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BUG OFF!
Produced, Directed and Photographed by T.C. Christensen
Written by T.C. Christensen & Rod MillerYendor - Steve Anderson
Krista - Briana Shipley
Tyler - Andrew Fugate
Alfred Willow - Johnny Biscuit
RMrs. Pickle Nickle - Gabrielle Woodsk
Krista is constantly tormented by her younger brother Tyler. He is angelic in the presence of his parents, but a tormenting demon when they aren't looking. And his sister is the object of his torture. Then comes the day that Krista has been dreading. Both of her parents have been called out of town on business. She will be left alone to the devices of her fiendish brother.
Then in comes Mrs. Pickle Nickle, from a local babysitting service. She's an odd woman who acts like she hasn't been on the planet very long. Good reason. Mrs. Pickle Nickle is in actuality an alien sent to earth to study our ways and see how we get along together. To help her in her duties she has a device that can do almost anything. Including granting a little girl's wish to turn her brother into a bug!
Of course, the device is broken shortly after that and add into the mix another alien named Yendor who is worse at acclimating to the Earth culture. In other words, Yendor is a babbling idiot. Now the race is on to turn Tyler back into human form because while we humans live for many years, a bug doesn't go much longer than a couple of days.
BUG OFF is one of those low budget films that is targeted specifically for the youth market. Its for fans of the Goosebumps series and similar literary fare. Steve Anderson as the bumbling Yendor is a focus point of hilarity for the kids, making mistakes in everyday life that no one would make. Mrs. Pickle Nickle is the best little old lady character in quite a while. Sweet with just a hint of trouble, mainly because she's actually an alien. The two main kids in the film work together well and you'd almost swear they were brother and sister.
It seems that director Christensen likes to handle all aspects of filmmaking and in this case pulls off a good story that looks great. Sure the alien costumes are a bit hokey, but we're talking kid flicks here and not the newest installment of The X-Files or some such thing. And he's smart in using a very small cast for a large part of the movie. we get a few school scenes with crowds of kids that go well, but for the most part it's the family unit and aliens that pull the film together.
I put the film to the ultimate test by having my five children watch the movie with me. All of them howled with delight during several moments of the film and they were glad we had the movie so they could watch it again and again. Of course it took some serious talking to my three year old to finally get him to understand that we couldn't remove the words 'FOR PROMOTIONAL USE ONLY' that appears from time to time on the screener. That just means I'll probably have to buy the regular DVD when it hits the shelves. So, if you're looking for a genuinely entertaining film for the kids, BUG OFF is definitely something that you need for your movie library. Mine have watched it five times this week and show no signs of getting tired of it.
Bio Info for Douglas Waltz
In the spare time afforded him between a full time job for the local phone company, Douglas is happily married with five, that's right five, children. He is a staff writer for the Print magazine Cult Cuts and does work for the webzine (www.cultcuts.net). He also publishes his own small press zine called X-Ploitation. In addition to that he's working on an annual publication of short stories from various writers called On The Night Highways. And if that wasn't enough he's about to shoot his first short film, Phone Sex, sometime this summer.