The defence The Arthouse Gremlin
“Its refusal to behave is the point.”
The strange choices create the kind of friction that follows you out of the theatre and into the argument.
Back to trending 
The Blob
Horror · Science Fiction · 1958
A drive-in favorite, this sci-fi classic follows teenagers Steve and his best girl, Jane, as they try to protect their hometown from a gelatinous alien life form that engulfs everything it touches. The first to discover the substance and live to tell about it, Steve and Jane witness the blob destroying an elderly man, then it growing to a terrifying size. But no one else has seen the goo, and policeman Dave refuses to believe the kids without proof.
Movie details
The Blob
“It crawls. It creeps. It eats you alive!”
1958 Horror · Science Fiction 1h 22m
Critical arithmetic
The consensus, allegedly.
Scores change. Arguments endure.
IMDb
6.3 / 10
31.2K votes
Rotten Tomatoes
68 %
Tomatometer
Metacritic
58 / 100
Metascore
TMDB
6.2 / 10
Community rating
External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.
A drive-in favorite, this sci-fi classic follows teenagers Steve and his best girl, Jane, as they try to protect their hometown from a gelatinous alien life form that engulfs everything it touches. The first to discover the substance and live to tell about it, Steve and Jane witness the blob destroying an elderly man, then it growing to a terrifying size. But no one else has seen the goo, and policeman Dave refuses to believe the kids without proof.
CriticWise case file
What this film says about your taste.
Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.
The archetype split
Who fights over The Blob?
For the defence
The Arthouse Gremlin
“The stranger, the better.”
Read their case For the prosecution
The Popcorn Loyalist
“Big screen, big feelings, no apologies.”
Read their objectionThe split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.
Taste neighbourhood
Nearby on the taste map.
TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.
It's Alive
Horror · 1974
The Davises are expecting a baby, which turns out to be a monster with a nasty habit of killing people whenever scared. And it's easily scared.
Island of Terror
Horror · 1966
When a small island community becomes overrun with creeping, blobbish, tentacled monsters that liquefy and digest the bones from living creatures, the community struggles to fight back.
X: The Unknown
Horror · 1956
Army radiation experiments awaken a subterranean monster from a fissure that feeds on energy and proceeds to terrorise a remote Scottish village. An American research scientist at a nearby nuclear plant joins with a British investigator to discover why the victims were radioactively burned and why, shortly thereafter, a series of radiation-related incidents are occurring in an ever-growing straight line away from the fissure.
4 Horsemen: Apocalypse
Sci-fi · 2022
A small team of scientists must race against time to stop what seems to be a cascade of global disasters signaling the possible apocalypse and end of days.
Mark of the Vampire
Mystery · 1935
Sir Borotyn, a prominent Prague resident, is discovered murdered in his home, with all indications pointing to a vampire assault. The victim's friend, Baron Otto, and the physician who analyzes the body, are certain that the vampire is the mysterious Count Mora or his daughter. Receiving little help from the law, Professor Zelen, an expert in the occult, is called in to assist with their investigation.
The Jack in the Box Rises
Horror · 2024
When a creepy Jack-in-the-Box is discovered and opened on the grounds of an exclusive girls' school, six brave students soon enter a fight to the finish against the unleashed demon.
Silver Bullet
Horror · 1985
The small city of Tarker's Mills is startled by a series of sadistic murders. The population fears the work of a maniac, but sightings of a mysterious, hairy creature soon spread. People lock themselves up at night, but there's one boy who's still outside…
The Cellar
Horror · 2022
When Keira Woods' daughter mysteriously vanishes in the cellar of their new house in the country, she soon discovers there is an ancient and powerful entity controlling their home that she will have to face or risk losing her family's souls forever.
House on Haunted Hill
Horror · 1959
Frederick Loren invites five strangers to the party of a lifetime and offers each of them $10,000 if they can stay the night in the reportedly haunted house. Armed with a gun for protection, each guest arrives in a hearse and will either leave in it much richer…Or dead.
The Haunting Hour: Don't Think About It
Horror · 2007
Cassie, a 13 year old Gothic girl, is trying to fit in at her new school. To entertain herself, she plays a series of pranks on the popular kids and her younger brother, Max. When she goes to a Halloween store looking for new tricks, she finds a little book called "The Evil Thing"
Where it lives
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Names above the title
The people responsible.
Cast & crew
Directed by
Irvin S. Yeaworth Jr.
Written by
Theodore Simonson · Kay Linaker
Steve McQueen
Steve Andrews
Aneta Corsaut
Jane Martin
Earl Rowe
Lt. Dave
Olin Howland
The Old Man
Stephen Chase
Dr. T. Hallen
John Benson
Sgt. Jim Bert
George Karas
Officer Ritchie
Court is in session
Put The Blob on trial.
Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.
The prosecution The Popcorn Loyalist
“Oddness is not depth.”
A film can break every rule and still leave nothing behind but the memory of how hard it tried to be singular.