Retrospective Film Review | Horror

Night of the Comet (1984) • 40 Years Later — apocalypse, shopping sprees, and 1980s nostalgia in cult classic

Two Valley Girls battle cannibal zombies and evil scientists after a comet wipes out most life on Earth.

On one fateful night in 1984, a comet passed over Earth. For the first time in 65 million years, the visitor was returning to our small portion of the cosmos. It was completing an orbit so large that the last time this fiery ball of rock cast its light on this section of the galaxy, the dinosaurs presumably looked up in amazement. Either that’s just a coincidence, or a portentous omen that you should spend the night in a bunker.

Regina ‘Reggie’ Belmont (Catherine Mary Stewart) considers neither option. She sleeps through the predicted meteor shower, and when she wakes, she discovers that the streets are entirely empty. Los Angeles, which just the night before was packed with denizens wanting to catch a glimpse of the infamous comet, is now a total ghost town. Well, perhaps not totally: much to her relief, her sister…