Stephen King's Sometimes They Come Back

Stars: Tim Matheson (Drop Dead Fred, Fletch, Animal House), Brooke Adams (Days of Heaven, The Dead Zone, The Unborn), Robert Rusler (A Nightmare on Elm Street II, Vamp). Based on a Stephen King short story, this tame but effective thriller stars Tim Matheson as Jim Norman. Returning to his old hometown after a twenty-year absence to take a teaching job at the high school, Jim runs into some folk he thought he'd never see again: the kids who killed his brother. Only problem is that those kids died twenty years ago when Jim grabbed their car keys and the immobile car was struck by a train in a tunnel. As one after another of Jim's pupils turn up dead, one of the kids who killed his brother takes the empty seat in class. Of course, Jim can't very well go to the authorities or even his wife with the truth. What makes Sometimes They Come Back work is the same thing that makes the best Stephen King stories work in the first place: a keen understanding of the society of children and a good narrative sense. He's told the schoolyard bully story umpty-ump times, but it plays because it's a facet of human nature that we all recognize and--as long as there's a decent amount of tension--we're going to hang around and see good triumph over evil. Audience: Stephen King fans. But keep in mind this is basically a "PG" movie with a mystifying "R" rating. (R. Pitman)[DVD Review—Oct. 2, 2007—MGM, 98 min., R, $14.98—Making its second appearance on DVD, 1991's Sometimes They Come Back sports a so-so transfer with no DVD extras. Bottom line: a disappointing release of a solid Stephen King adaptation.]