Dreamcatcher (2003)

DREAMCATCHER
RATING: 6/10
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I think I've said this a few times before, but I'll reiterate it here: I hate putting ratings on my reviews! Why? Simple. Because there's a cluster of peeps out there who don't seem to read the whole review and consider only the rating when emailing me to tell me to go F myself, when in actuality, the review itself should be the reason that they do the same. Please read the whole review, figure out what it was specifically that I liked/didn't like about the movie and then tell me to go F myself, if you like. It's all good. Thanks.

PLOT: A band of childhood buddies bundle up in a winter chalet for some old school chatter about some strange kid they used to know along with a whole lot of beer guzzling. The next day, some helicopters show up in the sky and a bloody mess of a man falls into their domain. The next thing you know, aliens are on the loose, body insertions are the draw of the day and Morgan Freeman is a badass with a wicked grey crewcut. I'm hip!

CRITIQUE: This is a flawed picture that totally had me in the palm of its hand during its first awesome half with a mysterious premise and a gang of believable mates, but ultimately lost me with one too many subplots and one too many attempts at genre-switching. The film essentially takes all the elements from Stephen King's earlier works including STAND BY ME, THE SHINING and THE TOMMYKNOCKERS, along with a bunch of other horror sci-fi/flicks a la THE THING, INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and anything else that Lawrence Kasdan and his homage-friendly partners decided to pepper into this winter-laden potpourri of monster, suspense, comedy of horrors and hoped that it would all make sense in the end. The film's actually got pretty much everything in it and more...in fact, too much!! It starts off with a nice, fresh premise, taking us through the lives of these four guys, even dropping a little suspense into our laps. But soon after the always funny Jason Lee spits out a few hilarious one-liners, it shifts into another kind of movie and things get a little wacky. Having said that, I continued to hang in there because I really dug all of the actors and the directing was sweet up to that point. Then, a couple of our boys get messed up, Morgan Freeman and Tom Sizemore's hairpiece slip into the mix and the next thing you know...the quiet, meandering build-up that was, turns into an action-fest with Free and Size churning CGI helicopters across the fair skies and kicking all kinds of alien ass!! Yes...an odd shift in momentum indeed. But I still tried to keep up with the handful, and ultimately, kitchen-sink full, of subplots, until one Donnie Wahlberg showed up as a mind-reading mentally-challenged weirdo, at which point, all hell literally broke loose, alien CGI monsters started to go mano-a-mano while I was left trying to figure out how "The New Kid" could look as horrible as he did.

All that to say that what continued to "save" the film for me was the absolutely fun, gung-ho performance of Freeman, who not only looked very different in this role, but also dropped enough machismo into my drink to crack me up every time he popped up on screen. Sure, the whole thing veered off into enough plot directions to twist anybody's tittie around a few times, but on the whole, I enjoyed the ambition behind the project, as opposed to the straight-assed one-note bullshit recycled fluff-pieces that are slammed down our respective throats week in and week out (or maybe that's just me?) Yeah, we didn't need all the friggin' flashbacks to their childhoods, we didn't need to see the whole "psychological" insides of a certain character's head (especially since it would have cut down the film's runtime as well) and we certainly didn't need the whole Freeman/Sizemore tete-a-tete, but overall, I liked a lot more of its stuff than I didn't like and would definitely still recommend it to anyone who wants to be scared a little, laugh a little and be confused a little. It also runs longer than it should, but the gang of initial characters are a blast to watch (shoulda stuck more to their story though), Freeman is the friggin' man, some of the alien/monster stuff is entertaining (they've got British accents...you bet!!), it features a handful of "memorable" scenes and its first half is more engaging than most movies are in their entirety nowadays, so make sure to catch it, at least, on video and if possible, in theaters, if only to see how aliens make their way in/out of human beings (and yes...it's pretty gross).

Where's JoBlo coming from? Battlefield Earth (7/10) - Being John Malkovich (8/10) - Hearts in Atlantis (5/10) - The Hidden (7/10) - Mission to Mars (3/10) - Pitch Black (7/10) - The Shining (9/10) - Signs (8/10) - Top of the Food Chain (8/10) -X-Men (7/10)

Review Date: March 19, 2003
Director: Lawrence Kasdan
Writers: Lawrence Kasdan, William Goldman
Producers: Lawrence Kasdan, Charles Okun 
Actors: Thomas Jane as Henry
Jason Lee as Beaver
Morgan Freeman as Colonel Curtis
Genre: Suspense
Year of Release: 2003
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