Stephen Kings Katzenauge (Blu-ray)

Cat's Eye was released in 1985, one year after Firestarter. Both are based on Stephen King stories and both star Drew Barrymore. The difference is that Cat's Eye is not based on a novel, but rather three short stories, two of which were published previously in the short story collection Night Shift. Another difference is that for Cat's Eye King wrote the screenplay himself and added a new story, General, to the two existing stories. The film is beautifully shot by renowned cinematographer Jack Cardiff who worked on classics like The African Queen, The Red Shoes and Death on the Nile, but also '80s action films like Conan the Destoyer and Rambo: First Blood Part 2, and who won an Oscar for Black Narcissus. The music is a striking early soundtrack from Alan Silvestri who did the classic soundtrack of Back to the Future next and went on to score many commercial Hollywood productions. In terms of acting there is a lot of talent involved, but James Woods pretty much steals the show as a man who becomes increasingly paranoid after he visits a shady company that is dedicated to help people stop smoking. All the stories have a humorous approach while not becoming as overly cartoonish as King's other anthology film Creepshow. The stories are linked by segments of a cat travelling through the USA on its way to Barrymore's character. The extras this edition includes will give you a new appreciation of the efforts that went into making the film, like in the second story, The Ledge, all the details of the city in the background are actually scale models built in the studio. And in the final episode, General, the opposite happened, as everything on set was actually built oversized to give the impression of a small troll invading a girl's bedroom. There are great extras about the training of the animals and memories about the filming from one of the actors of the second story. Also there is an interesting audiocommentary by director Lewis Teague, who also directed another Stephen King film which involved working with animals, Cujo. Overall this is a wonderful release, beautifully packaged and recommended to fans of King and short horror stories. And co-produced by Milton Subotsky, formerly of British Amicus Productions, it continues his dedication to the tradition of great horror anthology films.