Metrograph

Crackpot inventor Randall Peltzer (Hoyt Axton) purchases a pet mogwai—that’s Cantonese for “devil,” by the way—from a Chinatown vendor as a Christmas gift for son Billy (Zach Galligan), but when Gizmo’s new owners fail to follow strict instructions for the cute l’il guy’s maintenance, it’ll be hell to pay for the residents of the sleepy hamlet of Kingston Falls… and their lawn decorations. A festive black-comic horror romp with more than a little Looney Tunes in its DNA, with Billy’s Yuletide-phobic girlfriend, Kate (Phoebe Cates), unpacking the childhood trauma of her Santa Claus–costumed father’s fatal journey down the family chimney one among scores of memorably nasty bits of business.

Distributor: Warner Bros.