C.H.U.D. (Douglas Cheek, 1984)

You know you're in trouble when the director doesn't have a Wikipedia page and, upon further inspection, has only one feature film to his credit. You know you're in deeper trouble when your boyfriend proclaims while watching, "that's a cool shower head." Given the widespread references to chuds in popular culture (my favorite is from Marge to Homer in the great NYC episode of The Simpsons: "Of course you'll have a bad impression of New York if you only focus on the Pimps and C.H.U.D.s."), I assumed C.H.U.D. (Douglas Cheek, 1984) would prove gently creditable. But the title is far more memorable than the film itself. It's all too competent with a excruciatingly dull first act that fails to prep you for the lame cannibalistic humanoid underground dwellers. Cool new wavey score from OMD refugees Martin Cooper and David A. Hughes, though.

Grade: D+ (the plus is for that cool shower head)