Cat's Eye (film) This was a real winner in the 80's

Retro Fun Awesomeness! I remember watching this movie many times when I was a kid thanks to the spoiled brat kid that lived across the street from us whose parents would buy him whatever it took to make him stop being a pain in the ass. They had a Betamax collection of films that stretched across the entire living room wall so going over to his house was a real treat. His Dad also had an orange Corvette, which today seems a lot less cool than it did in the 80's.

Anyway, moving on.... to Cat's Eye!

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This one was a collection of stories all written by Steven King and 2 of the stories are somewhat related and are witnessed by (as the name would suggest) a cat.

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The first story involves Dick Morrison (James Woods) who has gone to a radical new program to assist people in quitting smoking. The company basically stalks you and does terrible things to you and your family if they ever catch you smoking. haha! This would definitely be effective for most people and while it does have some elements of horror, mostly it is just great comedy.

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The second story called "The Ledge" sees Morrison (again, James Woods) in a situation where he is forced to circumnavigate a penthouse apartment from the ledge outside. I do not remember why he had to do this but it doesn't matter.

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Again, this isn't really horror so much as it is dread playing on a very common fear of heights. It does a good job considering the time period and the relatively small budget of only $7 million. I wonder how much of that went to James Woods. The cat, as in the previous story, has very little to do with the story other than being the reason why we are there to watch it.

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The 3rd story is the best one of the 3 and this time the Cat actually plays an active role. It also features Drew Barrymore in one of my favorite roles I have seen her be involved in.

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Amanda (Drew Barrymore)'s family takes in a stray cat, who they name "General." However, they insist the cat stay outside at night which is unfortunate because Amanda is actually stalked by a small troll at night that is living in the walls (this is very common in North Carolina)

This trailer pretty much embodies every trailer that existed in the 80's as it seems that nearly every trailer had the same guy doing the narration. Obviously, since this movie was made nearly 35 years ago, it isn't going to stand up to today's standards. However, it was a great example of what the industry was capable of back at that time and you also need to understand that pretty much anything Stephen King did got made into a movie back then.

This movie is probably not considered great, but it was pretty special to me because it was right on the threshold of what I was allowed to watch at that point in my life. Drew Barrymore got nominated for Young Artist Award for Best Starring Performance by a Young Actress because of this movie. I think she was much better as a child actress than as an adult... but maybe that is just me.

Personally I wish that more studios would make anthology films. This is one of the first ones I remember seeing.

especially considering the time-period