Cat's Eye

In 1982, Stephen King teamed up with George A. Romero for the horror anthology Creepshow. In 1985, King returned to the anthology format with Cat's Eye.

King's leading lady from Firestarter, Drew Barrymore, stars and, along with a cat, ties the three stories together. After being chased by a rabid dog, a nod to Cujo, and almost being hit by a red Plymouth, a nod to Christine, the cat see's a vision of a little girl, Barrymore, who begs him to come and rescue her. On his journey to save her, the cat becomes a character in the other stories.

The first story involves a man, James Woods, whose trying to quit smoking so he joins a group called Quitters, Inc. to help him. The head of the orginization, Alan King, uses mob like methods, even threatening his wife and daughter, also Barrymore, to get him to quit.

The next story is a lot like the one in Creepshow that starred Ted Danson and Leslie Nielsen. A high stakes gambler, Kenneth McMillan, forces his wife's lover, Robert Hays, at gunpoint to walk a narrow ledge around a highrise skyscraper. If he makes it, the husband will grant his wife a divorce. But he doesn't make it easy for him and plays dirty.

The third story involves the girl from the cat's vision. She has an evil troll living in her bedroom walls who comes out at night to try and steal her breath as she sleeps. The parents don't believe her and the om hates the cat. But it's up to the feline to fight the troll and save her.

This is kind of a Creepshow lite. It doesn't have the gore and chills that Creepshow had, it is PG13, but it's still a good horror film. There's a lot of King references in it, the aforementioned Christine and Cujo. It also references The Dead Zone and Pet Sematary. The last story is even a King original. He wrote it directly for the screen instead of it being based off of one of his novels.

The cast is great, and director Lewis Teague has a lot of fun with the material. He also directed Cujo, which in itself was a great King adaptation.

I enjoyed all of the stories in this, especially the Quitter's, Inc. one. This is a fun and suspenseful little ride. And it's actually a King film you can watch with older children.

It's available on dvd.