Nerdly » ‘The Creeps’ 4K UHD Review

25th Dec2025

‘The Creeps’ 4K UHD Review

by Pat King

Stars: Chris Cavalier, Kheba Touray, Matti Paalanen, Veronica Jarvis, William Daniels, Joe Dante, Christopher Lambert, Iiro Panula | Written and Directed by Marko Mäkilaakso

Written and directed by Marko Mäkilaakso, The Creeps is a rarely funny tribute to 80s creature features.

We begin with a disclaimer that gave me a chuckle, part of which read, “This does not necessarily represent the views and opinions of the filmmakers, who did this just to get rich fast.” Well, let’s hope that worked for them, because the movie itself is quite forgettable, and not nearly as clever as it thinks it is.

Zach (Chris Cavalier) talks to the audience as if he were Ferris Bueller, one of many ’80s film references/throwbacks in the film. Other ’80s references include 1986’s Highlander, which is Zach’s favourite movie. It’s a film that he watches every birthday, which, coincidentally, this movie takes place on. It’s his 17th birthday, and he’s ready to party. Later, he’ll be joined by his best friend Joe (Kheba Touray) and a straggler they find along the way, Jaakko (Matti Paalanen).

The Creeps is a horny teenage rom-com smashed together with Gremlins and a bit of Puppetmaster. It’s an interesting idea, although it’s one that doesn’t always stick the landing. And if you’re going to dig the movie on any level, you have to enjoy juvenile humour, especially body humour, since Zach has explosive diarrhoea twice in the same night. It kind of turns out to be his superpower, in fact. Yeah. So there’s that. I personally can only take a little bit of that stuff before I start rolling my eyes. American Pie doesn’t do it for my mid-forties eyes and ears anymore. But if you enjoy this kind of humour and you have an overdeveloped sense of the absurd, you’ll probably get something out of The Creeps.

And what about the creatures, the titular Creeps themselves? Well, they’re little snowmen, about knee-high. They’re actually pretty cute little guys. They bleed green blood and explode quite easily, but they are also very vicious when it comes to their attacks on people, ripping limbs apart with ease. The creatures are cartoonish, but they’re supposed to be, so there’s no fault there. The fight scenes, in general, are all pretty good, probably even the best part of the film. There’s plenty of gore to go around. Almost enough to forget about all the fart jokes.

But, there’s really not a whole lot of surprises. The teenagers all turn out to be badass fighters, somehow. The hot chick and the main character get together. The monsters dispatch everyone with ease, save for the main characters, who take them out more or less with ease. That kind of thing. You’ve most likely seen it before, and you’ve most likely seen it done better.

Believe it or not, the acting is actually okay, especially from Cavalier. With better material, he might have made an excellent comedic leading man. He’s almost strikingly charismatic in a laid-back sort of way.

As The Creeps makes its first appearance on physical media, the 4K Ultra HD presentation immediately sets a high bar. The film is presented in native 2160p, encoded with HEVC/H.265 and framed in its intended 2.39:1 aspect ratio, resulting in a crisp, clean image that shows off the production’s detail and texture beautifully. Audio comes via a solid English DTS-HD 5.1 track that delivers clear dialogue and a well-balanced mix, while English SDH subtitles are included, rounding out a confident and technically polished debut on disc. Unfortunately, this release doesn’t include any extras, which is s shame, as I’d loved to have seen some behind-the-scenes footage or interviews with the legends that are William Daniels, Joe Dante and Christopher Lambert.

I suppose it would be unfair to call The Creeps a terrible film. It has its moments, none of which include Lambert phoning in his guest performance. But it’s not incredibly original or thought-provoking. And it’s not so-good-it’s-bad in a way that would make it a good party film. I admire the effort, but this just wasn’t a great way to spend an hour and a half of my life.