Reed Alexander's Horror Review of 'Dreamcatcher' (2003)

GROOOOOAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN! Ugh, I remember this movie being bad, but not this bad. I know books very rarely translate into good cinema, but Stephen King was always the exception to that rule. Fire Starter, Misery,Cujo,Maximum Overdrive,Salem's Lot, Pet Cemetery, Needful Things, the list goes fucking on for King movies, and not a damn one isn't a fucking classic in its own right... Then we come to this fucking movie. Jesus-fucking-Christ, even 1408 wasn't this bad! What the fuck happened?!?

You can tell there's a really great story buried deep in Dream Catcher, and it's one of those moments I wish I read the book just to make sure I understood what I was missing. I mean, a lot of its plot elements could make an amazing story so you can tell, buried deep within this flaming pile of dog shit, somewhere lies a gold nugget. But what the fuck is the point of digging through a flaming pile of shit to recover a gold nugget?

Don't get me wrong. The acting was great, the atmosphere was amazing. Even the general plot and the overarching themes were fantastic... it's just that the story goes abso-fucking-lutely no-goddamn-where for too fucking long. I mean, half the fucking movie is just the villain switching forms of conveyance. Oh, man! So fucking exciting! What form of transportation will he use next!? Will he go by Llama back?! There's no telling what this daffy bad guy will do!

SPOILERS!!!

Why the FUCK does Mr. Grey have a British accent? Look, I know we need to differentiate between Grey and Jonesy, and yeah, you could make the argument that this particular invading force might have studied one English speaking country over another but... No fucking offense to the Brits, but they ain't exactly a prime military target for global holocaust. Maybe it's my American Ego... or maybe it's the fact that we have the Nuclear Arsenal and aren't even matched in military might by China who, mind you is the first largest army in the world. If Grey spoke Russian or Chinese, I'd have been cool with that, but obviously that wouldn't have worked for plot's sake. So why the fuck does Grey sound British?!?

Second, these have got to be the worst invading aliens. EVER! You mean to tell me you have a form of interstellar travel, you have a biological weapon that is universally trans species infectious, you literally have telepathic abilities, and you can't take out this planet of upstart primates? Sure the "Ripley" infection is only 50 percent effective... but that's 50 percent of the population—human and animal—that will drop dead in days, start squeezing alien parasites out of their ass, and basically breed an invading force right here on the ground.

And you're telling me that in order to do this, all they have to do is get one fucking worm into the drinking supply... really? That's fucking it? We have drunks who regularly stumble up to, pee in, then fall into, and drown in, our drinking water by accident. We have entire cities without properly filtered drinking water that is frequently infected by all sorts of shit. This is a fucking given! America is ripe for infrastructure exploitation.

And what the fuck is up with this Duddits character? Okay, I get the fact that he's an alien. I get the fact that he knows what's about to happen and was plotting the whole time to get his buddies in the right place at the right time. I get the fact that he knows he can't tell them because he knows Grey is psychic. But do you think he could have prepared his buddies maybe a LITTLE better? 20 minutes into the fucking movie, one guy is dead, and one guy is infected, Mr. Grey's wearing the other guy like a suit, and the last is captured by the military. Good fucking job, Duddits. Fuck sake, Grey uses one of the special abilities Duddits gave his buddies to get through the military net. That little oversight could have cost them the war. And the movie tries to play it off as pre-planned. Yeah, by a jackass who clearly only gets lucky at the end of the movie because Deus Ex Machina.

And finally, if Mr. Grey knew Duddits was an alien, why the fuck did he walk right into such a blatant trap?

It's hard to believe there's a better book behind this flaming heap. I know enough to say it's likely more coherent. Like I said, all the right elements of a great story are there, it's just... fuck!

Yeah, fuck this movie.