I like seeing it with someone who has never watched it before and knows absolutely nothing about it since it helps me view it with fresh eyes. The acting is a bit dodgy and campy at the beginning especially from the old man and Mike, but of course, John Vernon is excellent. The guy playing Dave actually gives a pretty good performance too. I don't think anyone really watches this movie for the acting anyway. "Another door! ANOTHER door! Another door!" Wow, they should've cut those lines. It doesn't bother me though. I just love the thing.
Besides, the clowns are the real stars, and they're absolutely fantastic. Their nasty yellow jagged teeth and the revolting way they laugh. One slightly disappointing thing I noticed more this time is how their true Alien form seems to just be a big green crystal. That's a little weak (I guess a spider is slightly better sadly), but maybe that's just how they die. I do think they put quite a bit of thought into it even explaining several possibilities for the clowns' origins, and it's very clever all the crazy things they came up with like popcorn sneaking across the floor, cotton candy cocoons, the harvesting parade (the stuff of nightmares), the lethal shadow puppet, etc. The design of the clowns is just brilliant, and their space ship is so much fun. I love how you only see a few cocoons in it at the beginning, and then it's full of them at the end. Bye bye small town. That's a devastatingly high body count if you think about it.
I really hope the Chiodo brothers get to do their sequel one day. The practical FX in this movie are incredible.