather Wilson (George Martin), the head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Wilson is hell-bent on making sure that the story of C.H.U.D.”s never makes it to the public, and he has a plan in place that will ensure that any C.H.U.D.’S living in the sewer will be meeting their demise, along with anything else living in the sewer. Adding to this is a nice twist later in the film that expands more on his motivations that have him making desperate, and extremely dangerous decisions. Kim Greist plays George Cooper’s pregnant girlfriend Lauren, and does a convincing job of playing the lone girl in peril, but rather than being a defenseless girl prevalent in horror films, Lauren is a strong female who not handles herself better than anyone else in the film when faced with a C.H.U.D. attack, but actually is one of the only characters who actually kills one.
Peter Stein, no stranger to horror films before and after C.H.U.D., handled the cinematography and gave the film an overall look that is associated with other city themed horror films of the ’80s such as John Carpenter’s Assault on Precinct
Loved this film. Loved John Goodmans appereance at the end.
Again, wonder how long it’ll take before someone remakes this!?
This is a fantastic, uncompromising 80′s monster flick. The story is really engaging and the creatures are incredible. Despite my usual opinion I think this movie is ready to be remade, as long as the story remains the same and the creture design is at least similar.
Bottom line: GREAT. See it before it’s remade.
What a stupid great movie. It’s so rediculis that it works super well. Unlike the sequeal C.H.U.D kicks butt! Daniel Stern is wacky as fudge in this movie and I love the monster make up, so campy and super cheesey like ………BAD TASTE!! I love C.H.U.D and I always will!!!
I saw this several years ago on HBO. I watched it every time it came on. A fun movie that doesn’t take itself too seriously. Some good gore and a few good creeps and scares. I’ve added this one to my DVD collection.
chud chud chud
I’ll just start out by saying that I love the ’80s. You can’t go wrong with a decade that included both Dio and Queensrÿche, but the horror movies were some of the best ever to be made (the politics are another story…Reagan=yuck). Anyway, C.H.U.D. is definitely a campy ’80s horror movie, no doubt about it. It doesn’t take itself too seriously, either, which is good, but in the end it just isn’t that entertaining. Also of note, there isn’t much action. You see the C.H.U.D.s in all their rubbery glory a couple of times, and you see some bloody corpses every once in a while, but the rest of the movie plays out like a cop drama, which isn’t very fun to watch. If you want a better movie about bums dying, then check out Street Trash – it’s a far funnier and more gratuitous film.
C.H.U.D. might be worth it for fans of the ’80s though.
C.H.U.D. is one of my favorite movies with excellent monster and gore.
I like the idea of the CHUDS and all, but I wasn’t much for the movie. Like I know the film was made back long ago and perhaps was poor fundings. But when I saw it myself almost half-year-ago I found it really unentertaining I don’t think I saw them actually get their hands on anyone except when they were grabbing the police into the rooms, but they could of done that better regardless of the times.
I also didn’t like how the fate of the CHUDs was brought with the characters fighting against the person who made them. I’d rather the CHUDS had more to do with it.
However it had some effort, they did look cool and like I said I liked the idea of them. I just thought the senseless violence and killings were unappetising.
Not to be mistaken as an oscar winner, CHUD is still a classic piece of horror cinema. Decent effects, nonsensical story, moronic premise and Daniel Stern as a crazy conspiracy theorist are the perfect ingredients for an 80′s monster movie.
A fun, gory monster movie in the vein of Huminoids from the Deep. A lot of fun, some really great characters & cool creatures. There’s a lot of worse ways to kill an afternoon.
Haha gotta love CHUD, this was a true 80s classic monster film. Loved it.
The greatest B movie ever made.
pretty cool
This is a decent movie. The monsters look awesome! I expected way more because of the good ratings, but I was disappointed. There is barely any blood,almost no gore, and we don’t see the monsters until about an hour in the movie.
Decent killings and monsters but other than that the movie was pretty fuckin’ boring it was scarier when I was younger although now that I’m 33 I’ve become more decensatized and remembering
this movie now makes me laugh my ass off because
of how corny it really was.
HA!! love this movie…80′s movies rule in my book:)
Just watched this for the first time, and have to say “WTF!!”. This movie sucked. It seemed more geared toward the toxic cover up than the creatures that lived in the underground. It threw me off, and the ending where the truck blows up and kills the cover up bad guy blew because that was it, end of film, nothing about the humanoids, like they never existed. This definitely is a shitbox of a movie.
One of the best B movies. i loved the creatures and the story. I’ve watched this movie like a thousand times
Awesome. Great story and decent acting. Check this out if you love B-movies.
Another take on long forgotten legend of Manhatten Island. The indians who lived there were in fear of the flesh eaters who lived under ground, why else do you think they sold the island so cheap? Beads and blankets.
Classic!
Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dweller Magnum Opus!