This comedic fantasy-horror film tells the highly original tale of what happens when a young man, Billy Peltzer (Zach Galligan) is gifted with a unique, furry little creature—Gizmo, a mogwai—but inadvertently fails to heed three simple warnings that come with his new pet. The rules: never get him wet, keep him out of bright light, and never, never feed him after midnight. Before Billy knows it, his sleepy, picture postcard-perfect town of Bedford Falls is under siege from hordes of small, mischievous creatures hellbent on wreaking as much havoc and destruction as they possibly can.

The project came to Amblin through a spec script written by Chris Columbus (who would go on the write The Goonies and Young Sherlock Holmes) as a college student at NYU, a screenplay that would result in the young writer’s first produced feature. Spielberg had been equally impressed with another up-and-coming filmmaker’s work, that of Joe Dante, who’d started out cutting trailers for Roger Corman and directing low-budget features such as Piranha and The Howling. While prepping Gremlins, Dante would also shoot a very well-received segment (It's a Good Life) for Twilight Zone The Movie (1983).

With Dante’s wickedly playful sense of humor and imaginative, inventive puppet effects by Chris Walas, Gremlins is a wildly unique spectacle of hilarious mischief!

Amblin Fact: Gremlins is the first film to carry the Amblin Entertainment logo following the company’s formation in 1981.