Available on DVD! To buy, click on link(s) below and help keep this site afloat (commissions earned)   CLICK HERE to buy from   CLICK HERE to buy from Blu-ray   CLICK HERE to buy from V.O.D.   CLICK HERE to buy from   CLICK HERE to buy from Blu-ray   CLICK HERE to buy from V.O.D.   CLICK HERE to buy from German and English language   CLICK HERE to buy from V.O.D. German language only Always make sure of DVD-compatibility!!!

Arnie (Keith Gordon) is a nerdy high school student who probably wouldn't last long without his best friend, jock Dennis (John Stockwell), who seems to routinely get him out of scrapes, like with the school's biggest bully, Buddy (William Ostrander), who ultimately holds Arnie and Dennis responsible for being expelled from school for carrying a sitchblade knife. Then Arnie finds a totally dilapitated car, a '58 Plymouth Fury called Christine, buys it for a steal from her cranky owner Darnell (Roberts Blossom), and starts fixing her up in shady Darnell's (Robert Prosky) do-it-yourself garage. For some reason, everybody's against Arnie having the car, especially his parents (Christine Belford, Robert Darnell), but it does wonders for his self confidence, so much so that the hottest girl in school, Leigh (Alexandra Paul), becomes his girlfriend - much to the dismay of Dennis, who wanted Leigh for himself, but he soon suffers a football injury and is taken out of the picture for a while. In the meantime, Christine starts to develop a personality of her own, and not a very likeable one, as is evidenced one night at the drive-in when Leigh almost chokes on her food and Christine locks her inside, preventing Arnie, still outside, from helping her, and she's saved only in the nick of time.

Buddy and his friends have meanwhile found out where Christine is parked, and take some sledgehammers to completely demolish her as revenge for Buddy's repulsion. But pretty much magically, Christine fixes herself up upon Arnie's command, and soon enough Christine goes after one of Buddy's friends, Moochie (Malcolm Danare) and kills him. This brings Detective Junkins (Harry Dean Stanton) onto the scene, who immediately suspects Arnie, but Arnie's got an alibi. Junkins also figures there's something wrong with Christine, though it's somewhat unclear how he's come to believe it. Not long after that though, garage owner Darnell is found dead in Christine, which of course only reinforces Junkins' suspicions, and then Christine goes after Buddy and his friends, blowing up a whole gas station in the process.

Leigh calls Dennis, who has more or less recovered from is injury by now, and they make up a plan to corner Christine and pretty much crash her to tiny pieces using heavy machinery - a plan that almost goes deadly wrong more than once, but ultimately Christine ends up as a cube of compressed metal ...

If anything, Christine is a testament to John Carpenter's sheer talent as a director, as in this one he once again masterfully combines B movie sentiments with directorial inventiveness and perfect craftsmanship, making this one a pretty entertaining romp - which is quite a feat, as the material he had to work with here was less than stellar, a rather ill-conceived story about a possessed car that lacks in proper build-up, is carried by cardboard characters, and often has them react oddly to the goings-on. And what's really annoying is that the movie actually shows little sympathy for Arnie and really seems to want to spread the message "know your place, nerd (and leave the pretty girls to the jocks)!" - which is pretty much where Stephen King's version of Americana shines through, which is in many aspects very much stuck in the 1950s - even if Christine the movie is a streamlined and simplified version of King's book and more or less ditches the social commentary of the material. So basically, this is not a good film - but it flows so very nicely that one will probably still find oneself entertained.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

Feeling lucky? Want to search any of my partnershops yourself for more, better results? (commissions earned)

The links below will take you just there!!!

Find Christine at the amazons ...   amazon.com   amazon.co.uk   amazon.de Looking for imports? Find Christine here ...   eThaiCD.com Your shop for all things Thai

Thanks for watching !!!