Michael Greyeyes Archives

Review: ‘Firestarter’ (2022), starring Zac Efron, Ryan Kiera Armstrong, Sydney Lemmon, Kurtwood Smith, John Beasley, Michael Greyeyes and Gloria Reuben

May 12, 2022

by Carla Hay

Zac Efron and Ryan Kiera Armstrong in “Firestarter” (Photo by Ken Woroner/Universal Pictures)

“Firestarter” (2022)

Directed by Keith Thomas

Culture Representation: Taking place mostly in Lewiston, New York, the horror film “Firestarter” features a cast of predominantly white characters (with some African Americans, Latinos and one Native American) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: A psychic father goes on the run with his 11-year-daughter, who has the deadly ability to start fires through her mind power, and they are fugitives of the U.S. government and law enforcement.

Culture Audience: “Firestarter” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of star Zac Efron and the Stephen King novel on which the movie is based, but the movie is another failed attempt to do justice to the book.

Michael Greyeyes in “Firestarter” (Photo by Ken Woroner/Universal Pictures)

The 1984 and 2022 versions of “Firestarter” are both awful horror movies for different reasons. The 2022 version has better acting than the 1984 version, but the screenplay is worse. It’s a dull, incoherent mess with the last 15 minutes as the most heinous. The 2022 edition of “Firestarter” is from the horror-oriented Blumhouse Productions, which has a “hit and miss” track record, when it comes to putting out quality films. The same can be said of any movie adapted from a Stephen King novel or short story. “Firestarter” is based on King’s 1980 novel of the same name.

Directed by Keith Thomas and written by Scott Teems, the 2022 version of “Firestarter” should get a little credit for not being a copycat of the 1984 version. But that’s not saying much when the 2022 version is a tedious remake that takes too long to get to the “fugitives on the run” aspect of the story that was shown right away in the 1984 version of “Firestarter.” The first two-thirds of the 2002 movie are bogged down with a lot of repetitive scenes that don’t effectively further the story and in fact stall it on very monotonous levels. And the ending of the 2022 “Firestarter” movie is drastically different than the ending of both the book and the 1984 movie.

And even worse: The title character in the 2022 version of “Firestarter” goes from being a compassionate child to being a ruthless killer during a certain part of the movie. It’s a huge change in personality that looks very phony and hard to believe. People watching “Firestarter” already know that this girl has the ability to kill people with her fire-starting powers. But when she starts killing for reasons that aren’t really justified (and one of her murders is particularly shocking and despicable), it’s going to be a problem for a lot of audience members to see an 11-year-old child depicted in a way that doesn’t stay true to the book or the 1984 movie.

In both movies, a father named Andy McGee and his pre-teen daughter Charlene “Charlie” McGee are being hunted by the U.S. government because they both have unusual abilities as the result of a top-secret experiments that the father underwent when he was a college student. The research was being conducted in a lab by a mysterious government agency called The Shop, which administered a psychedelic drug called Lot 6 to the research participants, who were usually young people desperate for money. Andy met his future wife Vicky (the mother of Charlie) during these experiments.

As a result of these experiments, Andy developed psychic abilities where he could exert control over other people’s minds. Vicky also developed psychic abilities too, but not to the extent that she had mind control powers. Meanwhile, Charlie’s psychic powers came with the ability to start fires with her mind. She’s most likely to start fires when she’s angry or afraid.

Both movies also have a scene where Charlie gets angry at her mother and accidentally sets her mother’s hands on fire. And both movies show that when Charlie starts to get worked up, the temperature rises considerably wherever she’s at, and people start to sweat as a result. Charlie has to be trained to control her fire-starting abilities, but any training she gets isn’t enough. Meanwhile, Andy’s psychic abilities put a strain on his mind, which has internal hemorrhaging every time he uses his abilities, resulting in blood coming out of his eyes.

Back when Syfy was called the Sci-Fi Channel, it had a 2002 miniseries called “Firestarter 2: Rekindled,” which was about Charlie as an adult. This low-quality sequel series is not essential viewing along with any “Firestarter” movie. In fact, it’s not essential viewing for anyone who likes good entertainment.

In the 1984 “Firestarter” movie, Vicky is already dead, but she is seen in flashbacks. In the 1984 version of “Firestarter” (directed by Mark L. Lester and written by Stanley Mann), the McGee family was played by Drew Barrymore as Charlie, David Keith as Andy, and Heather Locklear as Vicky. It’s a very sloppily edited film with terrible dialogue and campy theatrics, including over-acting by Keith and co-stars such as Martin Sheen and George C. Scott.

In the 2022 “Firestarter” movie, a lot of screen time (about half of the movie) is taken up showing Andy (played by Zac Efron) and Vicky (played by Sydney Lemmon) raising 11-year-old Charlie (Ryan Kiera Armstrong) in Lewiston, New York. (The movie was actually filmed in the Canadian city of Hamilton, Ontario.) Both parents have very different opinions on how to handle Charlie’s fire-starting abilities. Vicky strongly believes that they should train Charlie to control these abilities. Andy disagrees.

“We have to protect her,” Andy tells Vicky, who replies: “Training is protecting.” There’s cause for concern, because Charlie has told them that, after a three-year hiatus, her “bad thing” has started to come back. “Something feels weird. My body.” And she says it’s not puberty.

The experiments that Andy and Vicky underwent in collage are breezed through in an opening-credits montage that shows quick flashbacks and voiceovers. These experiments were led by Dr. Joseph Wanless (played by Kurtwood Smith), who is seen later in the movie in a scene that doesn’t have very good placement in the story. The U.S. government has been looking for people who underwent these experiments to possibly use their superpowers as weapons of mass destruction.

The first half of the 2022 version of “Firestarter” has a lot of monotonous scenes of Andy, Vicky and Charlie at home, work or school. Andy’s backstory is briefly explained in the experiments montage, where he tells Dr. Wanless in an interview that he was orphaned at the age of 7 years old because his parents died in a car accident. When Andy is asked if he’s ever had an authentic psychic experience, he reveals that he had a premonition about this fatal car accident a week before it happened. The movie doesn’t bother to reveal anything about Vicky’s family background.

Andy works as a life coach/therapist, where he puts people through hypnosis/mind control to solve whatever personal problem they want to be solved There’s an unnecessary scene that shows Andy doing just that in a session with a client named Darla Gurney (played by Hannan Younis), who wants to quit smoking. Apparently, Andy and Vicky never thought about Andy controlling Charlie’s mind to brainwash her into not starting fires. Maybe Charlie is immune to this kind of mind control, but the movie never says so either way.

The 2022 version of “Firestarter” also spends considerable time showing Charlie in school, which is something that the 1984 “Firestarter” movie didn’t waste time showing. Charlie (who is a quiet and introverted student) is harassed in school by a bully named Gavin (played by Gavin Maciver-Wright), who picks on Charlie because he thinks she and her family are weird. For example, Gavin taunts Charlie because her parents won’t let her use the Internet.

Charlie’s teacher Ms. Gardner (played by Tina Jung) gently suggests to Charlie that Charlie can use the Internet at school to help her with her homework, but Charlie says that her mother has told her that using computers for extended periods of time can cause health problems. Later at home, Charlie pleads with her mother to get Internet access in their home.

Vicky is firm with her response: “That stuff rots your brains. We can’t afford it right now.” Charlie later finds out the real reason why her parents don’t want to have Internet access or computers: They think it will make the U.S. government easier to track them and spy on them.

In a scene that takes place in a school gym, the kids are playing dodgeball, and Gavin cruelly throws the ball at the back of Charlie’s head. The throw is hard enough to definitely hurt Charlie, who runs away and hides in a school restroom. Gavin calls Charlie a “loser” and sneers, “Yeah, run away, you freak!”

Ms. Gardner is the teacher on duty, so she follows Charlie in the restroom and is shocked to see the restroom filled with smoke. And as soon as she walks in, Ms. Gardner sees a closed restroom stall have its door blown wide open, as if an explosion was set off in the stall. The teacher sees Charlie come out of the stall, so Charlie gets in trouble for the damage.

The police are called to investigate. Charlie’s parents try to smooth things over and insist that Charlie did not set off an explosive device, but they can’t say the real reason why the restroom stall exploded. When the parents are at home, Andy has this to say about this explosive incident: “Our cover’s been blown.” Andy knows it’s only a matter of time before The Shop finds out about Charlie.

And he’s right. The McGee family gets on the radar of an official from The Shop named Captain June Hollister (played by Gloria Reuben), who sets a plan in motion to capture Andy and Charlie. She contacts an embittered war veteran named Rainbird (played by Michael Greyeyes) to enlist him as a hired mercenary. His mission is to find Andy and Charlie and bring them in for research. Captain Hollister insists that unlike previous mercenary jobs that Rainbird has done for the U.S. government, this quarry (Charlie and Andy) must be brought back alive.

The movie hints that Rainbird has been mistreated by the government, so Captain Hollister tries to appeal to him, by saying that his mistreatment came from “the old guard … I’m the new [guard].” Rainbird also drops a big hint about his own personal experiences with government experiments: “Before they tested their poison on pretty young co-eds, they had to use the lab rats.”

The Rainbird character was also in the “Firestarter” book, but he was not the main pursuer in the 1984 “Firestarter” movie. Instead, 1984’s “Firestarter” had a bunch of nameless government agents (all men, usually in business suits) in physical pursuit of Andy and Charlie, while Rainbird (played by Scott) makes his move much later in the story. In the 2022 “Firestarter” movie, it looks completely unrealistic that Rainbird is the lone person (without any real backup) looking for Andy and Charlie. If Andy and Charlie are so important to The Shop, there should be teams of trained professionals who go out looking for these two people with dangerous psychic abilities.

At any rate, Rainbird breaks into the McGee home, which results in Andy and Charlie escaping and going on the run without Vicky, whose fate is shown in this home invasion scene. Both “Firestarter” movies have a scene of Andy and Charlie temporarily hiding at a rural farm home. In the 2022 version of “Firestarter,” this hideout scenario happens when fugitives Andy and Charlie get a truck ride from a stranger named Irv Manders (played by John Beasley), who ends up inviting Andy and Charlie into his farm home for a temporary place to stay.

Not all of Charlie’s victims are human. After Charlie and Andy go on the run, there’s a scene where Charlie sees a stray cat and tries to pet it, but the cat scratches her out of fear. This unlucky feline then gets scorched to death.

When Charlie and Andy bury the cat and pray over this makeshift grave, Andy seems more concerned about the cat than the fact that Vicky is no longer with them. Vicky seems almost like an afterthought in this prayer scene, when Charlie says offhandedly toward the end of the prayer: “And bless mommy too,” as a reminder to Andy that they shouldn’t just be praying about the dead cat.

One of the most unrealistic aspects of the 2022 version of “Firestarter” is that when people get burned by Charlie’s fire, they almost never scream out in pain. It’s an odd choice to not have this type of screaming in a horror movie. There are also unrealistic scenes where Charlie should be burned by all the flames or overcome by all the smoke in a blazing room, but she’s not.

Most of Charlie’s freakout fire blazes don’t happen until the last third of the movie, but hardly anything in this boring sludge of a story is scary. The acting in the 1984 “Firestarter” movie was very over-the-top, and it was bad in a “train wreck” type of way. In comparison, the acting in the 2022 “Firestarter” movie is a little more professional and polished, but much of it is too restrained and often downright lackluster, especially from Efron, who is never convincing as a grieving husband.

Charlie goes from being a meek child who’s scared of her fire-starting powers for most of the movie to a sudden transformation into a rampaging, cold-blooded serial killer. It’s a jarring and extreme change that makes Charlie look like she’s got a personality disorder too. The ending of the 2022 version of “Firestarter” is what really makes it irredeemable, because it’s just mindless mayhem that tries to overcompensate for the lack of scares in most of this disjointed, bland and misguided movie.

Universal Pictures will release “Firestarter” in U.S. cinemas and on Peacock on May 13, 2022.

Review: ‘Wild Indian,’ starring Michael Greyeyes, Chaske Spencer, Kate Bosworth and Jesse Eisenberg

October 5, 2021

by Carla Hay

“Wild Indian”

Directed by Lyle Mitchell Corbine Jr.

Culture Representation: Taking place in a California and in an unnamed U.S. state, the dramatic film “Wild Indian” features a Native American and white cast of characters (with a few African Americans and Latinos) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: Two male cousins of Ojibwe Indian heritage have conflicts with each other over a murder they covered up when they were teenagers more than 30 years earlier.

Culture Audience: “Wild Indian” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in watching dramatic thrillers about sociopaths where the stories don’t offer easy answers.

Phoenix Wilson (pictured at right) in “Wild Indian” (Photo courtesy of Vertical Entertainment)

“Wild Indian” isn’t going to win any awards for groundbreaking portrayals of Native Americans. However, it’s a suspenseful drama about how two cousins in their 40s have very different views of how to handle the murder cover-up that they participated in when they were teenagers. Taking into account that there are very few American-made feature films with Native Americans comprising at least half of the principal cast members (including the lead actor), “Wild Indian” is notable for having this representation on screen.

The movie won’t satisfy people who are looking for a more definitive ending to the story. However, “Wild Indian” is an astute observation of how race and class play roles in how people are treated by the criminal justice system. This observation might be too realistic for some people’s comfort.

Written and directed by Lyle Mitchell Corbine Jr., “Wild Indian” tells the story of two Native American cousins from the Ojibwe tribe and how their lives took two very different paths after they decided to keep a dark secret: When they were teenagers, one of the cousins shot and killed another teenage boy in a cold-blooded manner, and he convinced his cousin to help him cover up the crime. The cousin who became an accomplice to murder has been wracked with guilt ever since. The cousin who pulled the trigger has no guilt and would do anything to keep this crime a secret.

If viewers have a problem with Native Americans being portrayed as criminals in this movie, it’s worth noting that “Wild Indian” writer/director Corbine is also from the Ojibwe tribe. “Wild Indian” is his feature-film directorial debut. Corbine’s “Wild Indian” depiction of Native American culture is less about negative stereotypes and more about socioeconomic effects on Native Americans. The movie confronts the very real issues of how Native Americans are treated by American society can depend largely on how well a Native American assimilates into places dominated by white people.

“Wild Indian” shows two parts of the lives of cousins Makwa Giizheg and Teddo: when they are in their early teens in 1985, and when they are in their late-40s in 2019. The actors portraying the two cousins are Phoenix Wilson as young Makwa, Julian Gopal as young Teddo, Michael Greyeyes as adult Makwa and Michael Chaske as adult Teddo. The movie is told from Makwa’s perspective.

As children, Makwa and Teddo (who are about 13 or 14 years old in 1985) live in the same unnamed city in an unnamed U.S. state. (“Wild Indian” was actually filmed in Oklahoma and California.) Makwa, who is an only child, goes to a Catholic school, where he is doing well academically, but he’s an introverted loner. His life at home is very troubled: His mechanic father Darren Giizheg (played by Elisha Pratt) is an alcoholic who is verbally and physically abusive to Makwa. Makwa’s mother Ivy (played by Happy Frejo), who also has a drinking problem, doesn’t do anything to stop the abuse.

Makwa and Teddo go to the same school, where Teddo has a secret crush on a fellow student named Alyse (played by Lauren Newsham), who is pretty and popular. Makwa is too shy to approach Alyse not just because he feels like a social outcast who comes from a troubled family, but also because of underlying, unspoken issues about race. Alyse is white, and so is James Wolf (played by Colton Knaus), the student who has started dating Alyse.

Not surprisingly, Makwa is jealous of James, but Makwa keeps those feelings to himself. At home, Makwa has to try to avoid getting beaten up by his father, who will fly into rages for no good reason. During one of these abuse incidents, Darren physically assaults Makwa and shouts at Makwa: “I don’t want you in the house!” And so, Makwa has to find another place to stay for the night.

The movie doesn’t really show Teddo’s home life when Teddo was a teenager. However, it’s implied that when things get rough in Makwa’s household, he can find refuge in Teddo’s household. Needless to say, Teddo is Makwa’s closest companion. Teddo is the one who teaches Makwa how to shoot a rifle.

Makwa gets injuries from the physical abuse, and some of those injuries (such as a black eye and bruises) are difficult to hide. At school, Makwa is called into the office of the school principal, a caring priest named Father Daniels (played by Scott Haze), who tactfully tries to find out if Makwa is being abused at home. Father Daniels asks Makwa how he got the bruises.

Makwa is sullen and abrupt when he replies, “I was running and I fell. Can I go now?” Father Daniels then asks Makwa about Makwa’s parents: “Do they drink often?” It’s a sore subject for Makwa, who cuts the conversation short. Makwa tells Father Daniels that he’s doing well academically, so there’s no reason for him to be in the principal’s office. It’s the first indication that Makwa has a side to him that’s willing to defy authority and deny there’s a problem to anyone who might want to help him.

In their free time, Makwa and Teddo like to go into the woods to shoot things, such as discarded items, for target practice. They use a rifle owned by Teddo’s father. And one day in the woods during target practice, when Teddo is a few dozen yards away, Makwa happens to see his rival James by himself. Makwa takes aim and coldly murders James.

Teddo hears the gunshot and goes over to see what Makwa as shooting at, and he’s shocked to se James’ dead body. Whle Teddo is panicking and says they should call an ambulance or the police, Makwa convinces Teddo not to tell anyone because he says that they will both get in trouble. Instead, Makwa convinces Teddo to help him bury James in the woods. It’s a secret that they will carry for the next 34 years.

Before the movie fast-forwards to 2019, there’s a very telling scene that shows that Makwa isn’t a misunderstood child who made a horrible mistake. After another vicious fight with his father, Makwa bites his father’s hand, and then runs outside to the woods, where Makwa finds the spot where James’ body iss buried, and he urinates on this makeshift grave. It’s at this point that viewers know what Makwa is a sociopath with no remorse for the murder he committed.

In 2019, Makwa is a successful business executive at an unnamed corporate job in California. The type of business he does isn’t fully described in the movie, but it’s a company where Makwa has to interact with important clients. Some of these clients like to play golf, so Makwa is shown playing golf as a way to be in a better position to network with clients or potential clients.

And there’s something else about Makwa’s reinvention as a successful executive who’s on the rise at his company: He’s changed his name from Makwa Giizheg to Michael Peterson. Michael is also married to an attractive blonde named Greta (played by Kate Bosworth), and they have a son named Michael Jr., who’s about 2 years old. Greta does not know about Michael’s past, including his former name.

Michael and Greta have an upper-middle-class lifestyle somewhere in the Los Angeles area. She works in human resources and isn’t very enthusiastic about her career choice. it’s why when Greta finds out that she’s pregnant, she tells Michael that she wants to take a leave of absence from her job. Michael doesn’t seem very happy that Greta is pregnant with their second child, since this second child was unplanned. Viewers will soon see that Makwa/Michael is not only a sociopath, but he’s also a control freak.

Whatever attempts that Makwa/Michael made to assimilate into his predominantly white environment, he still gets reminders that he’s a person of color. At his job, a white co-worker named Jerry (played by Jesse Eisenberg) seems to genuinely like Michael and is rooting for his success. But when Jerry talks about Michael being a top candidate to be promoted into an open position, he mentions Michael being Native American as something that will make the company look progressive. It’s a casually racist remark that implies that Michael’s race can be used as a trendy gimmick instead of Michael being qualified for the promotion, solely based on his skills and experience.

Meanwhile, as Makwa/Michael has made a life for himself as an “upstanding citizen” who’s living “The American Dream,” Teddo has spent 12 of the past 34 years years in and out of prison. He spent 10 years in prison for drug dealing. He’s also been incarcerated for drug possession and assault and battery.

In 2019, Teddo (who is a a bachelor with no children) has been released from prison and is trying to get his life back on track. He’s moved back into his family home, where he lives with his sister Cammy (played by Lisa Cromarty), who is the single mother of a 5-year-old son named Daniel (played by Hilario “Tres” Garcia III), who is very shy. Since Teddo’s parents aren’t mentioned at this point in the story, it’s implied that they are dead.

Teddo has a much bigger problem than difficulty finding a job because he’s an ex-felon. His conscience has been weighing heavily on him because of the secret that he and Makwa have been keeping. The two cousins have not seen or spoken to each other in years, but Teddo decides he’s going to track down Makwa and confront him about this dark secret. Teddo also reaches out to Lisa Wolf (played by Sheri Foster), the mother of James. (Jennifer Rader portrays Lisa in the scenes that take place in 1985.)

There are some other things that happen in the movie that should be surprises but unfortunately are revealed in the “Wild Indian” trailer. It’s enough to say that Makwa/Michael is forced to deal with this secret, and he goes to extreme lengths to try act innocent. During this period of time, viewers see that Makwa/Michael has been fighting a compulsion to commit violent crimes against people.

For example, Makwa/Michael has a disturbing encounter with a stripper that is eerily similar to what real-life serial killers have done to victims who’ve had violent experiences with serial killers. After this incident, Makwa/Michael is seen frantically praying in a church. It shows he has some feelings of guilt over his horrific crimes, but whatever guilt he feels is overshadowed by his need for self-preservation and control.

“Wild Indian” shows how Makwa/Michael uses his con man skills to lie and and manipulate his way out of a few situations. The movie never shows what happened in the years between the James Wolf’s murder in 1985 and Makwa/Michael’s life in 2019, but it’s easy to see that Makwa/Michael’s reinvention isn’t just about covering up the murder. He now lives a life of privilege, which he uses to hs advantage when it comes time for him to get a lawyer.

As the sociopathic Makwa/Michael, Greyeyes gives a chilling performance, even if it is a little robotic at times. Maybe it’s just Greyeyes’ way of portraying someone who has no empathy. All the other supporting characters in Makwa/Michael’s orbit (except for Teddo) are somewhat two-dimensional. Not enough time is spent with these supporting characters to get a sense of who they are as well-rounded people.

Teddo is a much more interesting character to watch because his adult life is more difficult and complicated than Makwa/Michael’s life. Even though Teddo has more morality than Makwa/Michael, Teddo’s prison record automatically puts him at a disadvantage in how people will judge Teddo and Teddo’s credibility. Spencer gives the role a very compassionate nuance in how he portrays Teddo’s troubled soul.

“Wild Indian” doesn’t have a typical story arc that movies tend to have about people who’ve covered up of a murder years ago, and their past comes back to haunt them. This movie is more of a character study than a predictable criminal justice story. People who have a more realistic view of the world will probably appreciate “Wild Indian” more than viewers who expect movies like this to gloss over life’s harsh realities and wrap up everything nicely in a tidy bow.

Vertical Entertainment released “Wild Indian” in select U.S. cinemas, on digital and VOD on September 3, 2021.