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List Price: $14.99 | | Label: Universal Studios
Salesrank: 27029
Released: April 1, 1998 |
| Our Price: $41.15 |
| Used Price: $9.80 |
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Drew Barrymore stars as an eight-year-old girl with the amazing ability to start fires with just a glance. Can her power and the love of her father save her from the clandestine government agency, "The Shop," that wants her destroyed? From the Stephen King novel.
Description of Firestarter:
Stephen King wasn't exactly in peak form when he wrote Firestarter, so this 1984 movie adaptation was at a disadvantage even before the cameras rolled. There were so many King movies being made at the time that this one's weaknesses became even more apparent. In her first film role after her memorable appearance in E.T., Drew Barrymore stars as a little girl whose parents acquired strange mental powers after participating in a secret government experiment. From this genetic background she has developed the mysterious ability to set anything on fire at will, especially when she's angry. That makes her very interesting to government officials seeking to exploit her skill as a secret weapon. Her father seeks to protect her by using his powers of mind-control, and George C. Scott plays an Indian who believes the girl must be destroyed. There's a routine climax involving a lot of impressive pyrotechnics, but none of this is grounded in a dramatically solid foundation, and none of the characters are developed enough for us to care about them. So the movie gradually turns into a laughable thriller with no suspense whatsoever. It's a movie only a pyromaniac could love. --Jeff Shannon
Firestarter Reviews:
Quite a good Sci-fi horror thriller! 
2009-05-12 -
A young girl named Charlene "Charlie" McGee (Drew Barrymore) and her father Andrew (David Keith) are on the run from the government. They want to use them as ultimate bio-weapons, Andrew was originally a test subject who had the amazing ability to bend minds and objects with his mind as one day he meets a beautiful woman named Vickey (Heather Locklear) as they got married and had Charlie together. Charlie has the amazing ability to make fire with her mind including fireballs, now the government wants to use her as the ultimate unstoppable weapon as she must fight back to save herself and her father.
A nice suspenseful Sci-fi horror thriller loosley based on Stephen King's novel! The film co-stars Martin Sheen, Art Carney, George C. Scott and Freddie Jones, there is lots of excellent pre-CGI special effects of it's day and some nice performances even by Barrymore as the young pyrokentic girl. The soundtrack by Tangerine Dream is very cool that adds to the dark yet atmospheric mood of the picture, not one of the best Stephen King movies but worth viewing.
This DVD contains good picture quality with good sound but the only extra is a trailer to the film.
Also recommended: "Akira", "Scanners", "Carrie", "Making Contact (a.k.a. Joey)", "X-Men Trilogy", "X-Men Origins: Wolverine", "The Dead Zone (1983)", "Hulk", "The Incredible Hulk (2008)", "The X-Files 1 & 2", "The Rage: Carrie 2", "Twilight Zone The Movie", "Powder", "The Shining", "The Pit", "Tetsuo The Iron Man", "1408", "The Running Man", "Final Destination Series", "Cat's Eye", "From Beyond", "The Blob (1988)" and "Videodrome".
2.5 stars out of 4 
2009-02-23 - The Bottom Line:
A faithful retelling of Stephen King's pageturner, Firestarter hits all the notes of the novel without hearing any of the music; simply a mediocre film, it's entertaining enough without being any good.
"Just BACK OFF BACK OFF!!!!" 
2008-07-23 - I love this movie, as child, I wish I had her powers, but thank god I didn't!!!! (ha-ha) This movie was wonderful!!!!
Great film, not so great DVD.
2007-02-13 - Buy the new double collection, it has much better quality. Other than that, this is a great Stephen King adaptation and I would recomend it to King movie fans.
Burn Baby Burn !
2007-01-19 - If you liked the movie called Scanners and if you liked the movie Christine, then you will probably like Firestarter. They are all similar pace wise and have some similar music in the background. I never read the Firestarter book so I can't compare them right now.
The acting is a little unbelievable when it comes to the secondary acting (ie goverment agents that act weird and goofy for no reason), but the main actors do a darn good job for how many takes they were given. Drew Barrymore is mostly realistic, except for two scenes where she seems to be at the end of a long day of shooting. David Keith has those hypnotic eyes and his bonding with Drew was quite good in realism. Freddie Jones has that panic look in his eyes, but he did better in Dune if you ask me. But then with the budget of Dune, you get more Freddie. Martin Sheen has some nice psycho moments and he gets similar screen time in the movie Spawn. Obviously he acts better in West Wing, but then he is pretty young in Firestarter. Art Carney plays an old farmer and he made me laugh a few times. Louise Fletcher has some small scenes on the farm as well, but to see her better, you should see One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest or Star Trek Deep Space Nine. George C. Scott plays a native american and I am not sure he pulls it off totally, but maybe he is half native american or something (they never say). But when George laughs in the movie, you cringe in your heart and you might even thank your lucky stars that George is not your uncle or father either !
The special effects show their age, but for no computer effects, it is pretty nice and poetic as the bad guys get their flaming body suits. Again, if you like the special effects of Christine the movie, then you should be able to handle this movie. The Pyro character in the X-Men movies has similar powers, but I grew up as the sci-fi special effects improved, so I can look past certain laws of physics being broken. However, one scene has Drew Barrymore almost getting run over by a huge truck on fire and I am still not sure how they did that stunt.
I watched the DVD as a rental, but last week I found the VHS tape for one dollar so it was worth it to me to own this flick.
