Missed Opportunities: The Blob

'A deadly entity from space crashes near a small town and begins consuming everyone in its path. Panic ensues as shady government scientists try to contain the horrific creature.'

Ricky Paull Goldin

Good movies don't need to exploit  hot young actors by teasing the audience with a little skin.  So so movies however, should really try to pull out all the stops. Although I've never seen 1958's The Blob, I feel culturally familiar with the film.  I saw familiar, because over the years, it seemed so many other films and television shows either referenced, or showed clips from the film. So many sit-coms especially, would use the 1958 horror film during their Halloween episodes to help set the mood.

I also never saw the 1988 re-make, well not all of it anyway.  I did DVR a recent airing after seeing it featured a young Kevin Dillon and Ricky Paull Goldin.  The remake also starred Shawnee Smith, an actress that most who grew up in the 80's and 90's would be familiar with.  Shawnee was in numerous TV shows and films over the year including 1987's Summer School.

Kevin Dillon

The first few scenes from the 1988 remake had me thinking the film might be fun.  The cast was  attractive and the high school set-up teased some possible future skin.  Unfortunately the story didn't really hook me enough to watch past the first 30 or 40 minutes.  I didn't think much about the film until a few days later. The film had a trio of ale hotties, Dillon, Paull Goldin and especially Donovan Leitch who played high school student Paul Taylor. A little skin from any of these actors might have prevented this film from being more than just a tiny blip in 80's movie history.

Kevin Dillon has never really done a nude scene.  Although he was a part of the swimming pool scene in 1986's Heaven Help Us.  The scene is well known by many for it's early appearances from Dillon, Patrick Dempsey and Andrew McCarthy.  Nothing much is really shown in the scene, nor should it have been given all of the actors were playing about younger than their actual ages. (All were over 19 at the time of filming)

Heaven Help Us (1985)

I really didn't know much about actor Ricky Paull Goldin other than watching him briefly on Another World in the early 90's.  I was surprised to see him in this film, and kept thinking what a wasted opportunity they filmmakers had.  A butt scene from Goldin certainly would have turned this forgettable flick into one that might have ended up garnering a lot more attention, not to mention more DVD sales..

Donovan Leitch

Maybe the biggest missed opportunity was not taking advantage of the strong appeal of actor Donovan Leitch Jr..  I had never heard of the actor until watching this film and had to Google him to find out what else he'd been in.  A  busy young actor during the late 80's, Leitch. Jr's career seemed to wane during the 90's and 2000's.  His last official role was an uncredited appearance in 2008's The Dark Knight. 

On the Cover of Dazed & Confused Magazine (1994)

Leitch Jr. was incredibly hot in The Blob, the perfect jock and high school himbo. He immutably stood out to me when I turned on the film, especially his first scenes trying to buy condoms with Ricky Paull Goldin.   Not only did the film not show any nudity, it didn't even bother to get any of their young cast shirtless.  Missed opportunity, especially for suck a so so film.