Lousy Lottery #1: Cat’s Eye
Welcome, friends, to the Lousy Lottery. Here’s how it works. First, I post four movies to a poll on Twitter. Fans vote to pick which movie to make me watch that week. I watch it, review it and spread the word about an amazingly awful, terribly terrific b-horror flick.
This is week one! The first movie you picked in this lousy lottery was 1985’s anthology wonder, Cat’s Eye.
Cat’s Eye is one of those movies that scared me to my bones as a kid. Looking back at the movie now, as an adult, I have no clue why. By the time this movie came out, I was a seasoned horror pro. My favorite movies were things like The Shining and The Omen. Why would this scare me?! In the end, it doesn’t matter because now I get two experiences of Cat’s Eye and they are honestly the two experiences the makers of the film were hoping the audience would have: fun and fear.
I got the fear experience of it as a kid. The evil trolls and deranged doctors shook me. Now that I watch it as an adult, though, I find the movie nothing but fun. It’s cute, it’s cheesy, it’s full of great practical effects and overacting, it’s just a fun romp start to finish. Do you have movies like this, dear reader? Movies that scared the bejeezus out of you at one point and were nothing but fun to you later? I sure hope so, because we should all have our Cat’s Eye.
Blending the fun with the frightening is something Cat’s Eye does well and it’s not surprise, given the movie is based both on a Stephen King short story and his original screenplay. King is a master of this melding of fun and fear. It fits perfectly. Fans of King will love the tone and the overall approach to the story and characters. Fans will also love all the little King easter eggs found throughout. I won’t spoil them all for you and highly encourage you to keep a close eye out for them. Here are two as a teaser, though. In one moment, a red Plymouth Fury nearly runs over our cat host. Think that reference is a stretch? It might be if the car didn’t have a bumper sticker on it that read “I am Christine.” In another scene James Wood’s character is watching Dead Zone on the TV before turning it off, saying “who writes this crap?” Oh, how I love Mr. King’s silly self-deprecation.
In the late ‘70s, iconic producer Dino de Laurentiis saw Carrie and began an obsession with Stephen King. He wanted the rights to everything and wanted to produce all the adaptations. He didn’t quite achieve that goal, but would go on to produce one King work after another. He gave King a great deal of creative control and let him guide the ship. So, it’s no surprise the author would be the sole screenwriting credit on many of these adaptations and would even direct one of them himself, 1986’s Maximum Overdrive. King also didn’t want to just do his big hits. He wanted audiences to get new or close to new content. So, the first flick he made with Dino was Dead Zone, a fantastic story that just wasn’t the hit The Shining, Carrie and the like were. Second out the gate was an anthology film called Cat’s Eye that was based loosely on a story King wrote for Penthouse years before.
And so, we get the second jewel on the string of obscure Stephen King stories adapted to the screen in a time of much cocaine and creative control for King. Like the other Dino films of this time, the final product is a mixed bag of greatness and goofiness and a film that is unlike any others. If you love anthologies and King as much as I do, you’re not going to want to miss this one.
Like any good anthology film, this one has a central element that exists in all the stories. This time it isn’t a location or Tim Roth, it’s a cat. A little tabby cat that always seems to be in the wrong place, at the wrong time. It’s mid ‘80s New York City and a little kitty hides from the rain, pursuing dogs and dangerous Plymouth Fury’s. A doctor’s assistant finds the tabby and brings it to the office. She works for a doctor, but not just any doctor. No, this fella’s methods go way weirder than the mere fact that he uses hypnosis to help folks quit smoking. Trust me, hypnosis is about to seem downright traditional compared to, say, stalking his patients, watching them in their homes and using extreme violence as a punishment for smoking. Hey, the methods may be scary, but you can’t argue with those results!
A patient decides to confront the good doctor and during the scuffle, our tabby escapes. Somehow it makes its way onto the Staten Island Ferry and all the way to Atlantic City! Here, kitty again finds nothing but trouble. It is taken in by a mob boss and casino owner and watches as a convoluted series of events unfolds. Double crosses, addiction, violence and murder abound in this seedy Jersey underbelly. After watching the mob boss take a dirt nap, our tabby moves along again. Most agree, this segment is the worst, with both Siskel and Ebert saying this middle segment is so bad it brought the overall score of the film down a star or two. Oh well, it’s not like King is famous for his crime and mafia stories.
We return to form in our last segment, however, as the tabby finds its way onto a train and all the way to North Carolina. There kitty is found by a wonderful little girl who immediately takes it in. King loves to find heroes in unlikely places. He loves to make heroes out of folks society deems outcasts and side characters. In King’s world, heroes are children (It, The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon), addicts (The Dark Tower series, Doctor Sleep), prisoners (The Green Mile, Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption), or they are the disabled, the old and the maligned. So, it is natural that, here, in our final segment, the heroes are a little girl and a cat. You see, that little girl has been tormented by a small but evil troll. The cat ain’t having none of this troll and together kitty and her new human face this evil bastard head on. This is the segment I remember most and the one I have always loved. Especially as a kid, the duo of child and pet fighting the forces of evil has always felt like unexpected treasure.
All in all, this anthology flick is a total treat. It will certainly give you a fix of ‘80s horror goodness and Stephen King wonder. If you’re a fan of both, as I assume you are, you’re going to love it. Add in the fact that it was directed by someone with great horror cred, Lewis Teague of Alligator, Cujo and The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, scored by the great Alan Silvestri (Predator, The Avengers, a million other movies) and has make up effects from legendary artist Carlo Rambaldi (Alien, ET, Deep Red) and you have a masterfully done piece of ‘80s horror. On top of all that and a King screenplay, you have an insane cast that includes James Wood (Videodrome, Vampires), Drew Barrymore (ET, Scream), Alan King (Casino, Rush Hour 2) and Charles Dutton (Rudy, American Horror Story) among many others. Put it all together and what have you got? You have a fun and frightening trip down memory lane. This movie is a whose who of ‘80s horror and is not to be missed.
Cat’s Eye doesn’t appear to be streaming anywhere, but I’m sure you can find it. It will certainly be worth the search. Tune into Twitter later today and there will be a whole new poll for Lousy Lottery 2! So, don’t forget to log in and vote!
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