Plantiana Yawn. Poorly Filmed Snooze Fest.

Smartorhypo Highly Overrated But Still Good

Sexyloutak Absolutely the worst movie.

Ella-May O'Brien Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

Leofwine_draca IMPULSE is an under-appreciated and little-seen US horror flick of the early 1980s. It's no masterpiece - the budget is a little too cheap and the pace is a little too slow for that - but it works a treat as a story in the Stephen King mould, with a small town being assailed by a mysterious virus which forces people to give into their worst impulses. It also reminded me of James Herbert's THE FOG a little. The capture of small town behaviour is well realised, while the various set-piece sequences really stand out, with the berserk sheriff being a highlight. The strong cast includes Tim Matheson, the great Bill Paxton, and Meg Tilly, who as anyone who has seen PSYCHO II will know, is a fine actress.

PeterMitchell-506-564364 Now for something completely different. I didn't know what to make of this film when I first saw it, back in 86'. I was surprised too that Tim Matheson was in this, after remembering his grand comic role in Up The Creek. Even though I loved this movie, because you didn't know what crazy thing was gonna happen next, where it's story sucked in, you so desperately wanted to know why these people were acting so crazy, when being told it's reasons at the end, I found it just too hard to buy. I'll never forget the snapping back finger scene in the bar, by that guy who didn't like having to wait, to have a chance to dance with Tilly. What you learn at the end, was that aerial spraying that still happens today, contaminated this milk at this plant, where there was an earthquake prior. Matheson drinks the milk that has this toxic substance. His Girlfriend, Tilly doesn't, but her brother, a younger Bill Paxton and the father do. Aha. It was just too much to buy that something like happening, could send people into such hysteric and violent states, as if acting on impulse, may'be the most dangerous emotion, where rational thought takes a backseat. The destructive and violent acts shown in the movie, some quite frightening, are impactful. This movie's a good watch, mainly 'cause it's different, if unique. Even the sex scene between Tilly and Matheson, where things hotted up, got frightening, when I first watched it. But remember, sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. I love the realization Matheson made when he found the spark of his violent acts, like a swell of relief one would say, amidst all the madness we saw prior. The end too worked well, this time the credits, unaccompanied by music, but a howl of wind, Tilly, standing forlorn, and resolute. The fight must on, as life.

moonspinner55 City girl Meg Tilly receives a horrifying phone call from her mother and, understandably shaken, returns home to her family's rural digs, only to be faced with a mystery: why are all the homespun residents acting out in bizarre and unsettling ways? Radiation thriller, with barely a nod to ecology, has small town residents going berserk, which (laughably) includes two women gazing at each other with desire in a public place and Tim Matheson receiving oral attention from a girl on an office bench. The picture is too silly for words, wasting Tilly's wistfulness and quiet intensity on trash while forcing itself into a corner it can't possibly hope to get out of. Some of the cinematography by Thomas Del Ruth is good (particularly a fire sequence set inside a garage), though he is let down by the scrappy editing--and a fairly bathetic finale. Simplistic screenplay has nary a surprise nor a shred of originality up its sleeve. *1/2 from ****

Son_of_Mansfield A fantastic idea, about losing control over animal impulses, is bogged down in simplistic thought and poorly directed scenes. The film starts out creepy, but becomes muddled in scene after stilted scene of sex and violence. There is a distinct dirty vibe in the movie that never seems to go anywhere. A man pees on a car, the sheriff tries to shoot some delinquent kids, and a mother stands by as her kids attempt to burn one of her friends. It is all so vile. Only one character, Tim Matheson, has any other kinds of impulses such as curiosity. There are a few effective scenes such as Hume Cronyn's doctor playfully cutting off the oxygen to one of his patients and Tim Matheson introducing tiny Tim Matheson to a young girl. Meg Tilly is completely wasted in a boring role as is Bill Paxton. It is really Tim Matheson's movie and he is not bad. The main problem of the movie is lazy direction that kills every scene before it has a chance to live.