Horror Movie Review: Insect (1987)

They really don’t make them like this anymore. Insect (aka Blue Monkey) is creature feature with a dumb story, a dazzling array of practical effects, plenty of gore, and ending that is hilariously telegraphed from the start. It’s a blast, a flawed blast, but a blast none the less.

Directed by William Fruet, and starring Steve Railsback, Gwynyth Walsh, Don Lake, Sandy Webster, and Helen Slayton-Hughes. The story takes place in a hospital that is quarantined after a mysterious virus spreads through the staff and patients at an alarming speed. One that seems to have come from an insect-like creature that emerged from a sick man, who got stung by an odd plant that came from a newly formed volcanic island off the coast of Micronesia.

If you’re already shaking your head in disbelief, hold on, it gets sillier.

The man is brought to the hospital where doctors Rachel Carson and Judith Glass work. He vomits up an insect pupa, which of course, is taken to be studied within the hospital. Elsewhere, police detective Jim Bishop is hanging around as his partner was shot in a stakeout, and a group of sick kids are roaming the halls, bored. One of whom is the healthiest looking leukaemia patient you’ll ever see.

Through a series of fun and idiotic events. Which include Rachel showing Jim the hospital’s high-tech research facility, where they are testing out powerful surgical lasers (wink wink). Cutting open the pupa and unleashing an unusual insect. A man’s chest exploding in a bloody mess. The nurse tasked with guarding the insect lured away for a cigarette and sex, and the kids pouring mysterious blue powder on the insect. We get a giant creature that infects the hospital and sets up residence in the abandoned lower floors, which, if you can believe it, used to house the criminally insane.

Sure, why the f**k not?

All of this might make Insect sound really imaginative, but the truth of it is that all of this, and pretty much everything else, has been done countless times before. There’s not an original aspect to this film, and with that comes predictable story beats, under-developed characters, dumb decisions, and ending that can be seen coming a mile away.

Yet, for all these issues, it’s a lot of fun to watch.

Effort was put in to making this stand out. As a director, William Fruet has skill. A hospital isn’t exactly the most exciting place for a horror film to take place, let alone a creature feature, but by adding more absurd aspects, it becomes a cool place to explore. He also manages to capture the alien-like aspect of the creature. Making both the practical effects work in light and dark locales, and shooting the gore in style. The chest exploding scene is so good, I had to watch it several times.

Credit to the FX team too, who created a giant insect that looks scary, moves a lot, and threw in a ton of other stomach-churning aspects to it. It’s 80’s horror in all its glory. Which also means we get poorly written characters and acting that varies wildly. Can’t win ‘em all, eh?