The TommyknockersDiscographies Movies Reviews
The Tommyknockers is a TV miniseries based on Stephen King's 1987 novel. An alien
spacecraft has been buried beneath the Burning Woods near the small rural New England
community of Haven for millions of years, but has now by chance been unearthed by Bobbi
(Marg Helgenberger) while digging around in the woods behind her house. The structure in
the woods begins to exert a glowing-green influence on the town, causing the people to
invent Rube Goldberg-like gizmos, develop the gift of telepathy, lose their teeth, and
form a hive-mind mentality bent on digging up the ship and revivifying the desiccated
aliens within. Luckily, Bobbi's significant other is an alcoholic poet (Jimmy Smits) who
needs to learn to face his fears. He also has a metal plate in his head that prevents the
hive-minders from reading his thoughts and makes him immune to the neon-green influence of
the aliens. Ultimately, it's up to him to save the day. Although the acting is topnotch,
especially from Smits and Helgenberger, and there are plenty of gooseflesh moments, there
are also enough plot holes here to fuel a very long and enjoyable evening's conversation.
Why do the aliens start in at this time, when they've been causing legends in the woods
for ages? Where does an alien ship buried for ages get all that dry ice? How does the
Smits character make a living as a poet? One suspects that King's fine sense of New
England characterizations is given short shrift here, and that the woods in his mind teem
with more alien thoughts than the TV miniseries form could embody. Welcome appearances by
congenial actors abound, notably Joanna Cassidy, E.G. Marshall and Robert Carradine. And
there's a slutty postal letter-carrier played authentically by Traci Lords. Commentary Odd things begin happening to the inhabitants of a small town when an emanation of unearthly light summons them into the woods one by one. Another chiller from Stephen King. Buy The Movie
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