Synopsis: A couple desperately try to hide their daughter, Charlie, from a shadowy federal agency that wants to harness her unprecedented gift for turning fire into a weapon of mass destruction. Her father taught her how to defuse her power, but as Charlie turns 11, the fire becomes harder and harder to control. When a mysterious operative finally finds the family, he tries to seize Charlie once and for all — but she has other plans.
Review:
Firestarter is hanging on by a thread thanks to the renaissance of Stephen King in theaters. However, we need to put a brake on the freight train that is sequels and remakes of Stephen King from the 80s and 90s. It was fairly odd to find out weeks before its release that the new vision of Firestarter would also be debuting on Universal’s streaming service Peacock on the same day as the theatrical release date, after all, it stars Zac Efron and is one of Stephen King’s most recognizable works.
The previews in theaters made it seem like an attempt at a horror movie mixed with Marvel’s X-Men capabilities. When you finally get down to the grit and muddiness of watching the film, the opening 10 minutes are freaking awesome. Then it immediately stalls and runs out of fire rather abruptly after the opening sequence. As it focuses more on Zac and the girl’s character it doesn’t have the same dialect that the original film had and even, in my opinion, the original wasn’t all that great.
Blumhouse has been on a winning streak with IP remakes and sequels to classic horror franchises such as the criminally underrated The Invisible Man and Halloween are top-notch. However, when you’re dealing with a lot of IP some are bound to be a dud such as Firestarter was meant for the Razzies. It’s the definition of a tough watch. I do think the storyboards of the film tell a much better story than the finished screenplay did.
Overall Grade: 0.5/5 stars
