The Worm Eaters DVD Review from Image Entertainment!

The Worm Eaters DVD Cover Artwork from Cult Cinema Collection & Image Entertainment

My first chancing across this odd and funky little Ted V. Mikel’s production happened many years ago as a late teen whilst I poured and drooled over a book called Inside Terrordome, released by Creation Press. Its theme was solely on the use of freaks, geeks, and weirdos in movies. The Worm Eaters only received a brief one line or so mention (plus a pic) which termed the film a geek one as in people are paid to eat worms. In the age of VHS tape rentals and bad pirate copies, I never found it and kind of forgot until last year I bought it cheap from a dealer on the Image Entertainment label.

I truly went into The Worm Eaters with pursed lips, not expecting much more than a chuckle at a bad movie. Well, I was right, but also wrong because The Worm Eaters is very entertaining and houses a wonderful central performance by Herb Robbins. Now Herb also directed this so it’s a kind of vanity project. He also directed the totally low budget madness, The Brainsucker in the late ‘80s (he also took a nice role in that one to) but more to the point, he wrote the script for and portrayed Lucifer in Sinthia: The Devil Doll, which sits as a side B with Satanis: The Devil Mass courtesy of Something Weird Video (see review here).

Starting up with a comical catchy tune accompanied by a piano and kazoo about growing worms whilst over the credits we are given some really cool drawings of worms in bathrooms, trees, etcetera, as stated on the cover it’s a comedy. And it truly is, in a way-out over-the-top sort of way. It has some really whacked out acting and characters – plus worms. Three guys are chilling in the great outdoors at night, drinking a truck full of Buds, when we see someone drop a writhing pile of worms nearby.

“I jus’ heard me the sound of worms!” says one bloke, “An’ I know me the sound o’ worms.” They rush over and hook ‘em a worm for fishing. Meanwhile the secret club footed wanderer is seen by a huge house. Soon afterwards a spoilt obnoxious brat of a girl cuts into her birthday cake to find it chock full of worms. She’s quite happy, “Look daddy, it’s a prize!” but the guests all run away speeded up falling into trees and walls, etcetera, trying to be funny. H’yuk h’yuk.

So then away with that and into some plot development. The Mayor and his henchman, Max, stand at a dam discussing property and the fact they want to build over the lake in which the dam heads. Max mentions how the Mayor’s father wouldn’t let anything stop him, not even Herman Umgar’s father and how the corpse is buried under tons of concrete. “My father never killed anybody!” the Mayor snarls under his ‘70s ‘stache. Barry Hostetler who plays, Max, really gives it a full-on acting scene, grimacing, shouting, pointing, as he verbally lays into the Mayor. It transpires that Herman may or may not own a deed left behind by his father that proves both of them own the town. He swears he’s gonna check Herman’s shack then have him committed and put away.

Herman Umgar is of course the club footed gentleman we have seen so far, and he breeds worms – hundreds upon hundreds of worms up in his shack. The Mayor knocks on the door and shouts “I know you’re in there, I heard you stub your foot again!” Herman talks to a jar of worms, between mumbles, grunts, whistles, and words. There’s a really eerie noise on the soundtrack I think to tell us the worms are talking either to him or one another. “They are going to put big cement buildings over our gorgeous lake. But pretty soon we are going to give everyone a surprise.” He takes out a handful and talks to one called, Carl. Finally answering the door, he is unbending to the demands. “My father, he left nothing.” (He’s also German by the way, with a quasi-accent)

Of course, he has the deeds, and later we see him placing them inside a small castle he’s built for his worms. “Don’t push, Carl,” he tells the central worm character. Anyhow we also discover that he owns the land around the lake, and runs a restaurant, because when a rag-tag mental set of tourists arrive, he sets about making them feel welcome – well, as welcome as an insane worm farmer can make someone feel. For instance, on the menu for dinner sometimes can be baby lizards which stuns members of the gathering.

The town baddies – e.g. the council, meet up wearing strange secret society costumes and discuss what they’re going to do about Herman. Whilst he’s around town being seduced by his waitress called Heidi who’s after his cash, the mob raid his home dressed as the KKK. We also have subplots about a group of teens trying to save the lake and an archaeologist who turns up.

After all of this, Herman is wined and dined at his shack by Heidi. She eats worms with her spaghetti because he wants her to leave and never come back so sneaks them in. After choking nearly to death, a strange thing happens – she undergoes a rather cheap tacky metamorphosis into a half human worm. This bewilders poor Herman, probably something to do with the vat of worm feed he keeps under the floor steaming and bubbling, he decides he must hide her. It isn’t long before he must hide two worm people.

Yet another subplot has the lake turning red. The three fishermen from the beginning have lived under the lake since they disappeared (yeah, they vanished) and are now half worm men who want Herman to find them half worm women so they can have children.

There’s no way he’s giving up his females, so Herman makes sure that a couple of tourist girls eat worms in their hot dogs. And when the archaeologist lady discovers what is happening, things get really crazy…

The Worm Eaters is like a reality where John Waters moved from Baltimore way back and set up his camera and gang of misfits in hick country. As an additional note to myself, I need to review more John Waters flicks, I’ve only dished out Desperate Living (see review here) and I’m a big fan of his movies.

The acting is divided, many ham it up, but the more plot orientated few, such as the archaeologist, the Mayor, and so on, they are all okay. The worm suits are simply hilarious. There’s nothing overly gross about the film because the folks don’t actually eat any worms, they just slop their slack open mouths around filled with food and worms hanging down their jaws, which I suppose is pretty sickening considering we have long moments of close up noisy sloppy mouths.

Herman is an interesting chap, he spends long minutes chuntering, then chatting to his worms. It’s all quite eccentric and amusing to watch, though the music gets a little tedious, aside from the lovely music box like tinkering ditty which appears at more the more emotional man and his worm segments.

Producer, Ted V. Mikels appears as an arm wrestler and his son also pops in on the birthday party scene. As an interesting note, Claudette Wells who plays the archaeologist, became a very successful voice actress in animated movies such as The Princess and the Frog, Barnyard, and Mulan.

Image Entertainment has done a decent job on the negatives, leaving the gritty grain how we love it, and levelling out the volumes. Extras wise there’s a trailer and a commentary.

The Worm Eaters isn’t what you expect, well I was taken unaware, it’s quirky and fun. It is something to watch with likeminded buddies, I mean choose them carefully, most people will probably beat you to death halfway through, but the likeminded will see the funny side.

AKA: Die Wurmfresser, Regal d’asticots, Los come-gusanos

Directed by: Herb Robbins
Written by: Herb Robbins, Nancy Kapner
Produced by: Ted V. Mikel
Cinematography by: Willis hawkins
Editing by: Soly Bina
Music by: Theodore Stern, David L Newman
Cast: Herb Robbins, Doreen Ross, Nancy O’Brian, Claudette Wells, Robert Garrison, Mike Garrison, Barry Hostetler
Year: 1977
Country: USA
Language: English
Colour: Colour
Runtime: 1h 29min

Studio: Cinema Features
Distributor: Image Entertainment