Review of Cat`s Eye

Introduction

I`ve never been a big fan of Stephen King`s horror story movie adaptations. I think his writing works best when the directorial reigns are handed to the likes of Frank Darabont, an uber director who knows how to craft the simple King vision into a heart felt piece of classic cinema.
In this DVD we get the usual King horror and supernatural tales. Three vignetted pieces of semi-twilightzonesque fluff. The link, and hence the title, is a cute tabby cat. His job is to save a young Drew Barrymore who`s in deep trouble at the start of this movie. As the cat travels it appears in each of the transitional pieces.

The cat`s journey begins as we watch the first vignette, about a heavy smoker (James Woods) who is trying to quit. In a last ditch attempt he attends "Quitter`s Inc." a radical group of Mafia-styled thugs who, upon a smoking relapse, will electrocute a member of the smokers immediate family.

The next tale features Robert Hayes (Airplane) who is having an affair with the wife of a notorious mobster. When said mobster finds out, he offers Hayes a wager. Hayes can have his life, $20,000 dollars and the mobster`s wife, if he`ll walk round the ledge of his penthouse apartment.

Finally we return to the cat as it reaches Drew. She`s being terrorised by a six inch Troll-beast-thing who wants to steal her breaths (not a typo). The parents blame any damage created by said Troll on the cat and have it constantly removed from the house. In the end can the cat save the day?

The fist two tales are taken from King`s night shift collection of shorts. The final Troll story is original to the movie.

Video

The picture is surprisingly crisp and solid in the colour department, contrast levels and sharpness. Presented in its 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen ratio it has no visible digital artefacting and virtually no grain. The blacks remain solid and whites shine bright with only a mild amount of haloing on very bright areas. Menus are static, un-scored and just dull!

Audio

Presented in Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo this is a little bit harsh in parts with some distortion in very loud moments. Dialogue is clear but again suffers from shrillness and distortion in parts.
Bass is more-or-less non existent, which is a shame as a good underlying bass extension adds greatly to at least the original musical score.

Features

You get a short and sweet bag of bits here, the best being an Audio Commentary by director John
Lewis Teague that`s insighful and charming with many anecdotes about the shoot. There`s also a small section of deleted scenes that don`t add anything to the movie and are just obvious timing cuts. And finally you get the standard theatrical trailer.

Conclusion

A nice transfer of a mediocre movie. For a better horror vignette flick, try Creepshow or Twilight Zone - The Movie. This just fails to offer the viewer any chill factor and even looks older than its 1985 date. Sound doesn`t impress either and a horror movie without decent sound is like Chips without Fish, a nice taster but not totally satisfying.