C.H.U.D. II: Bud the Chud

09/28/2017 15:40

Film: C.H.U.D. II: Bud the Chud

Year: 1989

Director: David Irving

Writer: Ed Naha

Starring: Brian Robbins, Bill Calvert and Tricia Leigh Fisher

 

Review:

This film begins with a doctor walking down the hallway of a building. He turns off into a room where there is a C.H.U.D. that is in captivity, the creature played by Gerrit Graham. A C.H.U.D. is a cannibalistic humanoid underground dweller, which are zombie like creatures with fangs. The building we are in is a government installation where they are deciding the fate of the C.H.U.D. program. Robert Vaughn is a colonel who is in favor of it. With him is a doctor played by Larry Cedar. The funding is cut after what happened in New York. Graham goes crazy, kills the doctor. Vaughn has him frozen so they can bring him back to study when the funding is returned to the program. The brain just needs a little electricity to turn it back on.

We then shift to a high school. In science class we have a group of friends. The clown is played by Brian Robbins. His best friend is a nerd played by Bill Calvert. They have a girl played by Tricia Leigh Fisher as well. Robbins is talking and asked to conduct an experiment with their frog. He claims that it doesn’t have the use of his back legs and electricity will fix it. Instead he causes a fire and the three are afraid they are going to fail. The class is supposed to see a cadaver be cut open the following day. Robbins and Calvert are cleaning up the storage room he is in and accidently bump the body. It rolls out of the building and down the road. They give chase, but it moves too fast and it gets away. They decide to try to find another body to replace it.

They end up at the center of disease control in their small town. They sneak in and steal the body of Graham. They take it home and have to sneak it in without Robbins’ parents knowing, they are played by Jack Riley and Sandra Kerns. Robbins ends up with him upstairs while Calvert distracts Robbins’ parents. Robbins’ sister wakes up. She asks what he is doing and he scares her, stating it is a nightmare. They go into the bathroom and Calvert joins him. Kerns had a bath drawn and wants to get in before dinner. Robbins accidently drops a hair dryer into the water and this wakes up Graham. The two get him in the basement and leave him there. They leave to meet up with Fisher.

Graham escapes and starts to look for meat. His first victim is the family dog, which also becomes a C.H.U.D. He then claims others in the neighborhood. Vaughn and Cedar come to the town with back-up looking for Graham and the group of teens. They want to bring him back. Graham though finds a picture of Fisher and falls in love. His goal is to find her and make her his mate.

Can the C.H.U.D.s be stopped before it is too late? Or will the city and possible the world be overrun with them? Is there a way to stop them? Will Graham end up getting Fisher?

Now I came into this film expecting much like the first one and let me tell you, if you decide to check this film out, don’t do that. This one is a comedy. We don’t get any of the monsters that we did in the first where they were much more animal like. This one is definitely more zombie like. These ones can talk and think somewhat. They do make them harder to kill than regular zombies though and the heroes have to get creative. We get that the events of the first one happened, which I liked so there is continuity. This one is just really silly though and it hurt it for me. There are times that the C.H.U.D.s could just bite someone and they don’t. It is clearly for the story to proceed, but I didn’t care for that aspect. Especially since I really like the first one and this one did disappoint me.

The acting I wasn’t too impressed with. Robbins is the dumb class clown, which he didn’t do too badly. I just feel that he was written way over the top. Calvert looks like the nerd, but also was slightly too good looking for it as well. Fisher wasn’t bad for an 80’s babe. I did like that she was pretty strong willed which was solid. She wasn’t pressured into seeing either of the characters, which was good to see. Graham did well as Bud the C.H.U.D. He had to walk exaggerated and perform some simple comedy, but I have seen him deliver in comedic roles. Vaughn is the same way; he plays the general way over the top. The rest of the cast was decent. I did want to give a shout-out to June Lockhart, who was in Troll, a film that is a staple of my childhood.

Next I had major issues with the editing. Every death in this film, except for the C.H.U.D.s themselves is off-camera. That annoyed me beyond belief. All we get is them being chased into bushes or showing their feet, we get the sound of a bite, some chewing and then the creature has a little blood that trickles by their mouth. A film like this, I really want to see blood or some actual scenes like this which disappointed me. That leads me to the next part; the film used all practical effects because they used make-up to make their skin look off and then fake teeth. It is hard for me to give them credit for this. The band at the dance was really 80’s and it wasn’t too bad. I kind of like that. The soundtrack didn’t really stand out to me aside from that.

Now with that said, I wouldn’t recommend this film to be viewed. I liked the original and this one failed to live up to that one. This one went way too heavy with the comedy and didn’t blend it with the horror or sci-fi enough for me. I tried to make my mindset as just watching this film as a stand alone, but it is hard to do with all of the references. This film to me couldn’t stand alone. The acting was a little iffy across the board for the most part. The editing was bad due to all the deaths being off-screen. There wasn’t much in the way of practical effects aside how the C.H.U.D.s look and the deaths of them. The soundtrack doesn’t really stand out aside from the time at the dance for me. This is an attempt at a zombie comedy, but there are much better ones out there worth your time.

 

My Rating: 4 out of 10