Xtro photo from http://www.britmovie.co.uk
'XTRO,' 'XTRO,' READ ALL ABOUT THE GORE
Miami Herald, The (FL)
September 13, 1983
Author: BILL COSFORD Herald Movie Critic
Estimated printed pages: 2
Xtro has the year's best promotional tag line -- "Some extra-terrestrials aren't friendly" -- but as is often the case, the rest of the movie isn't so hot. Apparently the promotional effort exhausted the production team before the fact, or something.??Though Xtro offers some of the more unpleasant images in the screen history of father-son relationships, during the moments when the film is neither cheap-looking nor revolting, it does affect a rather eerie tone. Those moments are few, however.
Little Tony lost his dad three years before the action begins. He literally lost him -- one moment they were playing in their back yard somewhere in Great Britain, and the next Dad was gone in a flash of otherworldly light. When Dad returns, he is not the same.
Boy, is he not the same. At first he is apparently little more than inter-galactic larva, requiring the services of a monster rapist to find him a place to be born. This is accomplished, an unsuspecting woman carries to term in less than 30 seconds, and amidst much shrieking and rending of flesh, Dad is emitted, fully grown. He cuts his own umbilical, stops to melt a pay phone and heads for home, where he sucks little Tony's shoulder until the boy is no longer what he seems, either.
Little Tony develops the ability to make his toys come alive, takes hideous revenge on the neighbor lady when she kills his snake, and puts the au pair girl in a compromising position. Soon there are larvae and E.T. eggs all over the place. It's gross.
With a little more thought and an extra dollar or two, the
filmmakers might have come up with a scandalously funny spoof of E.T. They chose a festival of splatter effects instead, aiming Xtro squarely at that segment of the audience for whom The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and John Carpenter's The Thing were good stuff but too subtle.
Movie Review
Xtro (R) *
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CAST
Bernice Stegers, Philip Sayer, Danny Brainin, Simon Nash, Maryam D'Abo, David Cardy
CREDITS
Director: Harry Bromley Davenport
Producer: Mark Forstater
Screenwriters: Robert Smith, Iain Cassie
Cinematographer: John Metcalfe
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A New Line Cinema release
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Running time: 82 minutes
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Vulgar language, nudity, implicit sex, considerable violence and gore
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At DADE: Trianon, Apollo, Palm Avenue, Marina, Northside, Movies of Kendall, Regency; BROWARD: Coral Ridge, Movies of Pompano, Diplomat Mall, Coral Springs Movie Center, Movies of Plantation, Lakeshore Drive-In, Thunderbird Drive-In; PALM BEACH: Village Green, Movies at Town Center, Movies of Lake Worth, Beach Drive-In, Delray Drive-In.
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