Anyone not liking this thoroughly enjoyable tour de force of special effects and superb child acting needs their head examined. She literally burns everything and everyone in the grand scenes. What's not to like? See the clips for yourself online. The director and screenwriter understood the power of excess and entertaining horror elements. Along the lines of the Evil Dead, the creators knew to tell a story with EXCESS- a story of revenge most viewers love: complete and total destruction of bad people.

So, initially, this movie wasn't on my radar at all. But, the trailer happened to be on my YouTube page, so I watched it. And, I couldn't help but see SO MANY similarities between this movie and Stranger Things' Eleven and her storyline. So, I had to watch it, and I did. The major props of Firestarter is mainly its source material, a novel by Stephen King, a horror novel legend. The unique concept of a young girl with powers being hunted and tested by the government is just a really interesting and somewhat possible concept. The synopsis of this movie would have drawn people in. But, the first half of the movie is a slow burn - it kind of meanders and I wish they would have spent more time with the family unit, so the emotional scenes and stakes would have hit harder in general. The second half, though, focuses more on the government side of things, which I enjoyed, gained more empathy and felt tense towards the climatic end for sure. Additionally, it definitely feels like a 80s movie with the synth score, and the pyrotechnics involved were wildly visually cool to look it. Feel free to check it out if you're interested!

The movie should’ve been so good, but it wasn’t. All the brilliant actors in this don’t shine either, and some of the dialogue is just a sharp, long stab in the chest.

Could be better, at this point, with how long this felt, you could just read the book instead

3.25 stars. Good take on a one of Stephen King's earlier horror novels. Extremely young Drew Barrymore is cute & several adult actors do a fine job.

Supernatural and entertaining Stephen king classic

Although I have vaguely fond memories of watching this on HBO as a youth, my revisit with this Steven King adaptation was disappointingly not a happy reunion. Not having read the original source material, I can't comment how faithful this is to the book. However if the screenplay here is indeed close to the novel, this probably isn't one of King's finest tomes. The basic premise is fun and would seemingly have a lot of potential, but it unfortunately takes a predictable route involving government conspiracy and unethical federal agents. But the basic problem is a simple one - once we've seen Barrymore start her first fire, there's not a whole lot of excitement watching her start her 14th fire. There are no thrills or excitement, and we don't care about the titular character, mainly because Barrymore's whiny and often grating performance frankly isn't all that great. Heather Locklear has a small role and achieves the amazing feat of being more convincing dead than alive. And the ending, if you really stop and think about it, is beyond ludicrous. There is some fun seeing a parade of award winning actors making cameo appearances like this was a 70s airport movie, but other than that, I was underwhelmed and bored.

Horror intro, tedious overacted drama middle, and amusingly bad finale that goes on a little too long even at 1.2x speed. 5/10 - Still better than the remake.

If you haven't read the book I'm sure most will enjoy Firestarter!

Acho que o problema neste filme chama-se roteiristas e editores, claro que tudo orquestrado pela direção. Um roteiro enrolado, com uma edição cansativa, tornou um filme um saco de quase 2hs. Os efeitos especiais são bons, exceto aqueles cabelos voando da Charlie. Poderia ser um filme melhor: poderia sim, mas acho que teria que começar do zero escalando outro diretor.

I'd say the RT 38% score is right on. It was … kind of ok. It felt more like I was watching a moderately passable tv show from the early 80's than a big budget movie. I felt like this one and the remake were about equal in quality and watchability. I did quite a bit of messing around on my phone while watching it, while still having a mild interest in what was going to happen.

"We don't need a warrant." "You do unless I woke up in Russia this morning." Okay so the government wants to weaponize the ability to set things on fire with your mind, not the power to make people do whatever you want them to by command. One can be done by a kid with a magnifying glass, the other is essentially magic. One of the many nondescript and unexciting Stephen King adaptations that has been swept under the rug in favor of the handful that work well, Firestarter is literally just a way worse version of Scanners that doesn't even have Cronenberg's sweet effects. Though it features George C. Scott karate-chopping a man to death in his sleep, Firestarter is really a remarkably dull film despite focusing on a superpowered family fleeing from violent government agents. It's billed as a horror but has essentially none, apart from a vague supposed terror of the pyrokinetic powers that are hardly ever shown on screen controlled by a small child; there's so much fear shown toward a character that is talked up far more often than she showcases her ability effectively. There is some solid (likely unintentional) comedy here though, with Scott faking a backstory as a veteran terrified of the dark thanks to torture at the hands of the Viet Cong, only to find that Drew Barrymore's eight-year-old Charlie has no idea what the Vietnam War was. Fun fact, Dino De Laurentiis wanted to purchase the plantation house featured in the film (Orton Plantation, built in 1735, currently on the National Register of Historic Places, and considered among the finest examples of its architectural style) simply so he could burn it down for the film's finale. (1.5/5)

I searched the plot of Stephen King's book, and the 1984 "Firestarter" closer to its source than the 2022 remake, and it's A LOT better. David Keith's performance was not that good, but he's better than Zac Efron on the remake (by the way, Andy McGee was clearly the inspiration for Eleven from "Stranger Things"); Drew Barrymore (yes, that Drew Barrymore) is more charismatic and more actress than Ryan Kiera Armstrong; and Keith's relationship with Heather Locklear has plenty more chemistry than Efron and Sydney Lemmon (they form probably the most tedious couple since "Annabelle"). The "Shop" is a lot more intelligent here than in the 2022 film, Martin Sheen and George C. Scott are genuinely threatening (even having inconsistent personalities), and Art Carney's character (Irv, who is made by John Beasley in the remake) has stronger participation. The third act is absurdly long, I mean, the film seemed to be ending since the 44th minute (it's 114 minutes long). After an event, the film suffers a massive downgrade; until that, it was pretty good, but after that, I was taken by boredom. At least the climax is epic and the ending was quite heartwarming.

I liked the special effects and score the ending was the best especially with the score at the end

Horrible plot. Rotten.

Its not bad compare to the movies that are made today. almost no CGI, actual sets, locations, everything real.

Probably would have been more appreciated if Carrie was never made. The remake makes this movie look like a masterpiece. No really, it does. Especially since there's no scenes of a cat set on fire.

i watched this after seeing the remake & maybe its bias, but i did prefer the remake version over this one. the beginning of this one was trying to cram a LOT of information/backstory in a very short amount of time (via flashbacks) which just felt rushed to me - i never really connected with the father or the little girl which made the rest of the plot line just sort of "meh" for me. it's definitely a decent watch though - i wonder if i had seen this one first if my opinion would be different.

One of the best movies of all time. Much better than the recent remake of it.

An interesting story that was stretched beyond its run time and was not given the opportunity to reach its full potential.