36 Years Later, This ‘Jaws’ Meets ‘A Quiet Place’ Creature Feature Is a Surprise Streaming Hit

For a movie to succeed, conventional wisdom says you need that big opening weekend at the box office, followed by holding on enough in theater over the next few weeks to turn a profit. Anything else is seen as a failure. Of course, plenty of classic films have bombed in theaters, only to find second life on cable TV and video, including now-iconic films like Blade Runner, The Thing, and The Shawshank Redemption.

But if you spent time watching cable or hitting up video stores in the ’90s, you might have a particularly soft spot for a film that followed this exact trajectory: Tremors. When it was released, Kevin Bacon‘s horror-comedy looked to be a bust for Universal. But despite its weak showing in theaters, 36 years later, the creature feature remains a cult classic that has won over new generations of viewers — and is now a surprise hit on Paramount+. If you’ve never seen it, check it out and experience the movie that launched a bonkers franchise.

‘Tremors’ Has a Clever Monster Movie Premise

Image via Universal Pictures

By the 1990s, creature features were nothing new. The subgenre dominated the 1950s with movies like Ants, The Blob, and many, many other similar films, which followed a group of bland characters alongside the military as they fought some strange, clunky looking creature. Then along came Jaws, which shook things up by focusing on the human protagonists first and hiding the monster for as long as possible.

Tremors has a similar setup. We quickly meet our leads, bickering best friends Valentine McKee (Bacon) and Earl Bass (Fred Ward) in the small desert town of Perfection, Nevada. In just a few short scenes, it’s established that Val is the carefree one and Earl the grump, yet these men care deeply for each other. Then the deaths begin: Something is taking out the residents of Perfection. One man is found high up on an electrical tower, where he died of dehydration — and we’re left to wonder what could have scared him so much that he’d refuse to come down. Another man is sucked down into the ground by unseen forces.

Eventually, snake-like creatures are seen coming out of the ground and hunting their prey. That’s scary enough, but then, the big twist is revealed: those snakes are attached at the mouth to creatures the size of a semi-truck. Referred to as graboids, the blind monsters live under the ground and hunt through vibration. If you move, they will sense you. What started out as Jaws quickly turns into a precursor to the more modern horror hit A Quiet Place.

Great Practical Effects Bring the Graboids to Life

Tremors was an absolute box office disaster when it debuted in theaters on January 19, 1990, and made only $16 million in cinemas. It’s unclear exactly what made it fail with viewers — though the fact that January has long been a dumping ground for bad films, and that the film had a summer blockbuster feel in the middle of the winter, surely didn’t help. No matter what the cause, it was another in a long line of misfires for Kevin Bacon, who hadn’t had a big hit since 1984’s Footloose.

That could have been it for Tremors, but then it shook things up in the emerging market of video store rentals. After becoming first a popular rental and then a film that aired often on cable, Tremors transformed into a cult hit before becoming a bona fide horror classic. The fandom has been intense enough that there have been plenty of silly sequels, along with a short-lived series, in the decades since.

Why has it become such an enduring hit? Tremors is rated PG-13, making it a great gateway horror movie for kids just getting into the genre. But this doesn’t mean that it’s light on the scares. If the monsters aren’t genuinely scary and the death scenes not well-crafted, nothing else in a film like this matters. And Tremors does indeed do a fantastic job of slowly revealing the graboids. When it finally gives viewers a full look at its monsters, there is no letdown. Viewers had never seen anything like them on screen before — and in an era before CGI, the horrifying sand worms are entirely practical effects. When they attack, it’s gruesome, with those tentacles pulling screaming humans down into the dirt, never to be seen again. Just like A Quiet Place would do a few decades later, Tremors‘ setup pulls the viewer in and gets them to play along. What would you do if every step you took could result in a monster launching itself out of the dirt?

The Film’s Greatest Asset Is Its Unforgettable Cast

Image via Universal

Tremors is scary and its effects are impressive. What keeps audiences coming back, however, is its unforgettable cast of beloved characters. Val and Earl are a great team, and their banter and one-liners loosen up the fear and provide some well-earned laughs. But it’s also more than a two-man show: Val is a given a love story with Rhonda LeBeck (Finn Carter), the seismologist who first discovers that something is wrong underground before later joining the besties on their journey. Yeah, she’s attractive (and, in the classic style of ’80s horror, Tremors eventually finds a way to get her in her underwear). But she’s also quirky and strong, an independent woman who is smarter than the guys and can handle herself.

For the best supporting characters, look no further than husband and wife survivalists Burt (Michael Gross) and Heather Gummer (Reba McEntire). With their stash of weapons, they’ve been waiting for all hell to break loose. These characters could have easily been written to be unlikable. But instead, Burt and Heather are part of the community and friends with their neighbors. They also just have enough guns to single-handedly take on a small country if they have to. Watching them bravely go to war with the graboids when they burst through their basement wall is the film’s most thrilling scene.

Tremors saved Kevin Bacon’s career to the point that he starred in a Tremors series pilot a few years ago and wants to be in a movie reboot, even though his fame has seemingly taken him beyond the film’s popularity. Thirty-six years after it was made, the movie feels like it was made yesterday with effects that still hold up. It’ll make you laugh, it’ll make you scream, and it’ll make you watch your next step.

Tremors

Release Date

January 19, 1990

Runtime

96 minutes