Blending excellent reporting and strong storytelling, this is a disturbing film truly stranger than fiction

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

I've always respected and admired Kiwi director Peter Jackson and his grand designs. While some of his films are somewhat overrated (I take particular issue with The Frighteners (1996)), I could always appreciate his vision. When I decided to take on Meet the Feebles (1989) earlier this month I was taken aback by just how clever the man was when he first started making waves in schlocky horror movies business.Bad Taste (1987) was the director's first full-length film shot on a minuscule budget of just $30,000 New Zealand Dollars or just over $25,000 American. To put that into perspective Kevin Smith's Cannes Film Festival winner Clerks (1994) had a budget of $230,000. That's a paltry amount in comparison to the average multi-million dollar budget of a summer blockbuster. Yet while Bad Taste can't compare to the flip-flap of the Hollywood glitter machine, for what it was at the time and still is, Bad Taste isn't...terrible.A group of wannabe commandos discovers the dastardly plan of a particularly nasty group of aliens. Vanishing the entire town of Kaihoro (which translates to Foodtown in Maori), the aliens plan on taking the morbid, bloodied mounds of flesh back to their home planet. The ultimate goal; turn them into meat for their fast food franchise. It's now up to Ozzy (Terry Potter), Barry (Pete O'Herne), Derek (Peter Jackson) and Frank (Mike Minett) to put a stop to their plan before they expand to other parts of the island, and maybe the world!On the face of it, Bad Taste plays like a lesser version of The Evil Dead Trilogy (1981-1992) made memorable by its exotic island location. The Ocean is never far from the action and the flora of New Zealand's northern island makes for something nice to look at when the camera-work becomes stilted. The dialogue edges just north of bland and there's something to be said about the sound mixing which is out of synch in places.Still, no one watches a movie like Bad Taste to read lips and Peter Jackson's script requires a lot of running, hiding, physical confrontations, gunfire and blood gushing. Jackson himself has the majority of the memorable scenes; most involving attempts to stop his brains from leaking out the back of his head. He and his friends also double for Blue shirted aliens disguised as humans. They're dispatched in clever and often over-the-top ways in the tradition of Nobuo Nakagawa.Fans of blood, guts and gore will no doubt enjoy Bad Taste as it is indeed an exercise in bad taste. Yet even to the casual viewer Peter Jackson's freshman project has something to offer. The all male cast achieves a sense of camaraderie without needlessly focusing on things like character development. Also the acting isn't completely horrid, just amateurish.Finally to all the potential filmmakers out there who fear rejection due to lack of talent I say take a look back and watch Bad Taste. You'd be surprised how far a man like Peter Jackson has gotten. For that matter watch the maiden voyages of other brilliant directors like Martin Scorsese's short film The Big Shave (1968), Rian Johnson's Evil Demon Golfball from Hell!!! (1996) or Stanley Kubrick's Fear and Desire (1953). Talent isn't something you're born with but something you earn through practice. In the case of Jackson's story about fast food loving aliens, consider Bad Taste a work in progress.http://www.theyservepopcorninhell.blogspot.com

If the story is true... (And I am quite sure it probably is given the time the film was made and a lot of favors he called in) - This was a seriously low budget flick...Peter Jacksons first major film is reputed to have only cost $600 in his native New Zealand.And is it good??? Its DAMN BRILLIANT!It is just totally over the top... Totally insane... Overacted, overstated, and totally unforgettable!Its a film that has to be seen to be believed... REALLY!Some fun facts!The aliens heads are flat on top as Jackson's mothers oven was too small to fit the masks in properly and squashed the material.The film WON the first prize in the 1987 Gore Awards...As for memories... My sister is a massive horror fan - She was watching films I could not stomach back when we first saw this... A Nightmare on Elm Street scared me witless but she raved over it...So imagine how funny it must have been for me to not only sit there laughing but eating a Massive meal (4 Chicken pies, 2 fried eggs and a full tin of Sausages and Beans all washed own with a few beers) while my sister was HEAVING!!!I have so many good memories of this film... Yes its dumb! Yes its effects are OH GOD SO DATED even by the 1980's standards, yes the film has a completely nonsensical plot! BUT THAT IS WHAT MAKES IT SO GREAT!!!! YOU HAVE TO SEE THIS FILM! REALLY!!!

Holy cow this movie was fun to watch, I've seen a lot of movies in my time and this one was one of the best if not the best low budget independent movies I've seen. Peter Jackson has made the best movie he could with the budget and all the other restraints, its actually inspiring to me as a small time film maker and I wish I had watched it when I was a teenager, I was put off by the freaky cover and R rating even though I was watching films like that a lot back then, but was really worth checking it out. Getting really into Jacksons earlier films at the moment, this one is my favorite.All in all ide say you really need a strong stomach to watch this(even stronger for 'braindead' AKA 'dead alive') and its very funny too, every drop of blood there's a laugh. check it out.

I sometimes jokingly remark how Peter Jackson's career was perfect until he directed the Lord of the Rings trilogy. It's hard to imagine that this director, who now specializes in big budget Hollywood movies, started off by creating twisted and gory low budget movies – his directorial debut, Bad Taste, being the prime example of this early, strange phase. Bad Taste was by no means an easy experience for Jackson, since the filming took 4 years. However, the hard work paid off and Bad Taste can be used as a valuable lesson in "do-it-yourself: low budget film making". It's amazing how, in spite of rather limited resources, Jackson managed to make it all work and look good – he created the masks and firearm replicas for the movie himself. He even constructed his own counterweighted steady-cam. Bad Taste is a definite must see for every aspiring movie maker, if only for Peter Jackson's creativity.The movie follows 4 agents (called 'The Boys') of some sort of secret service, who investigate alien activity in a small town. Apparently, the aliens have killed the whole population and replaced it. Things become more complicated when the aliens kidnap a charity collector passing through, and it's up to The Boys to save him, by using any means necessary. As you can see, Bad Taste's plot is fairly simple, there isn't much "story" to it – the movie is mainly action and dialogue driven. Due to this fact, the movie gets boring from time to time and I find it to be the worst from Peter Jackson's early phase. I also find it to be the least funny one. While there are quite a few amusing scenes, it doesn't even come close to other early classics like Braindead and Meet the Feebles. But at least there is enough violence and gore in it to make it interesting. The movie does get pretty graphic. Did you first notice the guy missing the top of his head or the Peter Jackson cameo?The effects in the movie (influenced by the cult special effects artist Tom Savini) are surely its best quality. You'll see heads exploding, limbs being torn off and even some chainsaw action. The scene which impressed me the most was the one where a character, played by Peter Jackson, fights with another character – also played by Peter Jackson. Actually, if you're not informed prior to the watching of movie, you may not notice he plays two different characters since they don't really look alike. Who knows – maybe Jackson has an acting talent waiting to be further developed? Speaking of acting, the actors did an OK job for this kind of movie, no one is laughably bad. On a side note, I think it's important to remark that all of the dialogue was dubbed in post production; that, however, isn't much of a bother since it isn't very apparent.While I wasn't really keen on Bad Taste (like I said – I found it to be somewhat boring and I prefer other early Jackson works) I would definitely recommend it to everyone. It's a gory, funny trash/cult flick about some guys fighting off a bunch of butt shaped aliens, set to an 80s heavy metal soundtrack. Why wouldn't you watch it?Rating: 6/10 Read more at http://passpopcorn.wordpress.com/