The Tommyknockers
by John Power
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Actor: Allyce Beasley, Jimmy Smits, John Ashton, Marg Helgenberger, Robert CarradineDirector: John Power
Brand: SMITS,JIMMY
Producer: Frank Konigsberg
Producer: Jane Scott
Producer: Jayne Bieber
Producer: Larry Sanitsky
Producer: Lawrence D. Cohen
Writer: Lawrence D. Cohen
Writer: Stephen King
DVD: Region Code 0
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround; Spanish (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 181 minutes
Published: 1998-09-01
DVD Release Date: 1998-09-09
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Lions Gate
DVD Reviews of The Tommyknockers
DVD Review: Not good...simple as that.
Summary: 2 Stars
Another disappointing Stephen King miniseries. For some reason, lately I've been rewatching some of the older Stephen King miniseries that I hadn't seen since they originally aired. Maybe I thought they'd be better without all the commercials to drag them on and on.
The cream of the crop is THE STAND. The dregs is THE LANGOLIERS, with the worst special effects ever...Ed Wood would have been proud. TOMMYKNOCKERS falls somewhere between.
Basically it tells the story of how one lady (Marg Helgenberger) stumbles across a mysterious little object in the woods, and is compelled to unearth it. Turns out its some sort of alien craft with the power to exert its "will" on the people of the little Maine town nearby. These people undergo gradual (or not so gradual) personality changes which allows them to "suddenly" invent impossible machines, read each others minds, and also to gleefully kill anyone who seeks to thwart them.
That's all well and good. Sounds like it could be good, clean, gory fun. Certainly, the book it's based on was. I know that King himself is not terribly fond of the book, mostly because he wrote it during the height of his drug and alcohol additions...but it contained some of his most disturbing scenes too, and a believable, ultimately heartbreaking romance between the two leads. I have always liked it myself. (To me, King's nadir was THE DARK HALF.)
Back to the "movie." Jimmy Smits plays Helgenberger's boyfriend, a formerly successful poet now awash in alcoholism...but trying to climb out of his hole. He's immune to the power of The Tommyknockers because of a steel plate in his head, but goes along for the ride for much of the story because of the guilt he feels over his own behavior. Eventually, things get bad enough that he finally musters up the courage to take matters into his own hands...with rather serious consequences for himself.
But the story is told in a plodding manner. For every compelling scene (for example, early on Smits is at a reception where he's been drinking too much, and has a gloriously over-the-top embarrassing moment) there's two clunkers (Cliff De Young and Traci Lords as two postal employees undergoing some serious hanky-panky in the sorting room!!) Helgenberger and Smits are fine, as are Joanna Cassidy as the local sheriff and E.G. Marshall as a kindly curmudgeon.
But the lengthy novel has been condensed so awkwardly, and the subplot with DeYoung and Lords given FAR, FAR too much time on screen (De Young is one of the worst actors EVER to get more than one role) to keep make even the gamest performances worthwhile. I guess the producers were so tickled to have former porn star Lords on their set, they just couldn't help coming up with more ridiculous things for her to do. Also, we are forced to see how far Robert Carradine (so good as the "head nerd" in REVENGE OF THE NERDS all those years ago) has fallen...he turns in a perfectly dreadful performance.
The special effects and makeup are quite cheesy. But many things could have been forgiven had a decent adaptation been managed. But THE TOMMYKNOCKERS was doomed from the start with a pitiful script, not helped by uninspired direction. If you're a big fan of Smits, Cassidy or Helgenberger, I guess you might want to take a gander. If you're a fan of Stephen King or horror/sci-fi...stay away!
Description of The Tommyknockers
The small town of Haven becomes a hot-bed of inventions all run by a strange green power device. The whole town is digging something up in the woods, and only an alcoholic poet can unfathom the secret of the tommyknockers. Includes interactive menus, scene access, and trailer.Genre: Horror
Rating: R
Release Date: 30-JUN-2000
Media Type: DVD
The Tommyknockers is a TV miniseries based on Stephen King's 1987 novel. An alien spacecraft has been buried beneath the Burning Woods near the small rural New England community of Haven for millions of years, but has now by chance been unearthed by Bobbi (Marg Helgenberger) while digging around in the woods behind her house. The structure in the woods begins to exert a glowing-green influence on the town, causing the people to invent Rube Goldberg-like gizmos, develop the gift of telepathy, lose their teeth, and form a hive-mind mentality bent on digging up the ship and revivifying the desiccated aliens within. Luckily, Bobbi's significant other is an alcoholic poet (Jimmy Smits) who needs to learn to face his fears. He also has a metal plate in his head that prevents the hive-minders from reading his thoughts and makes him immune to the neon-green influence of the aliens. Ultimately, it's up to him to save the day. Although the acting is topnotch, especially from Smits and Helgenberger, and there are plenty of gooseflesh moments, there are also enough plot holes here to fuel a very long and enjoyable evening's conversation. Why do the aliens start in at this time, when they've been causing legends in the woods for ages? Where does an alien ship buried for ages get all that dry ice? How does the Smits character make a living as a poet? One suspects that King's fine sense of New England characterizations is given short shrift here, and that the woods in his mind teem with more alien thoughts than the TV miniseries form could embody. Welcome appearances by congenial actors abound, notably Joanna Cassidy, E.G. Marshall and Robert Carradine. And there's a slutty postal letter-carrier played authentically by Traci Lords. --Jim Gay
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