Vengeance diabolique

Another adaptation from the Stephen King staple, but this small story is given a little more weight and probably from that gets a little too bogged down and brightly overwrought. Making it somewhat irregular in tone, mainly around the jaded flashback sequences that always inter-cut the present time. Although atmospheric (those sounds we hear which are not there) and unpleasant in parts, it could have been a much darker journey than it was. Still what we got were some solid performances, creepy imagery of our demonic thugs and their done-up car, well placed suspense and a gripping little tale of history repeating itself, but with our protagonist trying everything to make sure it doesn't. A man and his family head back to his hometown for a teaching job, but are still haunted by the childhood death of his older brother caused by a teenage gang who died at the same time in a train accident. But then the heartache comes flooding back when he is harassed in and out of the classroom by the demonic teenagers that killed his brother wanting revenge for their deaths. The plot actually at first plays around with the idea that maybe it's all in the protagonist's weary mind after the first death, but soon enough that's psychological angle is shot down when the first dead teenager makes a classroom appearance. There the tension, while basic gradually builds up as Matheson's character goes toe to toe with the vengeful dead while no one around him believes him. Robert Rusler is truly menacing as the hot-headed leader and Nicolas Sadler is devilishly sly as one of the members. In their decayed make-up, it was a ghastly sight. Tim Matheson's tormented turn is very well pitched, as he battles past events and reality as the two come together in a nightmarish ordeal. Brooke Adams' is affably good and William Sanderson also shows up a minor part. Director Tom McLaughlin (who was behind other horror efforts "One Dark Night" and "Friday the 13th Part 6") gets the most out of this TV production, as while it looks cheap and it could have been much tauter it has some stylish touches, lyrical camera-work and a hankering for numerous slow motion reactions.

"I can't keep running."

The film Sometimes They Come Back explores the proposition that if you got a big enough grudge against someone, especially if they helped aid your leaving this mortal coil rather abruptly, you can come back for payback. Doesn't matter if you've been good or if you've been bad and these three were definitely bad.

Tim Matheson comes back to his hometown with wife Brooke Adams and their son Robert Hy Gorman for a teaching job at the local high school. Tim's got some anger management issues which is why he left the last school he taught at in Chicago. He's got no great attachments to his hometown with his parents gone and his older brother killed back in 1963.

That's what this story is all about. He and his brother were stopped by some hoods in a train tunnel and the brother killed, but so were three of the hoods when young Matheson played by Zachary Ball stole their car keys as he ran. It's these three who kill three of Matheson's students with him having some peripheral involvement even if its premonitions and take their place. The three hoods from hell are malevolently played by Robert Rusler, Bentley Mitchum, and Nicholas Sadler. All transfered from Milford, Milford Cemetery that is.

Tim Matheson and the rest of the cast give good performances in this film adapted from a Stephen King short story. Fans of Stephen King and the horror genre should really like this one.

Along with his wife and son, a man reluctantly returns to his hometown years later to take a teaching job. It isn't long before ghosts from his past come back to haunt him and do much worse. Tom McLoughlin, director of the most overrated film in the "Friday the 13th" franchise, directed this made for TV adaptation of the Stephen King short story.

Tim Matheson stars as the man tortured by memories of his brother's death and the men responsible. The film is strong on mood, successfully bringing to life that sense of time, place and small town atmosphere that King's stories thrive on. The film's best quality is it's villains. Robert Rusler is particularly intimidating as leather-clad gang leader, Lawson. The scene where Matheson first sees him again, posing as a student in his class, makes for a potent moment. Another great scene takes place in the gang's phantom car as they show their true forms to a jock victim.

Unfortunately, the film doesn't keep it's momentum going as we head toward the finale. The climax is a bit of a mess, and the ending gets overly schmaltzy. The ending to King's original tale would have worked a lot better than what we get here. As it is, this is worth seeing for the villains and overall mood, but it's definitely flawed. Brooke Adams doesn't get a lot to do as Matheson's wife.

An interesting ghost story about Jim Norman and his older brother Wayne. Both of the young boys were touted by a group of older boys, greasers if you will. These greasers ended up stabbing Wayne in a train track tunnel one day, a train came and during the madness all were killed except Jim and one of the greasers - both got away safely. Years later Jim ended up married with a young boy of his own and became a school teacher. They moved back to Jim's hometown where his older brother and the greasers were killed. Now the the vengeful greaser ghosts are wanting Jim dead - they will stop at nothing.

Not a bad film. These are a gang of evil vengeful spirits, just as nasty and no good as they were when they were alive. They can manifest themselves, materialize, into solid matter. They seem to be seen by others only when they want to be seen and they seem to have the ability to chose who sees them.

6/10

Returning to his home-town, a teacher and his family find that the traumatic incident involving his big brother while he was growing up has caused the greaser-gang also included in the event to come back and torment them forcing a final showdown to right the wrong.

This one here wasn't all that bad even though it does have some issues. One of the film's biggest positives is the fact that this one really manages to get the fear of being involved in a traumatic incident from the past in a small-town. The fact that the initial accident itself feels like the kind of accident that really could happen in such a location, with the greaser gang tormenting them and then getting caught up in the train coming through the tunnel does come off like a rather enjoyable setup for later, and with the way this holds up the different incidents later on that trigger the incidents later on. From the dropped set of car-keys to the shoes and the kids coming one-by-one into the classroom, the set-up from these incidents plays a great part in how this one manages to come off when it starts to reveal what their actual purpose is for returning. Those are quite fun as the different variations of them appearing as students in his classroom while taunting him in the town, the ways in which they manage to fool everyone in class as well as the town who constantly think he's having mental breakdowns based on his past history which comes into play quite nicely and overall manages to give this one a great build-up for the story to play out in the later half. With the group out and tormenting him and his family with some rather impressive stalking scenes of the family at the house and the later scene in the church where they get taken away leading into the final confrontation in the tunnel once again as this makes for a rather thrilling and engaging finish that plays out the fateful accident that came through in the rest of the film. With these action-packed scenes that come together into giving this a lot to like alongside the few fine make-up effects on the ghouls who look quite creepy and chilling, there's enough to like here that really manages to hold off the few minor flaws present. The film's biggest issue is the fact that we're not given a reason to care about why the greaser club is seeking revenge, as the film makes the point of them coming back for him killing them only they deserved their fate so it's really troubling to get into the story. The gang is a total joke that simply act like tough-guy greasers but are just so over-the-top in their silly threats that it makes for a pretty hard time to find fear in them for the whole film as they're return doesn't make any sense. The other big issue here does manage to carry on about that with there not being any real reason stated about why they come back to begin with as there's just nothing explained about why they come back to life here at that point in time. By simply showing up saying they want revenge but never explaining how they manage to do so when they clearly never deserved to do so in the first place makes them so simply non-threatening that as a whole the film really stumbles with the main villains. That it also gets a little too schmaltzy with the fantasy-driven finale that looks quite goofy and silly against the more realistic elements, these here do hold it down somewhat.

Rated R: Language and Violence.