The Creature Wasn't Nice (1981)

3/10

nogodnomasters18 January 2019

Warning: Spoilers

The film is about the five-man (including Cindy Williams) crew of the Vertigo. It has an "NCC" number so it is meant to spoof Star Trek, but is more like a 1950's sci-fi. They discover a planet and take aboard an alien life form that eats them and likes a good song and dance.

The film doesn't have the sharpness of the typical Leslie Nielsen film. The dialogue was an attempt at humor but falls too far short.

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3/10

A film in that netherworld between tediously bad and entertainingly bad

Fibbly25 June 2000

The title suggests this was supposed to be in the same spirit as The Naked Gun, but the only similarity is Leslie Nielson. Drastically unfunny, even when it is technically bad. It drags like a rainy Boxing day. The sets are straight out of a 60's TV Sci-fi soap, the songs excruciatingly dull (and badly sung) and the the only suspense is how they got the money to make this low-point of Nielson's career.

Go and see a good film, like Plan 9, or Robot Monster! If you want to see a good film in the same genre (and budget) try Dark Star. Its beach ball monster shames the rubber beast in this film right back to Toyo studios.

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5/10

Leslie Nielsen, RIP

lee_eisenberg30 November 2010

Leslie Nielsen's passing brought "The Creature Wasn't Nice" to my mind. This is one of his lesser known movies. Not quite the same kind of comedy as his most famous roles, but still entertaining enough. The alien's song-and-dance routine was certainly a surprise. Nielsen was no stranger to sci-fi: many years earlier he had starred in "Forbidden Planet". As it was, "Airplane!" was his very first comedy.

So, this is mostly cheap laughs. Good enough for the time that it runs. Also starring Patrick MacNee, Cindy Williams (of "American Graffiti") and Gerrit Graham (Beef in "The Phantom of the Paradise").

So yes, don't call me Shirley.

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Erm.......

gwerq17 March 1999

This is one of the most bizarre spoofs I have ever seen! An unfriendly alien running amok on a spaceship full of idiots. Typically hit and miss, with lots of good ideas which don't always work. Still,Leslie Nielsen is at his stoney-faced best as the pilot, and the cast try hard,although at times they look slightly embarrassed.Nice songs too.

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1/10

While the movie was terrible, there is one GREAT moment!

tonitt21 December 1999

This has to be one of the lamest movies ever produced, despite the promise of a winning cast (Cindy Williams, Leslie Neilsen). However, if you can stick it out to about the middle of the film, you will find the cream filling inside the stale cupcake - a memorable song by a forgettable alien. I can still get my husband to throw things at me when I sing the first bar of that song...

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1/10

Oh My...

scruffycub2-15 April 2002

I picked up this movie thinking, "Hey it's got Leslie Nielsen in it"... I usually love the characters that Leslie Nielsen plays, but even he could not save this one. It was described as a "comedy" but I really can't remember laughing once. All I could do was sit there and shake my head and pray for a power failure.

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1/10

Got a one because there was no option for a 0

Terry-2525 July 2001

I see a number of people felt the same way I did about this movie. The $4.88 I paid for this DVD was overpriced by about $4.78. I must have seen worse movies than this - films that were offensive or overly violent. However, for plain embarrassing ineptitude, this one takes the cake. It makes "Attack of the killer tomatoes" look like Ibsen in comparison. I'm reaching for new superlatives of bad, but I fall short. If you have a chance to see this movie, take a walk instead.

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1/10

Bad just isn't bad enough when describing this film.

WWPhx11 October 2001

This film is so utterly horrible that it defies description.

Leslie Neilson does a great stony-faced captain, Patrick Macnee is almost good as a mad scientist (as the box claims him to be). In fact, the actors all actually do a fairly good job.

So what is wrong with this piece of garbage?

I guess it boils down to the script. The concept of a couple of musical numbers is cute, but they don't work. The special effects don't work. The fact that you can see the concrete floor of the studio doesn't work. The space ship models are so reprehensibly bad that they don't work.

The movie just doesn't work.

I remember the first time I saw the box for this DVD at Best Buy. They wanted $20. I read the box, saw the cast, and a cold shiver clutched my bowels. I _knew_ this was a horrible film.

But time passed, and I came upon a copy for $5 at a used book store and I should have passed on it. Instead I wasted 90 minutes of my life and whatever time it's taking me to write this warning, sorry, review.

I'll end with this: at the end of the credits you find out it was made in 1983 at a community college.

It shows.

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1/10

One extremely boring experience

el_ucca8 May 2002

Like many people I believed this to be funny because the title was Naked Space.

I am not sure, but I believe the title was invented after the success of the great naked gun movies that were made years after this horrible crap.

This is truly one meaningless movie.

No matter how much you try to laugh at the jokes, you can't because actually there are none. It is almost if they tried to make the most boring movie ever and succeeded.

I smiled once during this movie.

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1/10

Science is my pie.

misfitgirl7 February 2005

Well... I know some folks herald this as intelligent satire, but... I had a hard time with it. The only redeeming moment was when Dr. Stark, asked if he wants any pie, says "Science is my pie." That pretty much saved the movie for about thirty seconds.

The problem was that there were lots and lots of "jokes" that were very flat. Not flat as in deadpan. Flat as in... what was so funny about it? Perhaps if I watched it over and over again it might make me laugh more, but as I had a difficult time getting through it even ONCE, I doubt I'll ever know.

I am a big fan of horrible movies, such as "Traxx" starring Shadoe Stevens where a Soldier of Fortune mercenary turns his attention to being a successful cookie maker, and of spoofs like "The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra." But I could not find the spark that makes a bad movie great in Spaceship (a.k.a. The Creature Wasn't Nice).

Perhaps there was a lack of tension to make the characters pop? So they would seem less like they were just reading lines? Perhaps they all needed more pie, or more science. Or more Science Pie.

The world may never know.

Support your local piemaker.

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1/10

Against the odds... the worst film I've ever seen

euan_orienteer30 May 2006

Leslie Nielsen and Patrick Macnee? How could they go so wrong? I've gone out of my way to watch really bad films, and in their own way they're often entertaining. This was painful.

Nonexistent plot, spun out for 75 minutes. Little discernible attempt at humour - and believe me I'm the target audience for spoof space film references.

There must be an amazing backstory to this film - good cast, but they clearly didn't want to be on that awful set in that forsaken community college. Perhaps this is in fact the funniest film ever - and the joke's on all the viewers who sit through it.

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9/10

Get on-board for fun.

patm-mich6 February 2001

A simple, fun movie. The cast is bright, and great to watch. I have always loved Gerrit Graham, and he is really funny here. Patrick Macnee is very good as the crazy doctor, who wants us to love, and accept this creature. Of course, Leslie Nielsen as the captain, is very good. He plays it straight, but not stupid, like in those "Naked Gun" movies.

Bruce Kimmel, and Cindy Williams team very well together. Their other movie, "The First Nudie Musical" is pure joy, and this one is maybe one small step below that. Their final dance number is something to behold, and when you see Cindy at the talent show, prepare yourself to be dazzled. She adds so much life, and amusement to this film.

There are low points, but still this is a good movie, I only wished I could have seen it on the big screen. As others have mentioned, the creature singing, and dancing is a special, funny treat.

The direction was good, and if you have a few bucks, give it a go. With it re-released as "Naked Space", it should be easy to find. I had hoped that the DVD version would have had something extra on it, it doesn't.

I rate this movie a 8 out of 10.

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6/10

"We don't want that piece of snot aboard our spaceship." Nothing special but one or two memorable moments help it.

poolandrews31 July 2006

Warning: Spoilers

The Creature Wasn't Nice starts in outer space where the U.S. spaceship Vertigo is on a mission to, well I don't know actually & we never find out. The ship & crew come across a previously unknown & undiscovered planet which Dr. Stark (Patrick Macnee) is very exited about, Captain Jamieson (Leslie Nielsen) organises an expedition to the surface which is there in no time whatsoever. The team find a small purple blob of jelly which Stark insists he takes back to the ship to study, they get back to the Vertigo & continue on their way. As Dr. Stark studies the blob of jelly he notices that it is growing at an amazing rate until the point where it has become a huge slimy one eyed alien creature that likes to eat people. Captain Jamieson, morale officer Annie McHugh (Cindy Williams), mechanic Rodzinski (Gerrit Graham) & trainee John (Bruce Kimmel) are now on the creatures menu & must figure a way out to destroy the lump of carnivorous jelly before it eats them all...

Written, staring & directed by Bruce Kimmel who was also responsible for the songs in the film I thought The Creature Wasn't Nice wasn't anything special but it has a few things going for it that just about saved it from being a complete waste of time as far as I was concerned. The script takes a while to get going & it's not until the 50 minute mark that the alien is seen & takes center stage, the film is supposedly a comedy although most of the jokes & humour don't really work. I would describe the film as being a spoof of Alien (1979) with a touch of The Green Slime (1969) & The Blob (1958) thrown in there for good measure, personally I reckon it would have worked better & had been vastly more successful if it had taken itself a bit more seriously & tried to pay homage to the men in rubber monster suits films from the 40's, 50's & 60's like Invasion of the Saucer Men (1957) or It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958) although that's just my opinion. Unfortunately for all it's good intentions The Creature Wasn't Nice just isn't a very good film, it's not funny, it's not clever & not that much actually happens in it. For me the film is saved by the alien jelly-baby itself & it's notorious rendition of 'I wanna eat your face' while dancing, it's certainly a memorable sight & is funny more in a funny peculiar way than a funny laugh out loud way if that makes sense.

Director Kimmel was obviously working on a low budge & pads the latter stages of the film out with lots of dull shots of people walking down the same corridor in search of the creature, actually it's not meant to be the same corridor but it's so obvious that it is with just the identification number changed. The film is also horribly dated, apparently set in the future there is a shot of Leslie Nielsen playing Space Invaders from the early 80's & they still use cassette tapes for music, there isn't a CD or iPod in sight. The special effects aren't anything to write home about either although I loved the dodgy looking creature & thought it was a shame that he never ate anyone on screen.

Technically the film is rough, the special effects are anything but & the production design is cheap throughout. I personally rather liked the monster but he does look very fake at times. The acting is pretty bad from everyone (maybe intentional? Boy they did a good job if it was), Cindy Williams as the lone female is sort of cute in an early 80's way. Nielsen & Mcnee are really slumming it here & must have needed rent money badly, all I can say is was it really worth it boys?

The Creature Wasn't Nice has a few decent moments all involving the big crew eating purple jelly alien which amount to 10 or 15 minutes worth. Maybe I'm being a little generous here but I'll go with a 6 out of 10 stars (stars, spaceship & aliens? Get it? Forget it...) because of the alien & it song & dance routine, definitely an acquired taste. Overall though I'd say it deserves it's low IMDb score...

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1/10

The first time I gave a vote of 1

HunterDK17 July 2000

Oh, what can I say about this movie. I only watched half an hour, and it was the worst I've ever seen. The movie has been re-sold because of Leslie Nielsen's success with Naked Gun, but this movie is very bad. - I feel sorry of Leslie Nielsen, but this movie deserves 1/10, the budget must have been very small.

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A corny production with 2 moments of sheer brilliance... yes, worth it.

rooprect11 August 2015

You'd think a movie made in 1983 right on the heels of "Airplane!" and starring Airplane's own master of deadpan Leslie Nielsen, as well as Cindy Williams (Shirley from "Laverne & Shirley") and Patrick MacNee (whom I'll always think of as Sir Denis Eaton-Hogg from "Spinal Tap") would be a sleeper hit. Well, parts may put you to sleep, but other parts are definitely a hit. In the end I think "Naked Space" aka "Spaceship" aka "The Creature Wasn't Nice" is well worth the ride.

It should be noted that writer/director Bruce Kimmel never intended this comedy to be in the style of the Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker films "Airplane!" and "Naked Gun", but they were marketed as such, and, according to Kimmel's liner notes on the soundtrack, the film was edited by someone else without his approval. I think Kimmel's style was intended to be something closer to Mel Brooks' early work "12 Chairs", "The Producers", not nearly as zany & absurd as you've been led to believe by the marketing. But if you take it all in stride, a fun time will be had by all.

"Naked Space" has a very low budget look which works in its favor. Most of the gags are pretty tame (the film is rated PG, almost G if not for some brief hilarious gore), and often you may find yourself waiting for a punchline that never comes. If you are expecting Airplane-esque hilarity, you may be disappointed. But the money shot, which even haters of this film must admit is pretty great, comes in the 2nd half when we get a moment of sheer Mel Brooksian gold. That's all I'll say because it's best left as a surprise. But if you don't mind a mild spo!ler, go to YouTube and search "I want to eat your face".

The 2nd great moment comes near the end of the film. If nothing else, watch the movie for those 2 scenes, watch it to see a rare assemblage of great 70s- 80s actors, or watch it to kill 91 minutes of your life. The hilarious songs, as well as the movie, were written by director Bruce Kimmel who also co-stars as "John Boy".

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1/10

I can feel my mind slipping away...

antiwolf21 May 2002

I came into this expecting it to be bad. I had no idea how bad it was. The title suggested it might be in the Naked Gun/Airplane style of humor, which when it works is good, when it doesn't can be mildly amusing. I don't know what it was.

It makes me wonder if the director had actually even seen a movie in his life. Perhaps it was an experiment to see what would happen if you took someone who had lived his whole life in a dark mildewy closet with only half a moldy, mildewy rat for a playmate, and set him loose behind a movie camera.

Actually, 90 minutes of watching someone sitting in a dark mildewy closet, playing with a dismembered moldy mildewy rat would be more entertaining than this piece of garbage.

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1/10

Truly awful

martynalcott13 May 2015

Hard to see how this movie was ever made. A dire totally humourless script that simply can't be salvaged even with the talents of Leslie Nielsen and Patrick MacNee. A dreadfully weak Alien parody that could've been written by a five year old. Not one joke works in its entire 77 minutes. Quite simply one of the worst, drearily unfunny films I've ever seen. No matter how much you like Neilsen give this a miss. Just don't bother. It's shameful re branding as Naked Space clearly trying to capitalise on much much funnier releases does it no credit. I've just sat here for 10 minutes trying to think of a worse film I've seen in the last thirty years. I couldn't.

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2/10

Over-hyped

ccheckman27 June 2014

I bought this used, and it was titled "Naked Space". The blurb on the back says: "In the tradition of 'Naked Gun' and 'Airplane'." Never mind that only one Airplane movie had been filmed when this was, and none of the Naked Guns ...

And as for Cindy Williams "giving the crew sexy dreams", um, no, there wasn't anything like that there, just one guy's.

Still, I picked it up because I have guilty pleasures. This movie isn't one of them, though. It's 90 minutes of my life that I wish I had back. Okay, maybe 80, because there were a few good jokes.

What can I say that hasn't been said already in other reviews? Well ... it looks like they wrote ONE draft of the script and decided to shoot what they had. The writer should have let it sit overnight and worked on it, like quickening the pace or adding a B-storyline.

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1/10

Space waste in a hundred different ways.

d_gerrit2 October 2000

I think every movie deserves a chance but! The Creature wasnt nice does not deserve even one minute of the 90 plus minutes of my life I wasted watching this piece of space waste!!!!!!!! My friend bought this attempt at a movie for $6 dollars Canadian at walmart I think that with todays exchange rate thats less than a dollar American.

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1/10

Fast forward and you won't miss a thing

Tronie20 September 1999

Ok. I do respect movies. At least I always do what I can to see films also from other point of views.

BUT.

This is not a movie. It's really a piece of crap. Actually I myself have made better films than this one. I guess the point in this was to make a funny film, but actually nobody in the film crew or actors were interested about it.

I got the feeling that the camera men (if there even were any) were asleep behind the camera. Directing is something .. yes and music and graphics too. Actors couldn't care less about anything. Leslie Nielsen is infact the only guy even trying to do something of it, but I guess he stopped trying at some point.

Wait.

I remember some laughters.. Yes, when the keycode of a door made some familiar beeps and the other one was when Nielsen was evasing asteroids or something. But that's it. The rest wasn't even entertaining.

So everybody should cut the crap about "This is the worst movie I've ever seen". They actually haven't seen any movies if they say something like that about modern movies. To them I'll have to say: see this.

Actually the funniest thing was that the cover said that this film was released in 1994 and also that: After "Naked Guns" and "Spy Hard" Leslie Nielsen takes you to the funniest space trip you have ever experienced.

Geez. Do these guys ever watch what's in there...

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1/10

The filmmakers here have created a 'comedy' engine that misfires on all cylinders.

Death_to_Pan_and_Scan28 July 2006

This is a prime candidate for worst 'comedy' film ever made.

They came close to screwing up; there were a couple moments where I almost cracked a smilealmost. I have a friend who loves this film. His wife and I are considering having him committed to a sanitarium for just that reason. Neither of us can see what makes this film so amusing to him. At the same time, he can't see the entertainment value of "The Beyond" or "Dellamorte Dellamore" (aka Cemetery Man), two popular cult films.

What's wrong with "Naked Space"? It's not funny; it's uproariously unfunny. The attempts at jokes all fall flat. They even attempt an ill-advised musical number. They say that 'drama is easy, comedy is hard'. This is a textbook example of how badly a comedy film can fail.

The DVD I saw this on was where it was re-titled and called "Naked Space" in an attempt to capitalize on the popularity of Leslie Nielsen in the entertaining movie parody series "The Naked Gun" (based on the old "Police Squad!" TV series). The idea of this film was to parody old B grade sci-fi creature movies on obviously cheaply made sets. Even "The Seventh Planet", in all its awfulness, did a better job of that while probably attempting to be somewhat serious sci-fi.

Bruce Kimmel has never directed a good movie and probably never will. He helped write the story for Robert Rodriguez's "The Faculty", but it was simply a B grade sci-fi horror film idea that was made into a good film by Rodriguez's direction and a decent cast.

Leslie Nielsen can be very funny in parodies of a variety of film genres. This is not one of those movies. I rate this film only slightly higher than complete failures like such bad Z grade zombie films as "Day of the Dead 2: Contagium" and "Dead Life". The only reason to watch this film is because you lost a bet (and that should put anyone off of gambling). One could be excused for thinking that the cast members appear in this film because they lost a bet with Kimmel.

Run, do not walk, away from your nearest video store to avoid this movie!

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5/10

Expect a low budget sci-fi 80's comedy and you'll be OK!

Roachmerch2 August 2005

OK, while it shouldn't win awards and all that stuff, in this day and age I find myself reaching for this movie over and over. Yes, whenever there are parties at my house and I reach for this, people leave in droves. There is this one guy however that has seen it a bunch and loves it too! It's an acquired taste...like sardines on a hot day with a glass of skim milk...but an acquired taste nonetheless. It is campy and goofy, but that is exactly what I expected and I came out fine. There are some great facial expressions from the whole cast and some decent one-liners as well. Anyway, I checked out the 2001 A Space Traversty (or whatever it is) hoping it would be a funny Leslie movie and I liked this one (Naked Space..Spaceship....whatever) better. Granted, Leslie has a more "serious" role in this, but he makes himself look like an idiot more by doing so! It is a fun movie for me (just an opinion for myself!) and watch it EXPECTING a very low budget, dated, 80's cheap comedy. Where is "Creature's Not Nice II", Mr. Kimmel??

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10/10

Things you should now about Spaceship aka Naked Space

whitesheik23 July 2019

It's fine to hate Spaceship aka Naked Space. It's equally fine to love it and most folks who do saw it at a young age on USA cable. What's not fine is to not understand what you are watching, so let me help you. The soundtrack to this film came out a couple of years ago, and in the liner notes the writer/director goes into detail about what happened.

The simple version is that Bruce Kimmel wrote and directed a movie called The Creature Wasn't Nice. At some point, it was taken away from him and completely re-cut in an attempt to make it like Airplane, a series of gags (even though Airplane is not just a series of gags, which is why it works), with plot thrown out the window. What the original version was was a linear film, a literal spoof of Alien and 50s sci-fi monster on board the spaceship films. With a few musical numbers. In the re-cut, scenes were put in completely random order so that when the film isn't funny it isn't anything. Yes, there are funny bits still in the movie and even the one-star reviews here acknowledge that.

But I just read that we will finally get to see the original cut of the film and I'm hoping that it gives this film some vindication.

So, to put a period to this: This is not the film the writer/director actually made - in the original version there are no Japanese monster movie clips, there is no stupid rock music, no hip disc jockey voice for the computer, and on and on.

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7/10

It sort of grows on you.

johnbutler9 April 2004

I purchased the dvd at K-mart for $3.99 along with some black and white classics. I couldn't watch it through the first time. I thought it was horrible. I started to use it as a test disk for some dvd drives I was installing in computers. The more I watched it the more I liked it. My children are addicted to it and watch it over and over. Their favorite characters are Dr. Stark and John the trainee. Cindy Williams is excellent in her role as the morale officer. To fully enjoy this film you need to appreciate bad science fiction movies!

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1/10

"Amazed, incredulous, mind-boggled... any of those words would be appropriate."

bensonmum212 September 2014

Warning: Spoilers

Over the years, I've seen a lot of bad movies. And I can state without hesitation that The Creature Wasn't Nice (or Naked Space - the title I saw it under) is easily one of the very worst. It fits quite comfortably with cinematic disasters like Prime Evil, The Creeping Terror, and Curse of the Swamp Creature. I don't know how you set out to make a comedy and come up with something this unfunny. This piece of monkey excrement fails on every level. Everyone involved - writers, director, set designers, actors, key grips, caterers - should be embarrassed. What a disaster!

Most of the reviews I've read discuss what a disappointment it is to see Leslie Nielsen in something this bad. I have the same feeling for Patrick Macnee. I've always enjoyed his work, but in this hunk of garbage, he's just as bad as everything else. This thing is as far away away from Steed and The Avengers as you can get.

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