Stars: Christopher Walken, Brooke Adams, Tom Skerritt, Herbert Lom, Martin Sheen, Anthony Zerbe, Colleen Dewhurst, Jackie Burroughs, Nicholas Campbell, Roberta Weiss, Geza Kovacs

Director: David Cronenberg

Summary: Based on a Stephen King novel 'The Dead Zone' tells of a man who emerges from a five year coma to find he has developed psychic powers to 'see' past and future events.

David Cronenberg's first foray into mainstream filmmaking is also one of his most satisfying pictures. Adapted from a Stephen King novel, the movie stars Christopher Walken as Johnny, a man who has been in a coma for five years and wakes up to find that he can tell a person's fate just by touching them. Realising that he can change the future as well, Johnny soon intervenes in a number of would-be tragedies. Consequently, he soon becomes famous for his gift, but he longs for his former life, when he still had his job, his fiancee, and a normal life. However, when he shakes hands with a future president of the United States (Martin Sheen, in a wonderfully hammy performance) who could end up being the biggest mass murderer since Hitler, Johnny wrestles with what seems to be his destiny. Walken's bravura performance forms the soul of this excellent and touching thriller.

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One of the very best Stephen King film adaptations, The Dead Zoneis imbued with an ever-present atmosphere of dread. Shot in a permanently wintry Canada (standing in for New England), the icy backdrops are subtly employed by director David Cronenberg to accentuate the story's fatalistic tone. Cronenberg's welcome emphasis for the most part on psychological terror over physical shocks (something of a change of direction for him after The Broodand Scanners) is further enhanced by composer Michael Kamen's marvellously chilly music score and Christopher Walken's understated yet dominating central performance as high school teacher Johnny Smith, who wakes from a coma following a car crash to learn that he has been cursed with the gift of second sight. That his uncanny ability is indeed a curse and definitely not a blessing is made abundantly clear: even when Johnny is able to save people's lives, there is always a price to pay. The cosmic law of Karma is grimly unforgiving. Herbert Lom, as Johnny's sympathetic doctor, sums up the character's plight, "Some things just weren't meant to be." And even when Johnny learns the terrible secret of future Presidential candidate Greg Stillson (a villainous Martin Sheen), he knows he cannot act without accepting the fatal consequences. Brooke Adams, as the love of Johnny's life, and Tom Skerrit, as the quietly desperate sheriff on the trail of a serial killer, are excellent in support.

On the DVD:this disc comes with a chunky accompanying booklet with background notes on the film, cast and director, as well as a script excerpt for the originally planned pre-credits sequence (in the finished film we assume Johnny's second sight is a result of the car accident--this earlier screenplay follows the book more closely). The movie itself--which features the "scissor-suicide" scene uncut--is accompanied by a chatty and informative commentary from film critics Stephen Jones and Kim Newman (a regular Amazon.co.uk contributor). Both the 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen picture and the Dolby 5.1 sound are adequate if unexceptional. --Mark Walker

Aspect Ratio:	1.85 Anamorphic Wide Screen
Main Language:	English
Region:	Region 0
Special Features:	Audio Commentary, Original Theatrical Trailer, Animated Menu Sequence, Booklet With Liner Notes And International Poster Gallery
Subtitles:	English, French, Spanish
Year:	1983
Release Date:	March 4, 2002
Runtime:	103 minutes
Certification:
Catalogue Number:	S D E 3015
Keywords:	Special, Dead, General, Edition, Zone, Wide, Screen, Stephen, Horror, Occult, Sci, Fi, King's
Genre:	Horror/Occult