Reeling Backward: "The Dead Zone" (1983)

Stephen King writes a lot of books and during the 1980s to '90s there were so many film adaptations of them you can hardly keep them straight. They range from excellent to awful and various flavors of mediocre.

The poor box office performance of "Hearts in Atlantis" and "Dreamcatcher" in the early aughts -- both better flicks than they're given credit for -- sent the market for King movies south for a bit, but now there's been a resurgence with the "IT" duology and remake of "Pet Sematary."

We've also got another crack at a miniseries of his epic, "The Stand," one of my all-time favorite books, coming this December to the CBS premier access platform. (The less said about the 1994 TV miniseries, the better, though I still plan to say it in a little bit. Stay tuned.)

"The Dead Zone" came out in 1983 along with two other King adaptations that year: "Christine" and "Cujo." None of them were particular hits, though the other two at least have the benefit of a killer dog and a haunted car to cement their place in the cultural lexicon. "Dead," despite getting the best reviews of the lot, has been pretty well memory-holed.

It's the story of a school teacher who goes into a coma for five years after an accident, and when he awakes finds he has psychic powers to predict the future and see into the past. His visions occur when he touches another person (living or recently dead), and as things go on he discovers there's a "dead zone" in his premonitions wherein he can take action to prevent terrible events such as death or catastrophe.

I can only imagine being a casting director in the early 1980s and trying to figure out what to do with Christopher Walken. An Oscar winner for "The Deerhunter," his first major film role, he did song-and-dance in the bomb "Pennies from Heaven," then made two movies in 1983 about people with mind powers, this one and "Brainstorm," with which it is often confused.

Then he played Bond villain Max Zorin a couple years later in "A View to a Kill," and the "kooky Chris Walken" trope was firmly established. His disjointed speech patterns and mad sorcerer's stare have pretty much defined his career since, from "more cow bell" to a 1,001 impersonations.

Though he occasionally gets better material.

His character, Johnny Smith, isn't terribly well defined before the accident. He's a somewhat dweeby high school English teacher in an idyllic town, Castle Rock, one of King's fictional New England settings. He's engaged to be married -- or at least engaged to be engaged -- with another teacher, Sarah (the winsome Brooke Adams).

Curiously, Walken wears his hair combed forward in an exaggerated Roman style prior to the accident, then in his familiar swept-back pompadour after. He also goes from tweed coats to flipped-collar raincoats, giving him a vaguely Dracula thing.

Raised by religious parents (Jackie Burroughs and Sean Sullivan), Johnny's relationship with Sarah is chaste, despite her entreaties. "Some things are worth waiting for," he tells her, before driving off into the rain to meet his destiny in the form of a detached semi-tractor tanker lying in the road.

Interestingly, right before the accident Johnny had experienced a painful headache/hallucination while riding a roller coaster with Sarah -- perhaps an indication his psychic powers were already there, just lying dormant.

I enjoyed the scene where he wakes up in the long-term care clinic. His doctor, Sam Weizak (Herbert Lom), warns his parents not to reveal too much to Johnny about what has happened to him. Then his mom immediately blurts out that he's been conked out for five years, and Sarah abandoned him to marry another man. Nasty old rhymes-with-witch.

She soon dies of a heart attack, and we're glad to see her go.

Johnny's first vision results in one of his nurses rushing home to save her daughter from a burning house, which results in him becoming a local celebrity. He also uses his power to reveal to Sam, with whom he forms a bond that goes beyond doctor/patient, that the mother Sam thought he'd lost during the Holocaust is still alive.

Sam calls her to confirm the information, but hangs up on her and leaves it there. He tells Johnny that finding each other 40 years later "wasn't meant to be," suggesting that he considers his patient's abilities to be some kind of perversion of the natural order. Sam also hosts a rambunctious press conference for Johnny that results in a nasty encounter with an obnoxious reporter, and all in all Sam seems a better friend than physician.

The plot meanders thereafter, the middle section playing as a crime procedural, followed by a family/romance drama, and the last act as an incongruent political thriller.

In the former, nearby Sheriff Bannerman (Tom Skerritt) comes calling to enlist Johnny's aid in solving a series of stabbing murders of young women. It's a pretty tired dance of refusal, then enlistment, then doubting of his abilities, and then denouement as the killer is confronted. I'll skip right to the chase and reveal that it's the sheriff's smirky deputy, played by Nicholas Campbell.

(Sorry, no spoiler warnings after 37 years.)

Johnny uses these events as an excuse to move away, setting up shop as a personal tutor in a nearby town. He lives in a pretty grand three-story house all by himself, as once again Hollywood movies seem entirely incapable of grasping the basic economics of regular folks. These are hardly the sort of accommodations a semi-employed teacher could obtain.

He also retains a pronounced limp and uses a cane to get around, though the movie doesn't delve too much into how Johnny's psyche is affected by his disability. Dr. Sam seems to think that Johnny's body will only get weaker as his mental powers grow stronger.

During this time he becomes personal tutor to Chris (Simon Craig), the ostracized son of a very wealthy man (Anthony Zerbe), and they form a brotherly camaraderie. Johnny uses his powers to prevent Chris' death in an ice hockey accident he foresees, and he begins to embrace his abilities as a blessing rather than a curse.

Chris has a bunch of cool nerdy stuff in his bedroom, including a then-rare personal computer, figurines and comic books, and I think he and I would've gotten along famously.

Around this time Sarah also reappears with her toddler son in tow. She claims to be happy with her life but regrets the one with Johnny she left behind, so she throws him a bone by having sex with him. Only this one time, she warns, and presumably his only time, since Johnny is implied to still be a virgin.

Sarah seems to think she's doing him a favor rather than letting Johnny's feelings slowly burn out naturally. This is just throwing a log on the fire, and borderline emotional terrorism.

The film's last bit is hokey and contrived, as Johnny encounters an ambitious young candidate for the U.S. Senate, Greg Stillson, played with dyed-black hair and cartoonish aggression by Martin Sheen. Stillson rides around in a Cadillac limo but dons a construction hard hat for his campaign appearances, doing push-ups and delivering rambling monologues about what's gone wrong with this country.

Johnny inadvertently shakes Stillson's hand during one of these, and sees a vision in which the man becomes President and launches a preemptive nuclear strike, seeing it as his personal destiny bequeathed by God. He consults with Sam, obliquely, about whether it would be right to commit murder to prevent massive tragedy, using the obvious Hitler proposition.

I adored Sam's non-prevaricating response: "All right. I'll give you an answer. I'm a man of medicine. I'm expected to save lives and ease suffering. I love people. Therefore, I would have no choice but to kill the son of a bitch."

Thus Johnny sets off on an assassination mission with his father's old World War II carbine, which is successful though not in exactly the way he intended. Of course, his own life is forfeited in the exchange.

"The Dead Zone" is like a meal in which the chef was given a lot or promising ingredients and never figured out the right way to put it together. Jeffrey Boam wrote the screenplay adaptation, in a short but busy career that also included "The Lost Boys," "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" and the second and third "Lethal Weapon" films.

It was one of director David Cronenberg's rare non-horror films during the early part of his career, busy with mind-bending tales like "Videodrome," "Naked Lunch" and "Scanners." I get the feeling Cronenberg didn't quite know what to do with such a relatively straight story, and ended up churning out the sort of bland studio fare any one of a hundred other filmmakers could've delivered.

It's not especially scary, or exciting, or emotionally engrossing... or especially anything, really. I can grasp why it's been mostly forgot.

Apparently King did write his own version of the screenplay, though Cronenberg reportedly rejected it for being too brutal -- a rather hilarious statement, given the grisly nature of his own oeuvre. Even funnier: the person originally imagined to play Johnny, and King's own choice, was Bill Murray.

Just trying to imagine that version of the movie gives me visions of my own -- most unpleasant ones.

Video review: "The Jungle Book"

Here’s to show that not every recent remake has been a total waste of time. I actually prefer the new live-action version of “The Jungle Book,” with a heavy assist from CGI animals, to the original animated film from 1967. This one amps up the action, tamps down the musical numbers to an acceptable level, and delivers a fun and rousing family-friendly action adventure.

Neel Sethi is Mowgli, a boy raised by wolves in the jungle, especially adoptive mother Raksha (voice of Lupita Nyong’o) and Bagheera, a helpful black panther voiced by Ben Kingsley. But Shere Khan (Idris Elba), a hateful Bengal tiger, reviles all humans and wants Mowgli between his jaws. After tragedy, the boy is on the lam.

He meets up with Baloo, a lazy bear (Bill Murray) who wants to use Mowgli for his own purposes – mostly involving procuring honey – but starts to develop a tender spot for the kid. They face off with King Louie (Christopher Walken), a giant orangutan with his own monkey army who demands Mowgli give him the human secret of the “Red Flower” – the ability to create fire.

It’s interesting how this is a twist on the usual dynamic in human/animal stories. Here most of the animals, even benevolent ones like Baloo, are looking to exploit Mowgli for his physical attributes, instead of the other way around.

The digitally animated creatures are completely believable – their eyes, fur, movements and anthropomorphic emotions all seem quite authentic. When Shere Khan is bearing down, we can practically feel his breath on our necks.

The action scenes can be pretty intense, so the smallest children may need a little reassurance (or a pass until they’re older).

With its fancy computerized critters and throwback charm, “The Jungle Book” is a pleasing mix of old and new.

Bonus features are good, though you’ll have to upgrade to the Blu-ray combo pack to get most of them. The DVD comes only with a featurette on creating King Louie layer by digital layer. With the Blu-ray you add a making-of documentary with director Jon Favreau and his visual effects team, a feature on the casting call for Mowgli and an audio commentary track with Favreau.

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Review: "The Jungle Book"

Disney certainly has an appetite for "Jungle Book" iterations. Or at least they think we do. Lucky for them, they're right ... at least when it comes to good ones.

Beyond the cheesy 1967 animated feature, there was its (wisely) forgotten sequel, "The Jungle Book 2" in 2003; "TaleSpin," a short-lived 1990 TV spinoff; a live-action version in 1994 starring a nearly 30-year-old Jason Scott Lee as the boy Mowgli; another live-action version in 1998 that went straight to video; an animated cheapie in 2010; and another TV series that's still running.

The newest version directed by Jon Favreau ("Iron Man") is a pleasing mix of old and new elements. It uses high-end CGI to render all the animals, and the results are pretty stunning. Neel Sethi plays Mowgli, a "man-cub" abandoned in the jungle and raised by wolves, particularly fierce mother Raksha (voice by Lupita Nyong'o), with a little help from wise black panther Bagheera (Ben Kingsley).

The animals still talk, as they did in the books, and recite Rudyard Kipling's verse containing wisdom from the mouths of creatures. The action is fairly intense -- it was a bit scary for our 2-year-old -- and quite well-choreographed.

This is the sort of movie designed expressly for kids but entertaining enough to keep their parents engaged.

And yes, they do bust out a few iconic songs from the '67 movie, including "The Bare Necessities" and "I Wan'na Be Like You," sung by Bill Murray as the bear Baloo and Christopher Walken as the massive ape King Louie, respectively. Both end up serving as comic relief in the middle of some tense sequences.

Murray's version is actually quite charming, and in general his voice work is so emotive and spot-on that I hereby forgive him for the "Garfield" movies. Walken does a talk-singing thing that almost ends up in yodeling territory.

Scarlett Johansson also has a brief role as Kaa the mesmerizing serpent, but her best contribution is a gorgeous rendition of "Trust in Me" that plays over the end credits. Kaa actually helped Mowgli in the books, but here he's a she, and she's all bad.

The story mainly revolves around Mowgli's conflict with Shere Khan (Idris Elba), a massive Bengal tiger who deeply resents a boy living among the jungle denizens. A human wielding "the red flower" (fire) left him scarred and blind in one eye, and now the power-hungry feline wants to exact his revenge on all their kind.

Bagheera and the alpha wolf, Akela (Giancarlo Esposito), decide to return Mowgli to the human village in the name of maintaining comity between the jungle species, but their plans go awry.

Mowgli ends up under the protection of Baloo, a large and lazy bear who wants him to use his human ingenuity to get at all the wonderful honeycomb sticking to a cliff. He says it's for his hibernation, but as others point out jungle bears don't hibernate.

"It's not total hibernation, but I do take naps," he sniffs.

Favreau and screenwriter Justin Marks wisely keep the preachy life-lessons stuff to a bare minimum. The only real moral of the story is that humans shouldn't try to be animals, and vice versa -- but that doesn't mean they can't get along.

Sethi is winsome and agreeable as Mowgli, but as you might guess his character is just a vantage point from which the audience can view all the amazing creatures and action.

I was never a big fan of the old Disney animated film, and most of the other cinematic and TV versions have passed me by. This new "The Jungle Book" manages to seem fresh and full of energy, and that says something all on its own.

Review: "Eddie the Eagle"

“Eddie the Eagle” looks at first glance like a standard sports underdog story. Indeed, it’s a virtual remake of “Cool Runnings,” the 1993 film about the Jamaican bobsled team that competed at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary.

In fact, “Eddie” is set at the same time and place and involves another unlikely competitor who got his ticket punched to the Olympics only because of a complete absence of competition from their home country. With both the Jamaicans and British ski jumper Eddie Edwards, the goal was not to win but simply to earn a place in the competition.

They even recycle the made-up character of the washed-up, alcoholic athlete who reluctantly takes on the mantle of coach and mentor -- played by John Candy then and Hugh Jackman now.

But scratch but a little deeper, and you’ll find a story that’s actually about bullying, and overcoming it.

Director Dexter Fletcher and screenwriters Sean Macaulay and Simon Kelton see in Eddie, a humble working-class plasterer played by Taron Egerton, an awkward kid who’s been picked on his entire life, and smelts that negative energy into determination to prove everyone wrong.

“I was kicked off every team I ever tried out for even before I had a chance to prove myself,” Eddie says.

A lot of the fascination with Eddie, and the reason that gives power to his redemption, is that he’s homely. With coke-bottle glasses, pinched features, horsey teeth and strangely angled jaw, Eddie gets written off by most everyone he meets. He wore braces on his legs as a child, and there’s still a quality of ungainliness about him. Just standing still, he looks awkward.

Earnest and not bright enough to be called a nerd, Eddie is the guy everybody laughs at.

The British Olympic selection committee certainly laugh him off, declining to let him try out for the skiing team despite being one of the top amateurs in England. Later it’s the veteran ski jumpers from Finland or Norway who titter when Eddie decides to take on the sport. They’re all long, lean Vikings, and here’s this stumpy, half-blind guy who resembles the antithesis of athleticism.

But Eddie is determined, declining to listen even to his father, who orders him repeatedly (and unsuccessfully) to give up his Olympic dream and settle down in a stable trade. Mum (Jo Hartley) is more supportive, slipping him money and the even more valuable currency of absolute affection.

Eddie selects ski jumping because Britain hasn’t had one in Olympic competition in more than 50 years. That means there’s no community to train him up -- but also no one he has to try out against.

It might seem easy to be the best at something that no one else is doing. But this is a sport where mistakes lead not to disgrace, but a coffin.

Jackman plays Bronson Peary, a legendary former ski jumper who got kicked off the U.S. team for his drinking and carousing. Now the old lush who runs the snow plow, he becomes Eddie’s only friend and trainer. He doesn’t want the job, but reckons that if he doesn’t help, Eddie is liable to wind up dead.

Fletcher stages the jumps engagingly, showing us the soaring beauty and almost insane danger of the sport. The decathlon may be the measure of the finest overall athlete, but nobody routinely ends up with a broken body.

Egerton, who played second fiddle to Colin Firth in last year’s “Kingsman: The Secret Service,” gets more of a chance to shine here as the gullible but sweet Eddie. He shows us how this remarkable young man turned derision into cheers, and how triumph does not necessarily mean receiving a medal.

Video review: "Jersey Boys"

“Jersey Boys” was fairly ignored at the box office, but it’s just the sort of movie that clicks on video.

It’s got a historical story that appeals to older audiences, not to mention a soundtrack that plays like a Top 40 list from the 1960s. Couple that with winning performances and a dark – though not too dark – look at the underbelly of the music biz, and you’ve got all the ingredients for a home video hit.

The story of The Four Seasons is the story of America’s transition from the relative stability and conservatism of the 1950s to the upheaval and pandemonium of the ‘60s. The band, who combined the smooth vocals of the old-timey barbershop quartet with the beats and theatrics of rock, owned the airwaves prior to the British invasion.

Based on the Broadway show and directed by Clint Eastwood, “Jersey Boys” stars John Lloyd Young as Frankie Valli, whose effortless falsetto was somehow both angelic and masculine. Young, who also starred in the stage version, manages to play Valli from age 16 to 60 without ever straining.

I also appreciated the fact that rather than having the actor lip-synch to vintage recordings of the real McCoy, Young actually provides his own facsimile of the distinctive Valli sound – and a really good one, too.

Rounding out the cast are Erich Bergen as Bob Gaudio, who wrote many of the Four Seasons songs; Michael Lomenda as Nick Massi, the go-along-to-get-along member of the group; Vincent Piazza as Tommy DeVito, the resident bad boy; and Christopher Walken as a local mafia don with a soft spot for the boys.

A lot of movies get lost in the shuffle of summer, and most of them deserve to. But “Jersey Boys” nails its high notes.

Extra features are merely so-so. The DVD comes with just a single making-of featurettes, “Oh, What A Night” to Remember.” Upgrade to the Blu-ray combo pack and you add two more, “From Broadway To The Big Screen” and “Too Good To Be True.”

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Review: "Jersey Boys"

A lot of these Broadway nostalgia acts are what they call "jukebox musicals" -- they're colorful and bright, and the story is just a flimsy excuse to string together performances of golden oldies to please the blue-haired set. They can be good or bad, but there's an inescapable cynicism about them. They feel like live versions of greatest hits compilations.

"Jersey Boys" the stage show reputedly falls into this category -- I haven't seen it, so I can't say for certain -- but the film adaptation directed by Clint Eastwood mostly rises above it.

This is a darker and more ambitious version of the usual showbiz biopic. Eastwood and screenwriters Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice (who also wrote the musical book for the stage version) try to get at what brings a great pop group together, and what pries them apart. For them, the answer is right in the title: the pride, fear, braggadocio, family bonds and skewed sense of honor that drive working-class Italians from Jersey.

Before the Beatles invaded these shores, The Four Seasons were America's biggest musical act. Their smooth sound, buoyed by the crystal falsetto of Frankie Valli, connected the music of the Greatest Generation to that of the Baby Boomers. They used the old-timey standard of the barbershop quartet and layered in the increasingly sophisticated production and rhythms of rock 'n' roll.

The story starts out with a bit of a "Goodfellas" feel, with a teenage Valli running with a bad crowd of musician-thugs, who boost safes and other jobs when gigs dry up. There's even a local mafia don, Gyp DeCarlo (a sly Christopher Walken), who receives patronage and dispenses favors because he adores Valli's voice.

John Lloyd Young, who played the role of Valli during the initial Broadway run nearly a decade ago and won a Tony for his efforts, reprises the performance. He assuredly hits the high notes during the songs, though he's a little flat during some other scenes.

(There's some good makeup effects late in the movie to depict an older Valli, though their best efforts come during the early part. Young convincingly plays a 16-year-old, despite that he's pushing 40 in real life.)

The stage version was broken up into four acts, with each narrated by a different member of The Four Seasons. The film adaptation borrows but tweaks this storytelling device, with Valli remaining at the center of the tale while others give their interpretation of events.

Vincent Piazza is terrific and confident as Tommy DeVito, the swaggering leader of the group. A street hustler by trade and disposition, he's always running a side game or trying to whip the other guys into line. Nick Massi (Michael Lomenda) is the self-described "Ringo" of the group, going along to get along while the getting is good.

Erich Bergen plays Bob Gaudio, the songwriter and brains behind the outfit. A WASP-y type from outside the rough-and-tumble neighborhood, he's brought into the group over the protests of Tommy. His resentments are soon founded, as Bob and Frankie become artistic twins.

Some other subplots, mostly involving Frankie's rocky home life and marriage to an alcoholic wife (Renée Marino), feel short-shrifted and obligatory.

Of course, one of the main enjoyments of the film is listening to the fantastic music of The Four Seasons -- including iconic hits like "Rag Doll," "Sherry, "Big Girls Don't Cry" and also some tunes that didn't become hits in the States, like "My Eyes Adored You."

I always marveled at how The Four Seasons could sing such high notes and still sound entirely masculine. Young does a fairly spot-on imitation of Valli's distinctive timbre.

I also admired that Eastwood made the choice to include performances of entire songs, rather than the usual thing where they start the first two stanzas, maybe get to the bridge, and then cut away into montage mode. The director also makes the clever choice of repeatedly focusing his camera on audiences' reactions to the music of The Four Seasons -- not just a wave of bodies, but close-ups of individual faces uplifted and transported.

"Jersey Boys" is still something of a pastiche about these characters rather than a deep exploration of them. The heart of the story is really about the relationship between Frankie and Tommy, a combination of fierce love and big-brother resentment that neither can ever entirely overcome. Sometimes this gets lost in the songs, but it's a pretty nice sound garden to wander around in.