Grabbers DVD Review

Actors: Richard Coyle, Ruth Bradley

Director: Jon Wright

Format: Color, NTSC, Widescreen

Language: English

Number of discs: 1

Rated: Unrated

Studio: MPI HOME VIDEO

DVD Release Date: November 12, 2013

Run Time: 94 minutes

 

 

        Grabbers makes a perfect viewing companion to Edgar Wright’s The World’s End, as both provide a plot that allows its characters to get increasingly drunk as a means of survival from an otherworldly attack. In The World’s End it is done through robots and a body snatcher narrative, whereas Grabbers utilizes the creature feature storyline, with intoxication being the one available means of defense. Horror and comedy are balanced with the use of inebriation, adding more absurdity to a purposefully campy film.

 

        The film takes place on a small fishing village on an island off the coast of Ireland, where police officer Ciaran O’Shea (Richard Coyle) is able to drink himself into a stupor while carrying out his menial tasks within the community. The arrival of a straight-laced officer named Lisa Nolan (Ruth Bradley) only highlights the state in which O’Shea has let himself go. When a mysteriously unidentifiable squid-like creature is discovered in a lobster trap, it is all the reason O’Shea needs to stop drinking. Ironically, it also requires that everyone else starts drinking, for their own safety.

 

        With blood being the one thing that the creatures desire and alcohol being the only toxic way of poisoning the blood of all the residents in the village, O’Shea organizes a party at the pub for everyone to get appropriately tossed in anticipation of an attack from the tentacle-covered creatures. This plan’s only hiccup is the fact that it depends upon the decision-making skills of a group of drunks, with only the town’s biggest drunk remaining sober and vigilant. A rainy night makes the perfect opportunity for an attack on the village, and a marathon drinking session in order to survive.  

 

        The DVD includes a behind-the-scenes featurette, as well as a trailer.

       

Entertainment Value: 8/10

Quality of Filmmaking: 7/10

Historical Significance: 5/10

Disc Features: 4/10