SLEEPWALKERS (1992)
"Cop kabob!" Fuck, don't you just love cheesy one-liners in cheesy horror films of yesteryear? Even the bad ones (I'm talking suicidally bad) put a doltish grin on my face. That's how I would describe my impression of 1992's Sleepwalkers. It's stupid...God, it's stupid, but it made me forget the world for 91 minutes. I appreciate that because I'm currently nursing a (possibly) broken hand, and I'll take any frowzy, frou-frou entertainment I can find. Going in, I didn't realize that Stephen King adapted the screenplay from his own unpublished story. What is it with him and icky subject matter? If I had only read It and watched Sleepwalkers, I would wonder about his preoccupation with prepubescent gangbanging and incestuous pussy monsters.
Mick Garris directs it all with a cool, imperturbable stasis (you'd never guess that it was a scrambled shoot). I dug the steady pans and the rich lighting. The occasional hiccup editing? Well, I blame the studio, although a heft of juicy gore did escape their imposed scissors. The acting is better than I was expecting. Madchen Amick is a peach as the virginal, lily-white Tanya. I actually wanted her to live, which I'm told is a good thing. And I'd give King credit for crafting down-to-earth characters, but unfortunately, I'd also have to give him credit for plot holes and haphazard dialogue. Seriously, what the fuck was up with the black policeman? There comes Johnny with his pecker in his hand? He's off to the rodeo? What???
Sleepwalkers is fun. Not as fun as, say, playing board games with anthropomorphized soft pretzels, but still.
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