Hi, I’m Adam, and do you ever wonder how the hell you missed something?
The Dead Zone is a 1983 psychological thriller-come-horror based on a Stephen King novel of the same name. Directed by David Cronenberg and starring the likes of Christopher Walkern, Tom Skerritt, Martin Sheen and Herbert Lom, I can’t quite get over how I could’ve never seen this film before.
But, anyway, Walkern plays Johnny Smith, an English teacher head over heels in love with Sarah, played by Brooke Adams. One night, after a smoking hot date, Johnny drives his car into a fallen tanker, and ends up in a coma for five long years. Waking up with no girlfriend, no job, limited ability to move and a newly discovered psychic reading ability, Johnny is launched into a world beyond his understanding.
By holding people’s hands, Johnny is able to look into their future – or indeed their past. It starts off innocently enough, with Johnny able to save the life of a nurse’s daughter by seeing her screaming in her bedroom, surrounded by flames. But when he begins to take an active role in changing people’s futures, Johnny becomes complicit in an assassination – not to save anyone’s life in particular, rather, to save the entire world.
Okay, I admit it, Dead Zone is a borderline entry in this list. But hey, it’s only day 2 – gimme a chance. Overall, Dead Zone is a great film, with a shockingly impressive cast. You can certainly tell that it’s a Stephen King adaptation, though. Ignoring the fact Johnny has obviously acquired the Shining, Dead Zone feels like a much larger story, compressed into a single film. There’s a lot of stuff going on here, where any one of the plot lines could be a whole film in itself. First, you have the coma victim love triangle, then the psychic detective angle, then the rich man’s child, and finally the nuclear apocalypse- Huh. I’ve said too much.
Check this one out, it’s worth a watch!
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