Meet the Applegates

1990
15
1h 30m

IMDb RATING

5.5/10

2.8K

YOUR RATING

Home Video Trailer from Anchor Bay Entertainment

Play trailer2:02

1 Video

18 Photos

Dark Comedy Satire Comedy Fantasy Horror Sci-Fi

Modelling themselves after an idyllic cookie-cutter suburban 1950s family, a colony of insects move from South America into the United States with the intent of getting access to the nation'... Read allModelling themselves after an idyllic cookie-cutter suburban 1950s family, a colony of insects move from South America into the United States with the intent of getting access to the nation's nuclear resources.Modelling themselves after an idyllic cookie-cutter suburban 1950s family, a colony of insects move from South America into the United States with the intent of getting access to the nation's nuclear resources.

Director
- Michael Lehmann
Writers
- Redbeard Simmons
- Michael Lehmann
Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

5.5/10

2.8K

YOUR RATING

Director
- Michael Lehmann
Writers
- Redbeard Simmons
- Michael Lehmann
Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

Videos1

Trailer 2:02

The Applegates

Photos18

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Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
Filmed in 1988/1989, but remained unreleased in the U.S. until early 1991, due to the financial woes of New World Pictures.

Quotes
Aunt Bea: [to a passing construction worker who has grabbed her behind] You Homo sapien scum!
Richard P. Applegate: Excuse me?
Aunt Bea: Nah, nothing nothing, it's just uh, some asshole tried to rape me.

Alternate versions
The Image Entertainment LaserDisc release of the film is cut, missing one final scene at the end wherein it is revealed that Aunt Bea is still very much alive (albeit injured) and still optimistic about crushing the human scum by planning on infiltrating NORAD. Instead, the Image LD cut of the film cuts straight to the credits after the final jungle scene, missing the final Aunt Bea scene in its entirety (this scene is present in the TV cut of the film shown on Showtime Flix).

Connections
Featured in Siskel & Ebert & the Movies: Queens Logic/Run/Meet the Applegates/The Vanishing (1991)

User reviews38

Featured review

Hardly a serious attempt at ecology-based drama, but not very funny either.

Before I start this review can I just ask why this film opens with a shot of an Emperor scorpion? A West African arachnid in a brazilian rainforest? Righto.

Now that's out the way, on with the review. Though this film has a very strong moral (people who think insects are disgusting and live disgusting lives should first take a look at the human race) the whole thing is marred by the fact that it can't seem to decide whether it's a comedy or a more serious ecologically-themed drama. The insect family trying to fit into human society and coming to terms with it could have been hilarious, but the film is too mean-spirited and bleak to be funny (the family daughter is date-raped, the father commits adultery with his secretary, the son takes drugs, the dog is poisoned by the same drugs and ends up reverting back to an insect before being crushed to death). It's also too cosily bland and light-hearted to be regarded as having anything serious to say about ecology.