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Page 8 DTH Omnibus Thursday April 16, 1992 You won't do much Stephen Kins's Sleepwalkers Brian Krause, Madchen Amick, Alice Krige, Ron Perlman, Stephen King directed by Mick Garris Center 489-4226 12 F I folks. My name is Leonardo U I 'heCat.MygoodfriendMike II I I'm writing the review. And J LI it's a good thine, because this week's film is that new cat opus, Stephen King's Sleepwalkers. Sleepwalkers is the first Stephen King project written exclusively for the big screen. It's not based on any novel or short story. King wrote the screenplay and then hung around the set, providing revisions of the script when necessary. He also makes a cameo appearance as a bumbling care taker. Who cares? It's full of cats! As the film opens, we are pre sented with the legend of the Sleep walkers, a nomadic race of feline-like shape shifters whose lone enemy in this world is felinus domcsticus, or for you noh-phylum types, tats. The Sleepwalkers are helieved to be the basis for all vampire legends. We then meet Mary Brady (Alex Krige) and her son Charles (Brian Krause), ,who hav just moved to Travis, Ind. Theyare very close. Read my snout, very close. In their first scene together, Charles seduces his mother. Now that's close. You hu mans are weird. Mary tells Charles that she is starving and that he must Love, lust, The Mambo Kings Armand Assante, Antonio Banderas directed by Arne Glimche Chelsea 968-3005 f I just listed to you the elements of the plot in The Mamfco Kings, you'd think it was really trite. Two brothers, fresh off the boat, try to make it big. Love, Mike Long feed her. We immediately begin to suspect that these Bradys aren't going to live up to their TV namesake. Charles then begins to court Tanya (Madchen Amick, Shelley of Twin Peaks). Tanya is beautiful and inno cent. Brian acts very shy around her and asks her out. She shyly accepts. You wouldn't have believed how cute these two looked together. This is where King takes off the gloves, flexes his dewclaw and goes straight for the throat. y , '' Charles is a Sleepwalker! He at tacks Tanya and attempts to suck the lifeforce from her. She escapes, j ust as a Sheriffs deputy shows up. Charles kills the cop, but Tanya is saved by the policeman's sidekick, Clovis the Attack Cat, whoimmediatelypounces on Charles. Charles gets away and returns to his mother. He was trying to take Tanya's life energy so that he could "feed" his mother. The film then becomesafun-filled roller coaster ride as the police and every cat in town followClovis to put astop to the Sleepwalker's reign of terror. While watching this film, one can almost hear Stephen King laughing in the background. This is a fun movie and you can tell that King had a ball writing-it,. Whiie there have been some good adaptions of King's work, Sleepwalkers comes closest to captur ing the macabre 'depravity (i.e.: the incest angle) that' resides with King's writings. The sfpw-rriotion scene of hundreds of cats rurining down Main Street may border on camp, but if not taken too seriously, it's fun. Person jealousy and the mambo what a deal Mara Lee Mimm lust, jealousy, adultery and power struggles with managers and each other all figure in the plot. The direc tor even uses medleys. But because of the caliber of the actors, script and director, it all works. For instance, the compelling medley when Cesar (Armand Assante) gets roughed up in Havana is interlaced with the violence of the floor show. Bud&EbLs BarandGril, Timberlyne Shopping Center Weaver Dairy Road Chapel Hill 942-6624 sleeping ally, it made me cry. " J t The special effects in thefilm cbmV; bine hideous makeup designed by Tony Gardner (Darkman) and the digital morphing technique used in Terminator 2 and Michael Jackson's videos. Through morphing, the trans formation from human toSleepwalker takes on a slick, surrealistic feel that gives the film a dreamlike quality. The actors in the film are dyna mite. Madchen Amick is exquisitely stunningas Tanya. Amick and Brian Krause (Return to Blue Lagoon) look like the perfect, wholesome teenage couple and that helps to suspend the illusion of their happiness. Alice Krige is positively frightening as the inces tuous mother who constantly needs a fix of lifeforce. Ron Perlman, the beast from TV's Beauty and the Beast, ap pears as an asshole cop. Playful cam eos by King, and horrordirectorsClive Barker (He!ruiser, Nightbreed), Tobe Hooper (Texas Chamsaw Massacre), John Landis (An American Werewolf in London) and Joe Danre (The Howl ing, Piranha, Gremlins), plus a surprise appearance by Zippy, the wonder squirrel, add an extra element of hu mor to the film. Incidentally, Clovis was played by eight different cats. Director Mick Garris (Critters 2, Psycho IV) may not have seemed like a great choice, but he does a fine job. Garris told Fangoria magazine that horror doesn't have to take place at night. The scariest scene is filmed in broad daylight and Garris pulls it off perfectly, by employing rapid cuts and strange angles. Trust me, having lived with Mike, I've seen my share of hor ror films and it takes a lot to excite me. But during the finale, as I was cheering for Clovis, I was on the edge of my seat (and my paws still couldn't reach the floor!). Garris also told The dialogue handles funny lines very well. As Cesar says about the cigarette girl that becomes his lover, "If she cooks like she walks, brother, I'm going to lick her plate." But more difficult, and more pow erful, are the serious scenes. When Nestor (Antonio Banderas), the ro mantic brother, courts Dolores (Maruschka Detmers), it's so believ able. His beautiful brown eyes stare shyly over his straw as Dolores talks about her ambitions. Even more impressive, the un vocalized chemistry between Cesar and Dolores is surprisingly credible. Dolores looks like a bird hypnotized by a snake, and the sparks are so hot they nearly set his hair oil on fire. But the greatest accomplishment of the script is the conflict between the brothers. Cesar, the older, prag- ai rnlirUinine anil arulrlt prrrrulitr romrdt." iji This is my life SHADOWS! !l,rfIWlbiMj AND fOGSW MieBSa after Clovis the Cat tells Stephen King: Fangoria, "(The cats) are among the best actors in the film." What a guy! Overall, I was very impressed by Stephen King's Sleepwalkers. It was scary, funny, gross, exciting and chock full o'cats. What else could you want? There were several cat bashing scenes that I personally found d isturbing, but matic, assimilated one, wants to man age their own group and become su perstars. Nestor still mopes after his love in Cuba, the stunning Maria, and just wants to open a little club where you can eat good Cuban food and he can play his love songs. Nestor tries to express his dissatisfaction in Spanish and Cesar says, "I don't hear you. Speak American to me." Their love and their anger compete equally in their dialogue and their faces. "Beautiful Maria of My Soul," a line from one of Nestor's many letters home, becomes the hit that gets them on I Love Lucy and an album. In case you want to see this movie and you should I don't want to spoil it for you with the details of other suspenseful arguments, or the climax. This is a beautifully filmed movie, with the camera play, costumes and props all making 1952 New York very real. Seeing Cubans in more than stereotypical Miami and seeing black Cubans reminds Anglos not to as sume too much about Hispanic communities. this one "I got four letters for you: U-G-L-Y" knowing that Mick Garris is a mem ber of PET A made me feel better. Still, one thing about the film bothers me. The Bradys set traps around their house to keep cats away and are con stantly worried about a cat getting . inside. Why didn't they get a dog? It's really good to see a deep, emo tional relationship between leading males on the screen. Nestor and Cesar are more than just buddies, and they can express their feelings in more ways than just scuffing at the ground. " Nestor's trumpet, Cesar's drum ming, the band's rhythms and both of their voices are all wonderful. This is certainly not one of those musical movies where you're drumming your fingers waiting to get back to the plot while the songs are playing. The only thing disappointing about The Mamio Kings is the ending is a touch unsatis fying. And after all, as the woman says on the bus to New York, "I think Cuban accents are sexy." 'wait for the video s. go to the dollar theater only pay matinee price pay full price take your sister, too
Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
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April 16, 1992, edition 1
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