Dolan's Cadillac (2009)

Pretty Good

An action-packed slog

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

(Credit IMDb) A young man attempts to seek to avenge his wife's death after she is murdered by a Las Vegas mobster.I highly doubt I'm the only Christian Slater fan that is deeply saddened about how far his career has plummeted at this juncture. Slater is a gifted actor and he's better than this junk. Stephen King movies have always been a hit and miss, but they have been far more miss, as of late. The pace is as slow as molasses and I had issues paying attention. The ending to this movie is rather cool, but getting there, is the major problem. Slater makes for a cool villain, but he can do this in his sleep. Wes Bently is bland. Overall, I don't remember too much about this movie, probably a reason for it. It sucks3/10

I can't believe this film was the imagination of Stephen King. This crap is almost a ninety minute view of torture. Christian Slater playing evil and he doesn't do a half bad job of it as mob guy/slave trader, Dolan, who's now resorted to selling kids for suck clientele, and profiting fruitfully from it. He has his own supply of costumes on standby too, so he's got his s..t together. A beautiful witness, (Mia from Two And A Half Men) who has seen at first hand, the special cargo being loaded up, is taken out. The boyfriend, a teacher, now becomes completely obsessed and psychologically hell bent on tasking out Slater, first being worked over by him which intensifies his rage. Her image burns in his memory as he's sees a phantom of her on the lonely highway. He hatches a plan. He becomes a road worker, and carves out a section of loose bitumin, to entrap our Slater, which of course works, where Dolan's Cadillac goes under, with Slater begging for mercy. No suspense here, or in anything. That's it. End of movie. We see Slater minutes before going under, viewing some of the kiddies, on his laptop, holding numbers, a pang of conscience, looking away before looking back, but this son of a bitch has dug his own grave, the same place this movie should be laid to rest. The best part of this dreck is some of the hot girls in lingerie, put on show, but apart from that, forget it, this Cadillac sucks, this movie robbing people of their valuable time.

I admit to being a bit of a fan of the work of Stephen King, as such I am fully aware that there are many adaptations of his work out there that are less than average. Despite this, I live in hope that someday somebody will make a decent fist of one of his stories again. Unfortunately, this one goes on the 'below par' pile… along with too many others I'm afraid. I must say I haven't read the story on which this one is based, but, knowing Mr. King, I'm sure it works perfectly well on the page. More of my thoughts after this brief summary.A schoolteacher, Robinson, is devastated when his wife, Elizabeth, is murdered by crime boss Dolan. She had witnessed several murders committed by Dolan whilst out riding one day and ended up paying the ultimate price. With vengeance on his mind, Robinson gets himself a gun and stakes out Dolan for a long time. Thinking the time is right he prepares to kill him but a hit by a rival gang puts paid to his ambitions and demonstrates that Dolan's car, a tripped out Cadillac is one tough motor vehicle! Eventually a plan forms in Robinson's mind, one which will involve Dolan's Cadillac.There are elements of this film I liked, the fact that Robinson is haunted by visions of his wife after her death was a nice device. Shame they didn't use it to its full potential. There were a couple of moments of humour in there, but not enough to give this film a boost it needed. Performance-wise, Christian Slater did an excellent job as Dolan, he really knows how to 'chew the furniture' when required. Wes Bentley was also pretty good as Robinson and finally, although she didn't have an awful lot to do, Emmanuelle Vaugier did a decent job as Elizabeth.I do enjoy a decent revenge thriller but unfortunately this one is a bit of a let-down. The plot loses a lot of steam very quickly and never really recovers. It's a shame really because this one had some potential, but I can see why it went straight to DVD. Over all, despite a couple of decent performances, this one fails to live up to its potential… NOT recommended.My Score: 4.7/10

If you are reading this because you liked the short story I would say go for it. I read the story in Nightmares and Dreamscapes and it hung with me. I don't understand the negative comments and all I can figure is that: A. They didn't read the story or B. They didn't read the story. For gods sake, it's not an academy award winner and it wasn't intended to be. This was a very good enactment of the story and that's about all I can say. Not bad for a Saturday afternoon throw away movie. It delivers the essence of the story, Also I would advise any Stephen King fans to read or listen to the audio book, On Writing. It's pretty much an autobiography of the trials and tribulations of a writer who will go down in history as a contemporary, or superior, of any given living writer. Even if you don't write and you just enjoy the reading you will gain volumes of insight into King's mind. It's every bit as fascinating as any of his novels or short stories. Don't dilly dally, just watch it.