Tuesday Top Ten: Stephen King Horror Movies

In this Halloween season, everyone except my wife likes to watch horror movies, which means I don't get to watch horror movies.  This is a damn shame, since I love horror movies.  As a kid, I read a lot of books by Stephen King, who has written something like 14,000 horror novels.  Hollywood began to glom onto King in the late '70s and, more prolifically, in the '80s, adapting many of his books, novellas, and short stories into feature films.  Some were bad, some were good, some are horror classics, and many started with "C."  Here are my top ten horror movies based on Stephen King's works.  I can't claim that I've seen every Stephen King horror film, so this list is comprised only of movies I've seen.  Also, this list is limited to horror movies based on Stephen King's works, rather than all movies, which is why films like Shawshank Redemption, Stand By Me, The Green Mile, and The Running Man aren't mentioned.  I put these in alphabetical order, but please understand that The Shining and Carrie are my two favorite, in that order.

1.  Carrie (1976)

I understand Carrie is being remade with the chick from Kick Ass playing the title role.  I'm not sure how I feel about that.  The original version is just so damned creepy, and I can't imagine anyone other than the innocent Sissy Spacek paying Carrie or Piper Laurie playing her bat-shit-crazy mother, who tells Carrie, "They're all gonna laugh at you."  She was right.  And then Carrie locked everyone in the gym with her mind and killed them.  Moral of the story:  don't pour pig's blood on anyone with telekinetic powers.

2.  Children of the Corn (1984)

I haven't seen this in over 20 years, but I remember being pretty freaked out on one hand, and, other other hand, being pretty empowered by the thought that children can rise up against adults.

3.  Christine (1983)

You would think it would be nearly impossible for a car to get possessed, but if there was any model that could, it would be a Plymouth Fury.  This movie taught me that cars can be jerks and, worse yet, they can make their owners into jerks.  So, the only way to prevent that from happening is to have a bulldozer on hand at all times.

4.  Creepshow (1982)

Creepshow was an interesting horror movie because it featured five different short stories.  I haven't seen it in a long time, but I remember liking it.  How can you not like a movie with Ted Danson and Leslie Nielsen?

5.  Cujo (1983)

Here's the gist of Cujo:  a nice Saint Bernard is bitten by a bat and gets rabies.  It then kills a bunch of people and holds a woman and the kid who played Jonathan on Who's the Boss hostage in their Ford Pinto after the alternator conks out.  It's hot out, they can't roll the windows down, and they can't get out.  91 minutes later, the movie ends.

6.  Firestarter (1984)

This borders on the fringe of sci-fi and horror, but I'm including it because it's my list, and I have an anecdote about it.  Firestarter is just your classic tale of a young child who can start fires with her mind and the government agency that seeks to control her.  In 7th grade, I decided I didn't really need to read any books that were assigned in English class.  That laissez faire attitude carried over into books I chose to "read" for book reports.  Firestarter was one of those books, mainly because there was a film version.  During the book report, I kept referring to the main character (played fabulously by Drew Barrymore in the movie version) as a she.  Some dickhead in my class raised his hand and said, "I thought the main character in the book was a boy."  She wasn't, but I had no idea, since I hadn't even opened the book, so I made something up about Charlie being an androgynous name.  I started reading things after that.

7.  It (1990)

It was a two-part, made-for-TV movie featuring Tim Curry as the ravenous, child-killing clown, Pennywise.  The film centers on a group of kids who discover Pennywise and are then brought back together as adults when Pennywise returns.   I remember being terrified when I watched the first part, yet I for some reason tuned in for the second part anyway.  In addition to Curry (who was perfect as Pennywise), the movie featured John Ritter, Night Court's Harry Anderson, and Breaking Away's Dennis Christopher, as well as a young Seth Green and Jonathan Brandis as two of the young versions of the characters.

8.  Misery (1990)

Whenever Jester brings a sledgehammer into the bedroom, I still shudder a little, thanks to Misery.  This film featured Kathy Bates in her breakout role as Annie Wilkes, the superfan of author Paul Sheldon (James Caan), who gets into a bad accident in a blizzard and is rescued by Wilkes.  Hilarity ensues, as Wilkes holds Sheldon captive and breaks his ankles to prevent him from escaping.  I suppose it's better than the book (which I actually did read before seeing the movie), where she chops his feet off.

9.  Pet Sematary (1989)

I couldn't go near a cat or an Indian burial ground for weeks after seeing this.

10.  The Shining (1980)

This is still my favorite horror movie, despite our tumultuous beginnings.  In the summer of 1989, I was staying with my buddy Jeremy for a couple weeks while my parents were on vacation.  We liked to rent videos, and we forged a note that appeared to indifferent video store clerks to give us permission to rent R-rated movies.  We had always noticed the cover of The Shining in the video store and been intrigued, so we finally rented it. I made it about a third of the way through before I left the room, went upstairs and listened to my then-new Skid Row tape while playing Wizard and Warriors on Nintendo and trying not to think about those fucking twin girls. I have since managed to get all the way through the film on multiple occasions.  In my opinion, this is Jack Nicholson's greatest performance (not that he has any bad ones), and Danny Lloyd, who plays Danny in the film, is also really good, perhaps because he didn't know he was acting in a horror movie until several years later.