So back in the 80s an adaptation of Stephen King’s Firestarter was released staring a very young Drew Barrymore, now 38 years later we are brought the latest adaptation of the very popular novel this time starring Ryan Kiera Armstrong as Charlie McGee and Zac Efron as her father Andy.
A couple desperately tries to hide their daughter, Charlie, from a shadowy federal agency that wants to harness her unprecedented gift for turning fire into a weapon of mass destruction. Her father taught her how to defuse her power, but as Charlie turns 11, the fire becomes harder and harder to control. When a mysterious operative finally finds the family, he tries to seize Charlie once and for all — but she has other plans.
After seeing the trailer being shown before several movies over the last few visits to Cineworld I was intrigued to see how this latest version of the movie would play out and if Blumhouse would carry it off with a story that we have seen done before, but at the moment that seems to be the way we are going with the number of remakes/reboots that are coming along.
Sadly this new adaptation for Stephen King‘s Firestarter really didn’t do much for me it just seemed so flat and not much was happening, the pass is very slow and there are many moments that you look at the time and wonder when something is going to happen that will spark your attention!
I swear that the 1984 version had much more going on in it than this one, maybe it’s time to go back to that adaptation and see if it was better than this one but I do remember watching it and not being as bored when I watched the original.
I really couldn’t connect with Zac Efron’s character and he didn’t seem to fit the role as well as I hoped from seeing him in the trailer, on the other hand, Ryan Kiera Armstrong isn’t too bad as Charlie and she does have a slight look of the younger Drew Barrymore that we saw in 1984.
One thing that I really enjoyed during the film was the soundtrack, not sure why we had the brilliant John Carpenter bringing us the soundtrack for Firestarter, but it has that 80s feel to it and it was the only thing that really kept me interested in the film, but nothing can really make this the film that it could have been from King’s material.
Not Enough Spark to Ignite the Fire!
Movie title: Firestarter (2022)
Movie description: A young girl tries to understand how she mysteriously gained the power to set things on fire with her mind.
Date published: May 17, 2022
Country: UK
Duration: 1h 34m
Director(s): Keith Thomas
Actor(s): Zac Efron, Ryan Kiera Armstrong, Sydney Lemmon
Genre: Drama, Horror, Sci-Fi
Karen Woodham is the founder and owner of the Blazing Minds. She is also a Cinema reviewer and works with RealD 3D reviewing the latest 3D releases and IMAX, she has also had several articles published in various publications including the first edition of SFW Magazine. In 2015 she became an Award Winning Blogger and also has her website listed as one of the UK’s Top 10 Film Blogs.
