I'm Dangerous Tonight

It's accurate to say Tobe Hooper peaked early in his career when he directed The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, one of the most influential horror films of all time. It's also misleading because to reduce Hooper's output to one movie or to say he never made another one as good is to overlook a filmography filled with offbeat projects and hidden gems.

One such project is I'm Dangerous Tonight, a TV movie made for the USA Network and inspired by a novella (unread by me) by Cornell Woolrich, the noted crime writer who also wrote the story that inspired Hitchcock's Rear Window. 

Invaders from Mars (1986)

There are two types of people in the world: those who are amused by the notion of Nurse Ratched getting eaten by a giant alien Pac-Man and those who aren't, and if you're a member of the former camp, I have good news should you decide to watch Tobe Hooper's 1986 remake of Invaders from Mars.

Invaders from Mars (written by Dan O'Dannon and Don Jakoby) is broader, campier, and busier than the original. A lot of money went into making these nasty Martians and their weird technology, and they're rendered in such an exaggerated, over-the-top, bug-eyed manner, the movie is practically a live-action cartoon. It's probably not scary if you're over the age of 12 and maybe it's too weird if you're a kid, but in its own way, it's endearing.