Parents' Guide to

Slither

By Cynthia Fuchs, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 18+

Gross-out comedy-horror mix isn't for kids.

Movie R 2006 96 minutes
Slither Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

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age 15+

Based on 6 parent reviews

Chandler A.
Chandler A. Adult
February 8, 2023
age 15+

This title has:

Too much violence
Too much drinking/drugs/smoking
When you rate shining 3 stars
When you rate shining 3 stars Adult
January 14, 2020
age 18+

I lost BRAIN CELLS wondering why COMMON SENSE MEDIA Rated this a 2 STAR

SO overall if you have not checked out of my other reviews just click on my name. But seriously what it's like if common sense media knew how to make me even madder than I should Be. Like rly, it's violent and stuff, but unique in it's own way. Jeremy Jeremy got third degree malaria because it was so darn violent, but it like rly good.

This title has:

Great messages
Great role models
Too much violence
Too much sex
Too much swearing
Too much consumerism
Too much drinking/drugs/smoking
See all 6 parent reviews

What's the Story?

Starla (Elizabeth Banks) has settled. Obviously perky, probably sweet, and certainly exciting for her high school students in her tight little skirts, she's also married to the lunkiest guy in town, Grant Grant (Michael Rooker). Starla has a more suitable partner in handsome sheriff Bill Pardy (Nathan Fillion), who's had a crush on her since they were kids. She only realizes this when Grant becomes infected by an alien and tries to consume the entire town's population. After Grant is zapped by an alien through his chest, he transforms, slowly at first, and then quickly: he craves raw meat. As he turns increasingly hideous, alien-Grant sends forth a horde of blood-red parasite slugs to infect humans: these slugs shoot themselves into people's mouths, and the host bodies then become flesh-eating zombies, staggering and lurching like movie zombies tend to do. In one extended sequence, the slugs infect a family, though teenaged daughter Kylie (Tania Saulnier) fights off the invasion long enough to be rescued by Bill, who arrives just in time to see her zombified family attacking the pickup truck in which she's trapped.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (6):
Kids say (7):

Goofy and gross, SLITHER revisits the old alien invasion plot with comedic violence that might bother sensitive viewers. Suitably reluctant and arrogant at the same time, Bill is disinclined to shoot things. But he's also resourceful and careful about his image. He figures out that everyone who ingests slugs is connected to Grant (they all insist, sometimes speaking in unison, that "Marriage is a sacred bond"), and so the destruction of alien-Grant is the only way to end it. "I'll keep growin'," grrrs Grant, "'Til I'm everywhere, 'til I'm everything."

What Bill doesn't see is Grant's mirroring of himself: the guy who loves the girl so hard and so long and so hopelessly that he loses himself. Lucky for him, this loss of self becomes literal for Grant and his many extensions (all ugly, all pink and oozy, all soulless). It takes some serious devastation for Starla to see her proper partner, but Bill's still waiting.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about the continued popularity of gross-out and horror movies. What is it about these kinds of movies that fascinates people, especially teens?

Movie Details

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