51 Reasons Why Gremlins Just Might Be The Greatest Film Of All Time...

By Simon Gallagher /

36. Geeky In-Jokes: At the inventor's convention, in the background is the time machine from The Time Machine, and it is clearlywinding up to full power, and then in a moment of comedy genius, after the cut scene, the machine has disappeared, leaving only a wisp of colored smoke. It's not the only one, so I wont spend ages listing them like the giant dork I am- but I will say that my personal favourite (apart from Robby the Robot's appearance) is the Gremlin in the cinema, watching Snow White & The Seven Dwarfs who is clearly wearing some Mickey Mouse ears. The cheeky devil. I challenge anyone to come up with a definitive list of the excellent film references from Gremlins- it's a lot like trying to name all the Easter Eggs in a Pixar film. 35. It's Set at Christmas: All of the most entertaining films ever are set at Christmas, and that is a scientific fact. Die Hard, Home Alone, It's A Wonderful Life (which itself gets a brief cameo in Lynn Peltzer's kitchen) and of course Fred Claus. Well, possibly not that last one. 34. Mrs Peltzer: Like the stereotypical Horror film home-alone housewife, Billy's mom goes a bit nuts when she discovers the newly rehatched Gremlins in her kitchen, but in an awesome development, rather than roll over or run away scared, she turns out to be a Gremlin killing machine, despatching three of the critters in one grizzly scene, when everyone else seems comically incapable of even composing themselves in their presence. Girl power! 33. Ruby Deagle's End: The neighbourhood battleaxe, played by Polly Holliday, appears at first to be a total bitch, who will inevitably get what's coming to her at the hands of them spiny green bastards, and with delicious inevitability the Gremlins kill her in spectacular fashion, sending her through a window in her supercharged stairlift. Same thing happened to Thora Hird I hear. All very hush-hush. 32.

Murray Futterman, Billy's neighbor: [drunk, looking inside his car] Gremlins... Murray: [turning to Billy and Kate] You got-you gotta watch out for them forgeiners cuz they plant gremlins in their machinery. [he climbs inside the car] Murray: It's the same gremlins that brought down our planes in the big one. Kate: [laughing] The big one... Murray [turning round] that's right! World war two. [he puts his hand to his head] Murray: Good old WWII. Murray: [Murray tries to start his car] Y'know their still shippin them over here. They put em in cars, they put em in yer tv. They put em in stereos and those little radios you stick in your ears. They even put em in watches, they have teeny gremlins for our watches!

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