Um Frio Corpo sem Alma

Corporate exec Miles Creighton (Michael Beck) dies, and is cryogenically frozen in the hopes that he can be revived. Ten years later, the procedure is a success, and Miles returns -- without his soul.

So you have director Wes Craven, writer J. D. Feigelson ("Dark Night of the Scarecrow"), special effects from Stan Winston and an incredible actress with Jill Schoelen. How can you go wrong? One suspects the film is better than generally given credit for, but few have actually seen it in a format that actually allows the full effect of the film to be felt.

There is absolutely terrible DVD quality (both picture and sound) on the Digiview Entertainment version (it appears the film fell into the public domain). Most likely, this version was transferred from a second or third generation VHS. It does not do justice to the film, and if a better version exists, get that one instead.

This 80s film has a very good concept. What if you died and were cryogenically frozen immediately after, then thawed out years later. Would you be "soul-less?" Watch the film to find out.

Some very creepy moments but it's basically a dated 80s TV movie. Why bother releasing a film to DVD if there is no desire to enhance it? To make money I know, but, it's just wrong. The picture quality is awful and that's enough to make you want to shut it off. The "film" could stand a remake with a much broader scope because of it's interesting premise. There are a dime a dozen horror films out there but I don't think this approach to terror has often surfaced. What makes the film all the more relevant is the fact that man-kind could actually come face to face with this issue for real.

Corporate bigshot Miles Creighton (Michael Beck) employs cryogenics to have himself frozen after his untimely demise. Ten years later, something goes awry and Creighton is thawed out prematurely.

Once revived, everything seems normal, until Creighton takes his place as head of the family corporation. Now a ruthless psychopath, no one is safe from his selfish, homicidal mania.

Director Wes Craven works fairly well within the confines of 1980's television. Like his other made-for-TV movies, CHILLER suffers from the limitations of the medium. Craven does his best work in the R-rated film format. Still, this movie is watchable enough with good performances and a decent amount of suspense.

Co-stars Beatrice Straight as Creighton's blissfully ignorant mum, and Paul Sorvino as a preacher who suspects that something isn't quite right...

"Wes Craven's Chiller" is the latest addition to my collection of "Dollar Store DVDs," and at this point I think I'm going to have to seek professional help for this addiction, because I don't know how many more of these sub-par films I can stand before my brain explodes...

Anyway, "Chiller" may have a famous name director, Wes Craven, in the driver's seat (the back of the DVD I bought makes sure to mention that this film is "from the director of Scream and Red Eye!") and an interesting enough premise but the execution suffers due to its made-for-TV origins. It seems that rich old Mrs. Creighton's heart was in the right place when her beloved son Miles fell ill with a terminal disease, and she had him cryogenically frozen at an experimental lab until a cure can be found. Ten years later, Miles' tube malfunctions and he's thawed out a little early; fortunately, medical science has progressed enough that he is successfully revived. UN-fortunately for the rest of the characters, he's a little, um..."different" after his resurrection, though nobody can convince Mama of this for nearly three-quarters of the film's length. The family dog hates him (so it suddenly disappears), his teenage cousin is scared of the way he leers at her while she's swimming in the pool, and when he takes over the family corporation his underlings are shocked at his cut-throat business practices (the scene in which he forces the kindly old senior partner into a fatal heart attack in a stairwell would probably make Gordon Gecko of "Wall Street" proud). Eventually the family's priest (Paul Sorvino, in a mostly thankless role) realizes that while Miles spent a decade between life and death, he lost his soul (cue creepy music) and it's up to Mama to do something about it before more lives are lost. Though "Chiller" is only about 75 minutes long, it feels a LOT longer than that. The few bright spots for me were seeing a young Jill Schoelen (the young scream queen later seen in "The Stepfather," "Popcorn" and Robert Englund's take on "Phantom of the Opera" before she disappeared off the face of the Earth) and the final battle in the walk-in freezer between Miles and Mama Creighton. It should be noted that the DVD I watched (released on the Digiview label as a double feature with a 50s version of Poe's "The Tell Tale Heart") is absolutely god-awful... the picture is grainy and dark, the sound alternates between overly loud or inaudible, and the cheesy synthesized music, which probably sounded creepy in 1985, comes across as dated and annoying now. I was also left with this nagging question... whose soggy, defrosted legs are those that we see at the beginning of the movie, shambling around amongst the cryo-tubes? It's never addressed!!For a buck, "Chiller" was an OK night's entertainment, but truthfully, unless you feel the need to see absolutely everything that Wes Craven has ever had his hands on, I'd say that you could live a long and happy life without bothering with this one. You got it, "Chiller" should've been left in deep freeze where it belongs.

With this endeavour, director Wes Craven will not, in all probability, please many enthusiasts of his other films, the majority of which involve a good deal of violence and bloodletting, but he does a workmanlike job with this account of storage cryogeny which goes awry. Wealthy Marian Creighton (Bernice Straight) has kept her son Miles (Michael Beck) in cryogenic suspension for ten years since his death from a liver disease, and when a computer failure results in his sudden thawing, his mother decides upon immediate liver transplant surgery for him, a procedure not available at the time of his demise. Although this surgery is successful, and Miles resumes his former station as CEO of the family corporation, an issue arises as to how one might know of the possible lack of his spirit, or soul, whereas the other two elements of life, body and mind, have plainly been restored. The destructive behaviour of Miles is such that his mother and her clerical friend Reverend Penny (Paul Sorvino) begin to doubt that they should thank a higher power for delivering Marian's son to her, and a metaphysical inquiry becomes dominant in the film. Beatrice Straight gives, as ever, an excellent performance in her role, Paul Sorvino is tastefully nuanced as the troubled prelate, and Michael Beck obviously savours his part as the fulsome Miles, but Craven cannot seem to distance himself from his cinematic terror bromides, most of which become red herrings for a scenario which largely focusses upon ontology.