A young girl tries to understand how she mysteriously gained the power to set things on fire with her mind.
Film reboots have been around for a long time, and it comes as no surprise when a studio reveals that they are planning on remaking an older film or TV series. In 1984, Universal Pictures jumped on the Stephen King bandwagon and adapted his bestseller, ‘Firestarter,’ for the big screen. While the movie was most definitely flawed, it delivered everything that the new iteration lacks; story, character development, thrills, and everything one would expect from a supernatural thriller. The latest version is, without a doubt, one of the most unenthusiastic and shiftless remakes I have ever witnessed, even the remakes of “Bewitched” (2005), “Point Break” (2015), “Flatliners” (2017), and “Robocop” (2014) are better than this dud, and that’s saying a lot.
The story revolves around Charlie (Ryan Kiera Armstrong), a young girl who possesses pyrokinesis, the ability to create and control fire with the mind, and her parents, Andy and Vicky (Zac Efron and Sydney Lemmon). When Andy and Vicky were younger, they participated in an experimental trial where they were given a low-grade hallucinogen, which resulted in them gaining telepathic abilities; Andy can control the minds of others while Vicky can read minds. After their involvement in the experiment, the company was closed down, and everyone connected with the trial mysteriously disappeared. Andy and Vicky managed to escape and now live off the grid using assumed identities.
Charlie is now eight years old, and Vicky and Andy realize they have passed their abilities on to her and her pyrokinesis. The government agency that sponsored the experiment, the Department of Scientific Intelligence (DSI), is operational again under the command of Captain Hollister (Gloria Reuben), who wants to capture Charlie and study her for her own nefarious needs. When Andy and Charlie come home from the movies one night, they find John Rainbird (Michael Greyeyes), a bounty hunter and psychic, standing over her dead body. Charlie goes haywire and unleashes her pyrokinesis, sending John through the back wall. Andy and Charlie escape, but eventually, Andy is caught by the police and returned to DSI. Hollister uses him as bait, trying to lure Charlie in, but when she finally appears, her powers have increased exponentially, and Hollister is about to discover how powerful she is.
A banal script, appalling performances, and incompetent direction plunge “Firestarter” into so-bad-it’s-horrible territory. Seriously, there is not one redeeming aspect throughout its entire 94-minute runtime. And why is Zac Efron even in this? Does he need the work? He gave a better performance in “High School Musical,” and that was sixteen years ago! Characters lack intelligent motivation or incentive and do everything simply because the script needs forward momentum, not because it makes any sense. Andy loves his wife, and Charlie loves her mother, but after her death, they go on the run, and never once does either character ever appear to be heartbroken or mournful; they have apparently moved on with their lives and forgotten about her death.
Hollister is presented as unsympathetic and malevolent, desperately wanting to get her hands on Charlie, but she is killed off before she has a chance to do anything of considerable significance, and that is a shame as she could have made for a terrific antagonist. She gets to spout off some meandering dialogue early on that sets up a potential showdown with Charlie that could have been engaging if the producers had actually followed through with it. Kurtwood Smith appears in two short scenes, and we are led to believe he is going to be one of Charlie’s main adversaries, but he is never heard from again. Director Keith Thomas never once tries to breathe new life into a story that has the potential to be incredible. Instead, we get a film that fails to satisfy on every conceivable level, especially for a movie that labels itself a supernatural horror. Go back and watch the 1984 iteration instead; it’s not perfect, but it’s “Citizen Kane” compared to this disaster.
In Theaters and streaming on Peacock Friday, May 13th
