At its heart, Firestarter is almost a superhero story. Of course, there’s a fine line between hero and monster. Maybe that’s one reason Stephen King’s novels keep getting remade into film. The upcoming Firestarter adaptation from Blumhouse and Universal Studios marks the third version — at a time when audiences have embraced the fantastic like never before. In the meantime, Stephen King’s novel went from sci fi/horror to thriller. Look, I don’t care what genre you call it, as long as it’s good.
Does Universal’s description resonate with you?
In a new adaptation of Stephen King’s classic thriller from the producers of The Invisible Man, a girl with extraordinary pyrokinetic powers fights to protect her family and herself from sinister forces that seek to capture and control her.
For more than a decade, parents Andy (Zac Efron; Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile; The Greatest Showman) and Vicky (Sydney Lemmon; Fear the Walking Dead, Succession) have been on the run, desperate to hide their daughter Charlie (Ryan Kiera Armstrong; American Horror Story: Double Feature, The Tomorrow War) from a shadowy federal agency that wants to harness her unprecedented gift for creating fire into a weapon of mass destruction.
Andy has taught Charlie how to defuse her power, which is triggered by anger or pain. But as Charlie turns 11, the fire becomes harder and harder to control. After an incident reveals the family’s location, a mysterious operative (Michael Greyeyes; Wild Indian, Rutherford Falls) is deployed to hunt down the family and seize Charlie once and for all. Charlie has other plans.
This is what I ask from a horror movie thriller: interesting actors in interesting situations. Armstrong seems a natural fit for the challenging role of Charley, and it’s interesting to watch the continued evolution of Efron onscreen. I am hopeful that I’ll have the time and comfort to go to a theater to see this on May 12, but glad to have the Peacock streaming option as well.
The film also stars Kurtwood Smith (Amityville: The Awakening, Hitchcock), John Beasley (The Purge: Anarchy, The Sum of All Fears) and Gloria Reuben (Lincoln, Mr. Robot). The Firestarter score is composed by the legendary John Carpenter (Halloween, Christine, The Fog) and his fellow Halloween franchise composers Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies.
Directed by Keith Thomas (The Vigil), from a screenplay by Scott Teems (Halloween Kills) based on the novel by Stephen King, Firestarter is produced by Jason Blum (Halloween, The Invisible Man) for Blumhouse and Oscar® winner Akiva Goldsman (I Am Legend, Constantine) for Weed Road Pictures. The film’s executive producers are Ryan Turek, Gregory Lessans, Scott Teems, Martha De Laurentiis, J.D. Lifshitz and Raphael Margules.
Wait a minute — JOHN CARPENTER IS DOING THE MUSIC? This will be worth seeing for that alone.
