IHR induction #49: "It" (1990, Tommy Lee Wallace)

BEEP, BEEP, RICHIE!

You know, I don't think there's a person in my age bracket who hasn't seen the TV miniseries version of Stephen King's "It." Its 1990 premiere was a major, major deal that EVERYONE in my first grade class was talking about. Yeah, all of us were way too young to even THINK about picking up the mammoth 1,000+ page novel that the movie was based on, but damn near all of us knew who Stephen King was - the guy who delivered all the scary stuff that we were banned from watching. Somehow or another, a large percentage of the people in that AFOREMENTIONED first grade class found their way to a hidden TV on those two 1990 nights.

A bit of background information first before we get to the meat of the story. The novel "It" was released in 1986, during the absolute peak of Stephen King's collectibility and popularity. It was the longest novel he had ever sent forth to the public (until being surpassed by the uncut version of The Stand five years later), and based on the critical blurbs and the overwhelming fan response, It is most definitely some book. Taking place over two separate time frames and encompassing a large set of very likable, very distinct hero characters going up against an ultimate evil force, it's damn near horror perfection.

The miniseries was both a critical and financial success, pulling in mammoth ratings and massive residuals to this day. Hell, it still shows up on ABC Family (of all channels) once in a while. Most importantly, it scared the living daylights out of me back then and still has scenes that me and a loyal group of acquaintances quote to this day.

"It" is the story of the town of Derry, Maine, and the very, very bad things that lurk in its underbelly. The flick starts with the death of a little girl at the hands of a creepy clown, prompting Mike Hanlon (Tim Reid) to call six seemingly random people across the United States with a mere two-word message: "It's back."

The more engaging material in the film occurs in background segments that give us the childhoods of these characters, and explain the meaning of the phone calls. This section (which interweaves with the present-day 1990 story) takes place 30 years earlier, and we meet our kid protagonists. Nice guy Bill Denbrough (Jonathan Brandis, played in present-day form by John Boy Walton himself), sensitive, chubby Ben "Haystack" Hanscom (young version: Brandon Crane, older version: John freakin' Ritter), practical joker Richie Tozier (young version: Seth Green, older version: Harry Anderson), cute girl with an abusive father Beverly Marsh (young version: Emily Perkins, older version: Annette O'Toole), and hypochondriac Eddie Kaspbrak (young version: Adam Fairazl, older version: Dennis Christopher) are all recognizable, distinct, and likable people who instantly form a connection with the audience. Their situation is all the more relatable, as the group forms a unit called, appropriately enough, "the Losers' Club," as victims of a group of bully greasers led by the very dick-ish Henry Bowers (Jarred Blancard, who plays the young version, is extraordinary as this dislikable prick).

Across both timelines, the storyline is essentially the same - murders are happening at an alarming rate, and when the mysterious deaths - always accompanied by a grinning, horrifying clown who calls himself Pennywise - begin threatening the Losers' club, the group bands together to face the ancient evil entity on its own grounds. After succeeding in 1960, Bill - the leader of the group - makes the other members promise that if It ever comes back, they will return to Derry and destroy the force once and for all. Hence the phone calls.

There's your story, folks. But the thing that makes "It" hit home is its villain. Tim Curry takes the duties of playing Pennywise, and in an Internet world where all-encompassing blanket statements are the norm, nobody will ever be able to top him. He's scary, yeah, but he's also funny and memorable. It's hard to find fault with the guy who played both Dr. Frank-N-Further and Mr. Boddy, but this guy's awesomeness is practically universal. Every scene that Pennywise appears is a home run, and he scared the ever living CRAP out of me as a kid watching the mayhem unfold on ABC.

Which brings me to Point B regarding this whole manifesto - we're getting a remake of "Carrie." One that will be "truer to the novel" than the original Brian De Palma film, despite the fact that almost everyone agrees that the 1976 film is FINE the way it is, changes and all. We're also getting another re-adaptation of "It" at some point. I don't know if it promises to be "truer to the novel," but the changes that this film made from the novel were ALL for the better. If you want an example, the novel contains a completely out-of-nowhere orgy scene between the child versions of the main characters. No, I'm not joking. Google it.

And perhaps the most important reason why another version of "It" would suck - if done today, the "past" segments of the film would take place in 1981. I have nothing against 1981, but that's just depressing.

So there we have it. While lacking the polish of a big-budget theatrical film, the miniseries version of "It" is an awesome movie, with likable characters, a menacing villain, and a nice, evenly-balanced flowing narrative serving as the lynchpin of the action. Par for the course with a lot of IHR inductions, it's also a movie with strong sentimental value for this writer, and remains one of the better Stephen King adaptations out there.

Oh, and one more thing...

Beep beep, indeed.

IHR induction #48: "Maximum Overdrive" (1986, Stephen King)

Way back in the early '80s, when Dino De Laurentiis offered his personal services to Stephen King to produce his movies in a "quality" way, he had the best of intentions. Really, he did. It started off promising enough, with "The Dead Zone" as a bona fide classic and a minor box office success. Then came "Firestarter," a major box office failure...followed by "Cat's Eye," an even bigger box office failure...then "Silver Bullet"...and eventually the movie that we're talking about here today. The only movie ever to be directed by the man, the midth, the legend, Steve-O himself, and also one of only two feature films to have all of its music done by AC/DC. And really, it's the only one to have that distinction in my book, since that cash grab "Iron Man 2" soundtrack contained exactly TWO songs that were heard in the movie and a bunch of filler grabbed from their catalog.

To be fair, I've done by fair share of bitching about this movie in the past. And to be fair, it's far from the "masterpiece" that oh-so-handy movie poster informs us that it is. We'll be getting to that later. The important thing about this film, though, is that it holds a lot of nostalgic value, not only for yours truly but for a lot in my age bracket. It was played ad nauseum on the Turner networks in the early-to-mid-'90s, including a couple presentations on MonsterVision, and has become one of the semi-talked-about "cult classics" of my generation. Two, it's also the only movie to have its entire freakin' score done by AC/DC. A better ringing endorsement there cannot be.

* THE MOVIE *

Well, one of the very first things we see in this movie is the image above - Steve-O in a cameo role as a would-be ATM machine user, who promptly gets called an "asshole" by said machine followed by "Who Made Who" thumping on the soundtrack. Alright, we're off to a rocking start. Immediately afterward, we're treated to a pretty impressive sequence, as a bridge unexpectedly rises during the height of rush hour traffic, causing a multi-car pileup, death, destruction, and general chicanery. It should also be noted that this scene features Marla Maples getting killed by flying watermelons, which was oh-so-diligently pointed out to me by Joe Bob back in the day. All in all, quite the intro sequence, I must say.

Cut to the Dixie Boy truck stop, main location for the Romero-esque action that ensues. There's a whole cast of cutups here, most notably Bill Robinson (EMILIO!!! Estevez), an ex-con turned truck stop restaurant worker. Bill is at odds with his prickish boss Bubba Hendershot (Pat Hingle), who for some reason refers to everyone else as "Bubba," despite the fact that this is his own name.

Well, it isn't long before this sweeping character development grinds to a halt and the machine-related incidents begins piling up. An electric carving knife takes on a life of its own and slices one of the Dixie Boy waitresses, a video game electrocutes a greedy patron, and a steamroller goes crazy on a Little League baseball field. It seems that machines have taken on a life of their own all across the globe, gaining not only life but a decidedly anti-human disposition. In the short story "Trucks" upon which this movie is based (located in the anthology collection "Night Shift" for anyone who wants to track down the source material), it's semi-trucks and semi-trucks alone that get the magical come-alive treatment, but this movie's decision to make it EVERY worldly electronic doodad was a good one, giving us all sorts of additional tension what with the soda machines, lawnmowers and other motorized devices running people down.

There you have it - "Maximum Overdrive," boiled down to its simplest forms, is essentially Night of the Living Dead with trucks as the main threat and a host of little threats, a tale of misplaced survivors paired up against an almost unbeatable force. Fairly basic premise, but it's pulled off with reasonable success. For starters, it helps that the movie has a pretty decent lead villain in the legendary Green Goblin-headed truck seen above. Pretty much everyone in my age bracket, at one point, thought that the "Happy Toyz" truck was badass personified. It also seems to have some sort of weird telepathic control over the other trucks, with its eyes glowing bright red whenever it wishes to communicate. It also serves as the primary negotiator/bringer of death to the humans in the film. ***** for "Maximum Overdrive" Green Goblin truck.

In addition to that, the music in this film works very well. As AFOREMENTIONED, not only the background songs but the freakin' SCORE are provided by AC/DC, and while this sounds like it would get old fast, it works really well. It helps when the band is as cool as AC/DC and you have universally loved songs like "You Shook Me All Night Long" and "Hells Bells" to work with, but even the "pad" music is done very well, along with a "Psycho"-style guitar chord that will crop up in your mind at all the wrong moments and remind you of the scene where a hick gas station attendant gets an eyeful of gasoline from a vengeful pump.

That's what works in the film. Unfortunately, there's a lot of stuff that doesn't. Namely, the characters. Estevez was definitely game for the role of Bill Robinson as written, but there's rarely been a "hero character" less heroic than Bill. For most of the film, he does absolutely nothing, a trait that goes for most of the characters. We're given almost no reason to believe that the bad guys are beatable, until the script throws together some ragtag useless crap to "win" in the final ten minutes.

And the "love story" in this film...whoo boy. OK, kids, here's the summary: one of the survivor group is a hitchhiker named Brett (Laura Harrington), who rode into the Dixie Boy with a slimy Bible salesmen. Just because the script calls for it, Brett immediately takes a liking to Bill, and after a couple "flirting" scenes accompanied by what is really a very nice piece of background music by Angus & Malcolm, we get this ridiculous kissing scene that almost kills the movie halfway through. So big strike against the movie there.

But you know what? Forget all that. It goes without saying that, technically speaking, this is a pretty bad movie. As an experience, though, it's loads of fun. There's plenty of exploding trucks and decent kills to ensure that you won't be bored. Watching this flick in a crowd setting is always a treat (and I can speak from experience); there's plenty to laugh at, not the least of which is one of the characters screaming "WE MADE YOUUUUUU!!!!!!" at the circling gargantuans before getting shot in the chest by an Army gunner vehicle, Hingle's mystical weapons stash that he oh-so-conveniently keeps in his basement, the gas station assistant's flatulence during a toilet scene, and Lisa Simpson herself asking her new husband "ARE YOU DEEEEAAADDDD???" If you're looking for unintentional laughter, there are few movies better.

Which brings me to the whole point of this manifesto. Movies can be enjoyable in different ways. Sometimes, it's admittedly hard for me to enjoy critically acclaimed, heady, introspective films that are inherently challenging. Sometimes, I just want to be an idiot. If you're looking to turn your brain off, enjoy a fun roller coaster ride and go back to a time when it was perfectly acceptable to watch an unmanned steam roller flatten an unsuspecting CHILD (very hard to see this one getting by the MPAA today), this is one of the best fixes you can ask for. Especially since, as we speak, a remake is in talks (and this doesn't include the crappy 1997 TV movie "Trucks," which I'm well aware of), one that almost surely will be more professionally polished and nowhere near as much fun.

IHR induction #47: "Citizen X" (1995, Chris Gerolmo)

Apart from the horror genre, the "serial killer" film is practically a genre unto itself. In the two decades since Anthony Hopkins slithered his way into our hearts as the lovable Hannibal "The Cannibal" Lecter, there have been scores of imitations/ripoffs depicting multiple murderers as quasi-heroes and/or inherently much more creative than your typical deviant psychopath. John Doe and Jigsaw are the two names that spring immediately to mind; heady, intelligent men who kill not because the addiction that real-life serial killers have, but rather because of some moral stance or revenge.

Of course, as facts go (and this is coming from somebody who has done quite a bit of research on the subject), this quite literally COMPLETELY untrue and unrepresentative. Most serial killers are of above average intelligence, not the genius level required to pull off some of the crazy contraptions that Tobin Bell rigs up in the Saw series. In addition to that, their motivation for killing is often sex-based; the compulsion burns inside during a "heating up" period as the individual begins fantasizing and dreaming about their next victim, eventually being overcome by the desire and exploding in a fury of violence. This is most definitely the profile for one Mr. Andrei Chikatilo, a.k.a. "The Rostov Ripper" and the focus of the film "Citizen X." In the annals of high crime, Chikatilo's acts - which included not only mass murder, but cannibalism and pedophilia - rank right up there with the luminaries (and if you ever want to really creep yourself out, google the name "Albert Fish").

This is definitely not a movie for everybody. The reason? This is one of the most FRUSTRATING and downright difficult films you're ever likely to see, and not in the "Saw" torture porn "OMG is this really happening?" way, but because of its ability to endear its characters to the viewer and truly make the audience feel for their plight. Due to circumstance, they are unable to do this for the vast duration of the movie. More on that later.

Flash back to the early '80s. Setting: Soviet Russia. A farmer is plowing his fields when he spots the image that you're seeing above staring back up at him. The body in question winds up in the possession of Victor Burakov (Stephen Rea, in one of my favorite performances ever - he is infinitely likable in this role, and is fantastic in dialing up the emotion and desperation that the part requires), the region's forensics investigator. On his command, several of his assistants comb the nearby forest for further evidence, and much to everyone's shock return to the morgue with seven more dead bodies - all of them children.

Word of warning - "Citizen X" is a slight message movie, although I don't think it will offend the sensibilities of anyone reading this review or watching the movie. It becomes apparent very early on that Burakov is not in for an easy investigation. Every one of his recommendations for the case are flat-out denied by the Soviet government, and the reason for this is because, according to strict Communist doctrine, serial murder is strictly a result of Western decadence and is impossible in a people's paradise. Time and time again throughout the course of the film (and throughout EIGHT YEARS in real-life, kids), Rea shows up before his superiors, begging for more manpower, more funds, more technology, and time and time again he is told that he is chasing a man who doesn't exist. All the while, the bodies continue to pile up...

While the movie is about the acts of Andrei Chikatilo, it's the investigators who really take top billing in "Citizen X." Still, the role of Chikatilo was absolutely crucial; some of his murders are shown in intimate detail, from the planning stage to the act of snaring an unsuspecting child to the actual act of killing, and the entire film hinges on having the correct individual play this psychopath. Jeffrey DeMunn, a character actor known as one of Frank Darabont's favorites and a horror veteran, devastates as the guy causing the immense headache for the Soviet bureaucracy. In fact, DeMunn does such a good job in the role that at times we feel sympathy for him; he is shown in some of his quieter life moments - through DeMunn's mannerisms and facial expressions, we can sense what a weak and troubled person he is. Then, in the next scene, he is cannibalizing a young girl. This is some movie, I tell ya.

Finally, on the character front, Donald Sutherland appears in an award-winning performance as Colonel Fetisov, a high-ranking member of the military who is concerned only with his standing in the Party at the beginning of the film. The film's true power "Citizen X" lies in the development of the relationship between Rea and Sutherland. As the years tick by, Fetisov undergoes a transformation, going from one of the staunchest critics of the investigation of the murders into the person who stands up most for Victor Burakov's pleas for more aid. It also doesn't hurt that the two actors have amazing chemistry together - every scene they share is a sight to behold.

As a movie that made its way into the public spotlight via HBO, this is a flick that is rarely talked about when the great serial killer and/or horror movies are discussed. Make no bones, this is a film that deserves to be in the conversation. You'll rarely see a movie with actors as perfectly matched to their counterparts (nonfictional as they are), with a script as underivative, and with a true-life story so brutally and honestly told. It's got more than its fair share of blood and guts to sate any horror fan, but "Citizen X" isn't a movie for the gore hound crowd. It will make you think, it will frustrate the hell out of you at times, and it will make you feel uneasy...but you won't be bored. Not by a long shot.