Tammy and the T-Rex

I was channel surfing the other night on DirectTV, and came across this movie with the wacky title. When I read the nutty plot description and noticed that it starred Ellen Dubin (from Lexx) and Denise Richards in an early role, I selected it out of curiosity. I expected to watch it for maybe five minutes and then get bored and turn to something else. I ended up, however, being really surprised by how entertaining I found this film to be. I knew I had to see what other people at IMDb thought about it. And just as I expected, almost everyone here hated it. I'm not surprised that most people don't "get" this movie. Those without any sense of camp will have no appreciation for it.

Let me explain something to everyone: This movie is bad, and the people who wrote and directed it KNEW that they were making a bad movie. Most of the characters and things that go on in it are totally, utterly ridiculous, and the filmmakers obviously reveled in this fact, to a degree of aggressive silliness. Realism and reality have little to do with this film. Basically, it's a send-up of other B-movies--romance, sci-fi, horror, etc--and a clever one at that. But apparently very few seem to have recognized it as such. Do people really think that the filmmakers were just too dumb not to realize that real-life funeral-goers would have noticed a huge T-rex watching the burial service from behind some shrubs just a few yards away? Or that the creepiness of the tender love scenes between Tammy and her grotesque dinosaur "boyfriend" was an accident? The movie's deliberate outrageousness and low-mindedness is what makes this movie fun and is the source of some of its funniest moments. For the first half of the film, I couldn't believe what I was watching, and couldn't believe that anyone would make a film like this.

And then I loved it!

I was up at an unearthly hour (2:30 am) and turned on the television. Much to my dismay, this movie was the best thing on. I hesitate to use the word "best", but even more strongly hesitate to use the word "movie". I must admit that at that hour, almost anything would be entertaining, but I feel like I lost a significant amount of brain cells after watching that...thing. It was, in a word, bizarre. I can't think of any other way to describe it in an even remotely positive manner. The humor was quirky, but misguided, and the acting was horrendous. I'm positive that Denise Richards now weeps whenever she hears anything related to dinosaurs. Let's just say that it wasn't her finest hour. But, by all means, see this movie. It will give you far greater respect for the oscar nominees.

I bought this film merely because of Denise Richards, who I think is one of the most beautiful actresses in Hollywood. I was deceived by the title and the picture, both of which made me think it was a movie for children. Boy, was I wrong. This is a Trash movie, what made me glad that I bought it. Now I can place it among the other titles of my B-Movies collection. Is this a bad movie? Of course it is. Surprisingly as it may be for most people, it was made that way ON PURPOSE. And, what may sound even more surprising is that some people (such as myself) really do appreciate this genre of film. Trash, B-movie, whatever you call it, are based in 4 concepts: Hot chick (Denise Richards couldn't be more appropriate), bad acting, cheesy special effects and a ridiculous script. This movie succeeds in all of them.

Thus, considering the logic of those who are into Trash movies, this one deserves an 8 or 9 out of 10. For the rest of you, who just can't get what is to enjoy in a truly bad movie, I guess it would be 1 out of 10, considering a conventional rating system.

One of the greatest "how did they pitch this?" movies I've ever seen. I, somehow, avoided the PG-13 cut all these years and only recently witnessed the new uncut Vinegar Syndrome cut and I can't even imagine how they trimmed down this fairly gory movie into a PG-13. It's filled to the brim with Troma/early Peter Jackson style gore and the tone of the film is very similar as well.

Denise Richards seems to have a reputation as a bad actress by some, but after seeing this, I can't understand it at all, because she commits so hard to the ludicrous premise of her boyfriend's brain being transfered into a mechanical dinosaur that you just want to give her an award of some kind for all her effort. Did I mention that her boyfriend pre-brain into mechanical dinosaur is Paul Walker?

Weekend at Bernie's Terry Kiser shows up as the evil scientist who stole Walker's brain in the first place and John Franklin from Children of the Corn is his assistant and computer wiz.

Tammy and the T-Rex surprises at every turn, makes you laugh, and even makes you root for the relationship between a beautiful high schooler and a mechanical t-rex. If that's not art, I'm not sure what is.

I came across this CHEESY flick while watching USA up all night one sat eve and had to laugh...ok the plot was lame and the acting was by no stretch of the imagination amazing, but for late nite laughs how can you go wrong? Plus i went to the same high school as Denise Richards and had no clue that this was a movie she was in until she came onscreen...so of course that made it watchable for me. However for any other joe smoe if you are looking for a little laugh and serious cheese this is the flick for you....