Impulse ** (1984, Tim Matheson, Meg Tilly, Hume Cronyn, John Karlen, Amy Stryker, Bill Paxton) – Classic Movie Review 13,768

Residents of a rural small town start to exhibit strange and violent behaviour after a small earthquake, in the 1984 American sci-fi thriller film Impulse.

Director Graham Baker’s 1984 American science fiction thriller film Impulse stars Tim Matheson, Meg Tilly and Hume Cronyn, along with John Karlen, Amy Stryker and Bill Paxton.

There are strange goings on when Stuart (Tim Matheson) and his girlfriend Jennifer (Meg Tilly) visit her rural small town home after a small earthquake ruptures the seal on a toxic waste burial site: the residents can’t help acting on impulse, which involves them in mugging, murdering and marauding.

Written by Bart Davis and Don Carlos Dunaway, it is twice as silly as it sounds, and not half as interesting, and the mystery of what’s happening is very unmysterious indeed.

Veteran star Hume Cronyn features to some effect as a kindly old physician called Dr Carr, who stops a patient’s respirator, while Matheson and Tilly do a good job as the perplexed out-of-towners. But the portrait of a collapsing society screams out to be painted in bolder colours.

English film director Graham Baker had previously made Omen III: The Final Conflict (1981) and went on to make Alien Nation (1988).

It cost $10 million and earned $2,773,433 at the box office.

Bart Davis is a pseudonym for Nicholas Kazan, an Oscar nominee for his screenplay for Reversal of Fortune.

© Derek Winnert 2025 – Classic Movie Review 13,768

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