The primary time Stephen King turned straight concerned with a function movie adaptation primarily based on his work was with the 1982 horror comedy anthology movie Creepshow, for which he wrote the screenplay. King then teamed with legendary producer Dino De Laurentiis to assemble an anthology movie as a feature-starring automobile for Drew Barrymore, the star of De Laurentiis’s 1984 movie adaptation of King’s 1980 novel Firestarter. The results of this collaboration was the 1985 anthology horror movie Cat’s Eye, which consists of two segments primarily based on quick tales, “Quitters, Inc.” and “The Ledge,” adopted by a concluding third phase, “Normal,” that King wrote for the display screen.
The three segments in Cat’s Eye are unified by the presence of Barrymore, who first seems because the disembodied picture of a younger woman in want of rescue, and the titular roaming cat, which performs a significant position in every phase. Nonetheless, Cat’s Eye is most notable for its constant leisure worth from starting to finish. Whereas everybody who has watched Cat’s Eye undoubtedly has a favourite phase from the movie, there aren’t any actually weak hyperlinks with the trio of segments. Missed on the time of its launch, amid the barrage of King diversifications that flooded theaters within the early to mid-Nineteen Eighties, Cat’s Eye deserves to be ranked alongside The Useless Zone and Stand by Me among the many finest King movies of the Nineteen Eighties, along with serving as a blueprint mannequin for all future anthology horror movies.
‘Cat’s Eye’ Is an Entertaining Mixture of Comedy and Horror
Cat’s Eye
- Launch Date
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April 12, 1985
- Runtime
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94 Minutes
- Director
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Lewis Teague
Stephen King has had a decidedly uneven relationship with the numerous diversifications of his work. Whereas the 1980 psychological horror movie The Shining, primarily based on his 1977 novel, is extensively considered being one of many best horror movies ever made, King has by no means been a fan of Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation. He has all the time had a keenness for these diversifications that seize his lowbrow sensibilities whereas being devoted to the supply materials. After all, one of the best ways for a manufacturing to stay in King’s good graces has all the time been to incorporate him as a part of the artistic course of. This was the case with the anthology horror movies Cat’s Eye and Creepshow, each of which have been scripted by King, who additionally makes a featured appearing look within the latter.
King’s morbid humorousness is very seen in Cat’s Eye, starting with the opening “Quitters, Inc.” phase. It stars James Woods as Dick Morrison, a married father who reluctantly visits the titular anti-smoking clinic and discovers that the clinic has very unconventional strategies for convincing their purchasers to give up smoking. These embody strategies akin to threatening to abduct Morrison’s daughter, performed by Drew Barrymore, and electrocuting his spouse. The scared-straight method definitely works for Morrison and the viewers, particularly given the creepy implication that the mob-connected clinic will all the time be watching him.
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Cat’s Eye will increase the depth with its second phase, “The Ledge.” It stars Robert Hays as Norris, a womanizing tennis bum who has been having an affair with the spouse of Cressner, a vicious on line casino crime boss. He takes revenge by having Norris kidnapped after which blackmailing him into strolling the circuitous and frighteningly slim exterior ledge of Cressner’s high-rise Atlantic Metropolis penthouse residence. In a transparent reference to Alfred Hitchcock and the fear of The Birds and Vertigo, Norris is tormented throughout this perilous trek by a pigeon, which pecks at his foot, drawing blood. This identical pigeon later assaults the slimy Cressner, who, as a satisfying comeuppance, is finally compelled to stroll the ledge by Norris.
Cat’s Eye enters the realm of fantasy with its third and ultimate phase, “Normal,” through which Barrymore performs Amanda, a younger woman who’s terrorized in her bed room by a malevolent troll. Unable to persuade her dad and mom of the existence of the troll, which hides in a magical gap in her bed room, Amanda finds a buddy and guardian with the movie’s signature cat. The cat dangers its life to maintain Amanda secure from the troll, which has the supernatural energy to steal the breath of youngsters of their sleep.
The Tales in ‘Cat’s Eye’ Match the Anthology Format Completely
A lot of the unsuccessful Stephen King movie diversifications are people who try and extrapolate King’s novellas and quick tales into feature-length type with disastrous outcomes, as seen with Kids of the Corn, Graveyard Shift, The Lawnmower Man, Silver Bullet, and most particularly Most Overdrive, which was directed by King himself. All of those movies could be more practical if that they had been condensed into quick movies as a part of an anthology. After all, a notable exception is the 1994 jail drama movie The Shawshank Redemption, primarily based on King’s 1982 novella, which is extensively thought-about one of many best movies ever made.
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Cat’s Eye, like Creepshow, is profitable as a result of it presents every of its roughly 30-minute-long segments as entertaining diversions, which in any other case lack the depth and weight to transcend the anthology format and exist efficiently as function movies. The segments in Cat’s Eye operate as briskly-paced quick tales, as an alternative of feature-length ideas which were mercilessly distilled to the quick movie type.
‘Cat’s Eye’ Is an Glorious Anthology Thriller and Worthy of Rediscovery
Extra anthology horror and thriller movies might have been launched theatrically between 1982 and 1985 than at every other level in historical past. Likewise, eight Stephen King movie diversifications have been launched throughout this era, starting with Creepshow and ending with Silver Bullet. Amid this glut, Cat’s Eye obtained misplaced within the proverbial shuffle, regardless of receiving usually constructive critiques. Cat’s Eye completed its theatrical run with a complete box-office gross of simply over $13 million, the bottom complete for any King adaptation as much as this cut-off date.
Certainly, one of many causes few anthology movies have acquired theatrical releases over the previous 40 years is that they’ve traditionally carried out poorly on the field workplace. This can be a testomony to the inherent problem of participating audiences in a number of tales of various high quality inside a single movie. The particular achievement of Cat’s Eye is that whereas every of the movie’s segments is thrilling in its personal manner, they’re additionally interconnected via a consistency of theme and tone, in order that the viewer by no means feels misplaced, even when one phase isn’t fairly pretty much as good as one other. Cat’s Eye is streaming without spending a dime on Tubi.