"Outtakes" movie column/"Tremors" review, Jan. 26, 1990

When I was growing up in Wyoming, the cool thing to do on Friday nights was to go to Jimmy Royal's house, stay up real late and watch "Nightmare Theater" on one of the Salt Lake channels. I remember, vividly, that the logo dripped what looked like blood, and the announcer's voice was creepy enough to give me chills.

The movies on "Nightmare Theater" were rarely well-made, but they were always good. This is not a contradiction when you're 10 or 11 years old, up way past your bedtime and eating your way through the refrigerator. As I recall, there was usually a double feature, and we especially liked anything with Vincent Price, vampires or nearly bare female breasts. "Nightmare Theater" must have shown a lot of Roger Corman movies, because we saw many more scantily clad women than Price or blood-sucking bats -- combined.

I got to thinking about those old movies after seeing "Tremors," a new Universal creature feature that opened last weekend. It's a lot like the monster movies that were made by the studio in the '30s, '40s and '50s. Back then, you saw the monsters in the movies -- much of the time in broad daylight. Sure, it might have been only a spider or praying mantis blown up to look 20 times the size of a Cadillac, but the monster was right there in front of you -- a force to be seen and reckoned with.

"Outtakes" movie column, Dec. 14, 1990

Robert Redford

As I recall, Vincent Price's derisive remark concerning Robert Redford during a 1984 speech at Utah State University drew a big laugh. Charles Laughton, he said, was wonderful when it came to playing tragedy. And Boris Karloff was a sweet man who nonetheless could terrify an audience.

But Redford, Price quipped, was quite remarkable at being, well, Redford.

I laughed right along with everyone else -- that conspiratorial laugh we commoners share at the expense of public figures who are wealthy and famous and talented. Redford is something of an easy target, after all; he's good-looking and people tend to notice that more so than his finely tuned artistry in front of the camera.