Whenever the subject of domesticity and suburbia comes up in a film, I tend to refer to the time David Lynch very effectively stated “I discovered that if one looks a little closer at this beautiful world, there are always red ants underneath”, a simple sentiment that says everything we need to know about the supposed ideal way of life, where the white picket fence and perfectly maintained law is viewed as the optimal version of the proverbial American Dream. However, what happens when the insects themselves invade suburban life and attempt to make it their own? This is the premise of Meet the Applegates, in which Michael Lehmann sets out to tell the story of a group of mutant creatures that resemble enormous ants and originate deep in the Amazon Forest, focused on one particular group of shapeshifters that move to a small town in Ohio, passing themselves off as an ordinary middle-class family, with an intelligent father and dedicated stay-at-home mother working to provide for their rambunctious son and charming daughter. However, beneath their placid appearance, the Applegates do have a plan, namely to ensure a nuclear meltdown that will annihilate the human race and allow the insects to regain power and dominance over the planet, a scheme that does seem to have promise until they realize the sheer number of obstacles that stand in their way. Lehmann has always been a filmmaker with a taste for the perverse and unconventional, and following on from the radically successful Heathers a few years prior, Meet the Applegates seemed to have the same sense of humour and penchant for the absurd and unorthodox, which makes it quite a fascinating work, even when it veers towards overly predictable and quite one-dimensional at certain points.

It’s hardly surprising that Meet the Applegates was a divisive film, and one that was met with a collective shrug – the premise is genuinely quite bizarre, and it isn’t handled by someone who had a proven track record outside of helming a single dark comedy that developed a cult following only in the years that followed. Yet, it’s important to take into account the situation in which the film was created, and how it was so much more than just a one-dimensional science fiction dark comedy, and instead had enough substance to justify its existence, even if it may not have followed through on absolutely all of those ideas. The United States was in the final stages of the Cold War, with the Berlin Wall crumbling the same year this film went into production – tensions were high, and a film about not only the broken promises of the American Dream, but also the complete annihilation of the planet through nuclear warfare, was something of a sore subject and not likely to be appreciated by audiences that were ready to celebrate the end of the tensions and a momentary reprieve from the fear of another global conflict. However, this doesn’t disqualify this film from having achieved something quite remarkable, not in spite of the milieu in which it was made, but as a result of it – and ultimately, we find that Meet the Applegates is a timely work, one that is perhaps even ahead of its time. As we have seen, the global population is growing more incredulous to their leaders, and question government and institutional structures more than ever before, and while it may seem slightly heavy-handed in how it delivers this message, the themes are reflective of something quite resonant, and which continues to be eerily reflective of the state of contemporary politics, which has not only stagnated since the late 1980s, but actively become more unsettling, which is ultimately the theme that Lehmann and his cohorts are insisting to exploring throughout this film.

As with any work of satire, approach is the most important way to convey a message, and in the case of Meet the Applegates, a decision was made to turn this premise into an outrageous, off-the-wall comedy, which only seems logical considering the subject matter, which could hypothetically lend itself to something much more bleak and disturbing, but was always going to have some level of humour attached, even if only marginally. The director had worked in this kind of deranged dark comedy before, and adding even more layers of horror onto the story elevates it to be increasingly more disturbing, which is exactly the method required to tell this story. Much like Heathers, this film features a lot of very stylish imagery – Lehmann seems to be a filmmaker driven to create memorable compositions that can make his work stand out even more, especially when some of the narrative progression can feel somewhat flimsy. The ideas that drive Meet the Applegate are perfectly complemented by the visuals, which are remarkable for the era in which they were made. Lehmann combines 1950s science fiction with Norman Rockwell-inspired depictions of suburban life, creating a striking juxtaposition that is not at all exclusive to this film, yet still carries a fascinating set of ideas that feel earnest in their efforts to be unique. The design of not only the creatures and their specific traits (which are both alluring and repulsive in equal measure), but every detail of this quaint hamlet in which they find themselves, is exceptional and gives the film such a distinct appearance that adds gravitas to humour, making them stand out even more than they would have in any other context.

Considering the premise and how untested he was as a director, Lehmann does manage to enlist quite a remarkable cast to bring these characters to life, not only choosing talented actors, but also people who could accurately portray both the placid domesticity and deep sense of destruction that were integral to the progression of the story and the development of these characters. Ed Begley Jr. has been positioned as this delightfully quirky character actor who usually tends to be cast in supporting roles, but Meet the Applegates is one of the rare instances where he was able to play a leading part, and he is as exceptional as you would expect. He captures the spirit of this happy-go-lucky suburban patriarch who has a very dark side to him, and he plays the part to perfection, perhaps slightly more than the surrounding film warranted, since it certainly doesn’t seem to want to have put too much effort into the nuances of the characters as we would expect. Stockard Channing is always exceptional on screen, and much like Begley, she captures the spirit of the era in which this film is set, as well as the more jagged edges that accompany the character. There are some surprisingly small roles scattered throughout – Dabney Coleman is a wonderful villain, playing the aptly titled “Aunt Bea”, while the deeply underrated Glenn Shadix has a scene-stealing supporting part that feels so much more nuanced than we would anticipate. A film like Meet the Applegates doesn’t need to be driven by its cast, but they’re all uniformly excellent and bring this film to life with such vivacity and charm, its impossible to not be entirely enamoured with it on every conceivable level, which seems to be one of the reasons it has become such a cult classic.

Meet the Applegates is certainly not a film that everyone will understand or be able to appreciate, especially if we’re looking at reactions from when it was released – its a thorny, harsh and sometimes quite cynical glimpse at American life, and how it is essentially nothing more than a bundle of broken promises consolidated into the culture by the idea of crafting the ideal image of a family and how it functions within society, even though this is nothing but an archetype. Added to this, the film is further provocative due to its willingness to court controversy, touching on themes that remain quite polarising, with its depiction of terrorism, political unease and social discord all fertile ground for a truly daring piece of storytelling, one that doesn’t always have the expected outcome. Despite all of this, Meet the Applegates is still quite effective – an offbeat comedy that is filled to the brim with boundary-pushing concepts that were far ahead of their time, driven by the desire to hold up a mirror to the complacent members of society, exposing the hypocrisy of those who purport to lead a moral life, but in reality are about as far from moral as one could get. Unconventional, unhinged and often quite brilliant, this film is one that was not understood at the time, but is most certainly ripe for rediscovery, and has the potential to only grow as a classic of cult comedy.