Where'd Ya Get Those Peepers?

I revisited another series for Halloween this past week, so I figured I share some thoughts. I remember going to the theater without high expectations for Jeepers Creepers when it came out in 2001, and really had no idea what to expect since I avoid reviews and the like as to not read any spoilers. What I got from the movie was a pleasant surprise... a nice little monster movie that's a lot of fun. Now after a sequel that I also enjoyed there's another film in the series currently being filmed: Jeepers Creepers III: The Creeper Walks Among Us. But let me not get ahead of myself too much. Back to the first film.

I guess what I liked so much about it stemmed from the fact that I had no idea what it was about. From the previews I thought it was a slasher film, but it's not that at all. It starts out as a brother and sister drive home from college to their parents house down a lonely stretch of highway (during the daytime). So stage 1 begins... a road movie. They get harassed by a guy in a huge, menacing truck along the way and eventually see him up to no good at an old church as they pass. Upon investigation of the church, they find a boatload of bodies and run like hell, so stage 2 begins... a chase movie that still feels like a slasher film. At some point while they're at an old ladies house (surround by cats) you realize that what's chasing them isn't a man at all, but a monster. So stage 3 kicks in... a monster movie. A bizarre winged, birdlike monster who like to snack on people. When they first see him in his truck, the vanity tag reads BEATNGU, which they assume means "beating you". After watching him munch on a few folks you realize that it really means "be eating you", although I'm not sure what monster would go through the trouble of getting a personalized tag on his vehicle implicating himself... it's still cool.

Of course it's not all good all the time. I mean it's a bit cliche' at many parts, the characters tend to behave in unrealistic ways at times (they return to the old church to look around... hello?) and I get tired of the sister being such a bitch, but I still enjoy watching it pretty much every Halloween now.

I love the old truck. I love the bad guy (known now as the Creeper). I love when Trish says "You know the part in scary movies when somebody does something really stupid, and everybody hates them for it? This is it." I like the guy who plays the brother, Derry (Justin Long aka the Mac in the Apples's MAC commercials among other roles). I like that the creature isn't overdone with CGI but a guy in costume. It's got good suspense and a nice visual look to it with a big final showdown and ending.

And since it was made for a budget of $10 mil and it grossed over $59 mil worldwide... you should have known there would be a sequel. Sure enough, 2 years later Jeepers Creepers 2 was released. In the first film, we learn the Creeper feeds for 23 days every 23 years, so part 2 is set just a few days after the first movie. This time a school bus driving on the same highway with a high school basketball team and some cheerleaders is attacked.

This time around I obviously knew going in it was a monster movie so the whole surprise is gone, but at least the Creeper begins smashing folks right off the bat this time. At the very beginning he tries to fake someone out as a scarecrow, as he does in the first movie, and you know things are going to get wild quickly this time around. After he snatches some kid, the kid's father (played excellently by Ray Wise) becomes hellbent on revenge ala Captain Ahab in Moby Dick. It adds a storyline to the kids on the school bus story and by the end the 2 stories collide in bloody fun.

What's not to like? Well, there's no Creeper truck in this one, which sort of sucks. Also the song the title of the series is based on doesn't even play until the credits. A couple of missed opportunities to tie it more to the first film if you ask me. Lastly, once again the director feels the need to put annoying kids together and let them bicker back and forth, like that's going to make the audience relate to them? It makes me want to choke them all. But on the plus side, Justin Long does cameo for a small dream type appearance.

At the box office, Jeepers Creepers 2 was made for a budget of $17 mil and took in over $63 mil worldwide, another success. Enough so that the 3rd film is underway, as I said above.

In Jeepers Creepers 3, Jonathan Breck will be back under the makeup as the beast again, and of course Ray Wise will reprise his role from the second film. The writer and director of all 3 movies, Victor Salva, promises that part 3 "brings back all the classic ideas of the first film, but brings them horrifyingly full circle. It also revisits characters from both, lets us learn more about what the Creeper is and, by popular demand, reintroduces the infamous Creeper truck."

The story will have a prologue set in the Old West that details how the Creeper became a terrifying part of Native American folklore and then jumps ahead to the ending of Jeepers Creepers II on the eve of a brand new 23rd spring.

According to Salva "one aspect of the third film features Trish (again played by Gina Philips from the original film), who, 23 years later, has a teenage son of her own, named Darry after her long lost brother. Trish is having a terrible recurring dream where her son meets the same terrible fate as her brother. Now a rich and powerful woman, Trish is determined to stop the Creeper once and for all."

Pencil me in for the first weekend of release, which from what I've heard will now be early 2011.