User Reviews

This adaption of Stephen King's novel leaves a lot to be desired. Even the book was a slow read; but some major elements of the novel and lead characters were totally reworked for the movie and King's intent is by the wayside. A UFO crash lands in the forest guarding Haven, Maine and the impact burrows the craft into the ground. Eminent vibrations from the alien craft has citizens creating mechanical gadgets for no good reason, while some of the inhabitants just disappear or gravitate to the dig site trying to unearth the alien ship.

Jimmy Smits seems out of place playing the alcoholic writer and eventual hero. His awkward performance still out shines the rest of the cast except for Marg Helgenberger. She is very easy on the eye and plays her character flawlessly. Former porn star Traci Lords still needs a lot of work to move into mainstream movies. Her part was played over the top and becomes quite irritating. Not as abrasive as Allyce Beasley and Robert Carradine. Cliff De Young plays the cheating husband effortlessly. Joanna Cassidy and E.G. Marshall round out the diverse cast.

The special effects, namely the aliens buried in the craft are pretty top notch for a made-for-TV project. Stephen King is my favorite writer and I do have to agree with those that think Tommyknockers is no where near his better work. But in this case, read the book first and then watch this presentation. It is not what it could have been...better.

Aside from the odd exception, Stephen King has rarely transfered well to the big or small screen, and along comes this little mini-series which is a by-numbers example of what actually gets lost in translation. Firstly: when these novels are adapted for the screen, fundamental elements of the plot are excised or replaced, and this is true of even the better King-flicks ("The Shining" and "Carrie" are just as guilty as pulp trash like "Needful Things" and "Cujo"). "The Tommyknockers" begins as if it's going to buck the trend, establishing the majority of the usual King misfits early on, and actually adds a little suspense by not showing its hand too early - for example, this adaptation does not make clear what's buried out back in Bobbie's farm straight away. But as the town begins to be affected by said item, it's off into it's own world, and toss the novel out the window. Granted, some of the more imaginative gimmicks the township dreams up cannot be translated to screen with the appropriate panache, especially with the meagre budget allocated to this project - but does everything need to look so cheap? Much of the dialogue at best doesn't ring true, at worse stinks. Witness the actually quite good Marg Helgenberger delivering some awful lines ("Gard, let's experience it together!") but in an offhand way that suggests that she's really aware that she's not in a Mamet play, but, Hell, let's make the best of it anyway. Any good points? Well, Joanna Cassidy is always worth watching, but an actress of her class still can't make a thrown together middle-age romance look realistic. Helgenberger and Allyce Beasley come out of it with the least mud sticking. Worst crimes? Jimmy Smits completely miscast, terrible dialogue, cheap effects, complete massacre of the source material, Traci Lords all at sea outside of a John Waters movie or skinflick ... the list goes on.

The novel Tommyknockers was one of Steve King's earlier attempts to do sci-Fi, and it was only moderately successful. King fused his usual horror plot structure formula to a basic alien possession plot and added his standard strong character development. The characters were, in this case, better than the plot deserved. John Power's three-hour TV adaptation leaves most of the story intact, but drops some of the crazier and more absurd elements of the original work. Even without reading the original, those familiar with King's work will notice the restrained manner in which the climax takes place.

In the woods behind Bobbie Anderson's (Marg Helgerson) house, something is buried. Some say it is an Indian curse, some say it's a holy place, but in general, the members of the little New England town of Derry don't go there. But one day, while her recovering alcoholic boyfriend Jim Gardner (Jimmy Smits) is out doing a poetry reading, Bobbie and her dog Pete start digging. Before long, Derry starts experiencing miracles, accompanied by green glowing lights.

The casting is superb, and with the exception of an overcooked performance by Traci Lords, the acting is fairly good. Smits and Helgerberger are very good. The characterizations in this three hour long film fairly represent the original work, but the script lacks some of the original's punch. The cinematography is solid for a TV movie and the special effects are good. Tommyknockers is well edited, competently directed and fairly entertaining, but, like the original novel, it is not one of King's better works.

Recommended for King fans. Weakly recommended for Sci-Fi fans.

For some reason I always avoided this movie, despite enjoying most of the Stephen King movie adaptations as a teenager. It was simply because of the horrible title that I stayed clear of it. But having a chance to have seen it in 2015, after all these years, I finally got around to watching it.

The idea behind "The Tommyknockers" was adequate; a buried alien spacecraft holds some extraterrestrial force that invades the minds of the residents of a small rural community. Personally, then I didn't fully understand the thing with the missing teeth. And the thing that the people were unearthing just didn't appear extraterrestrial at all.

Now, I say mediocre Sci-Fi horror because it just didn't manage to step beyond and become interesting.

As for the acting, well they had some good talents on the cast list, with a number of familiar faces. The actors and actresses did good jobs with their roles, despite having storyboard limitations working against them.

The special effects in "The Tommyknockers" weren't impressive, not even by the standards back in 1993. However, I will say that the inside of the alien spacecraft was actually quite good. And the creature design of the alien creatures was good as well, it was the typical "grey one" design, but buffed up with a pinch of horror. And it worked out quite well.

"The Tommyknockers" isn't the best of Stephen King movie adaptations, but it is adequate enough for a single viewing.

First part of it seemed promising then it all fizzled away. The movie is very chopped up and at times makes no sense or the drama and horror that needs to be there is just not there...poor job all around with acting, directing, editing, etc

Believe me, if you want to know what its all about, read the book by King instead..don't waste 4hrs on the SciFi channel watching this garbage

I really liked the The Tommyknockers novel. I decided to watch this directly after finishing it. It was so hard to get through it and I nearly gave up halfway through. I eventually finished it and I was so frustrated and confused at the end. I hated it. It was horrible.

Usually the norm for Stephen King adaptations, particularly with those directly adapted for television or as a miniseries, to stay away. They're mostly produced by hacks who have to cut apart King's works, even then ones that don't need or shouldn't be adapted (or the ones he comes up with himself like Storm of the Century), and place them in a set running time meant for commercial breaks and to (sometimes) tone down explicit language and whatever bloody violence tends to happen in the original stories. But somehow Tommyknockers came to me (via the wife of all people), and decided to give it a chance purely based on the premise. It's about a small town in Maine (for King, color me shocked and awed!) and what happens to them when one of the townspeople, local writer Bobbi, comes across a strange object buried in the ground. She keeps digging and digging, and it just becomes an obsessive thing to unearth the entire metal-maze that seems to be underground. But then a green substance or other overcomes her, and the town, and they're slaves to some extraterrestrial entities - all except for one, a man with a metal plate in his head who can't be made zombified.

With a good premise and a few interesting cast prospects (Jimmy Smitts, Marg Helgenberger, EG Marshall, Traci Lords), I was prepared for anything. It could have been a horrid telling of the story, or perhaps something truly surprising and brilliant. It's in the middle; it's not very brilliant nor bad at all. The Tommyknockers works, more or less, how one sees a Stephen King book (one of the really good ones) work as a story: introduce the characters, let us get to know them very well and maybe empathize with them or sympathize with their troubles (alcoholism, infidelity, superstitions) or just understand them, and then just put them through total HELL (in caps). Most of the first half is just set-up, seeing the relationship between Bobbi and Jim, who has been on the wagon until an incident that sends him in turmoil, the fractured marriage of a cop and a postal worker- the latter cheating with a sultry temptress (Lords) every day- and the little boy who wants to master, and believes, in magic.

But once the effects of the Tommyknockers spreads through the town, it gets equally interesting and hokey. Some of the acting is just terrible, as one might expect (the kid playing the would-be magician is the kind one would usually find on low-rated episodes of Are You Afraid of the Dark), and some of that green visual effects stuff is rather cheap even when nifty coming out of a lipstick container. And the writing in some scenes is silly too, and I'm not sure if that's a criticism of the movie or of King. Yet what does work is that it's a solid story, told with a degree of professionalism and some creativity that makes it worth watching. Smitts and Helgenberger give as good as they've got, which is a big boost, and some scenes like the 4th of July climax of the first half of the movie are staged in a creepy manner and style (cutting between the zombies, the dolls, the kid repeating and the telekinetic typewriter typing Tommyknockers over and over). Even the aliens are a lot of fun to watch towards the end, with the end result revealed as just a rip on what would later be seen in the Matrix.

Some of this is predictable, and silly, and its ending is equally tragic and unintentionally funny. But I was entertained and didn't want to get up or stop the DVD during its running time, and that's my two cents.

I first watched 'Tommyknockers' on VHS back in the nineties. I'd been a fan of horror writer Stephen King's work and knew that some of them didn't translate well to film, while only a few did the source material justice. 'Tommyknockers' falls somewhere between the best and the worst. I have to confess that I always enjoyed it and now own it on DVD. However, I wouldn't go as far as saying that it's a masterpiece, or up with the best of King's work (translated to film), or even horror in general.

If you've seen one Stephen King film then you'll know the time of place it's set. Yes, another small New England town falls foul to a supernatural force. This time it seems like whatever's going on is actually helping the residents, allowing them to 'think outside the box' so to speak and start designing all sorts of crazy (and hopefully profitable?) contraptions. So, while everyone from the postmaster to the local chef in the diner start work on weird inventions that will make their lives easier (and make them rich, of course), local writer Jim Gardner (Jimmy Smits feels a little left out. Whereas all his neighbours talk about receiving wonderful ideas beamed into his head, he jokes that it must be the metal plate in his head that's blocking the signal.

There are quite a few characters in 'Tommyknockers' and not all of them are particularly well developed. Some are downright cliches and you may find yourself cringing at some of their dialogue. There's some special effects here and there. The film runs for nearly three hours (in its extended cut) and pretty much all the way through the special effects look like the wouldn't be out of place on nineteen seventies 'Dr Who.' However, during the final act the film-makers obviously knew they better spend their budget somewhere and there are some pretty ugly nasties lurking beneath this quiet little town.

My biggest gripes with the movie was that, first, it's a bit all over the place. Some bits get quite tense and then there are long periods where nothing really happens, or it doubles down on a point it's already made in a previous scene. However, like I say, I still enjoyed it and reckon that anyone who has an appreciation for Stephen King's filmic adaptations should give it a try, or if you're just in the mood for a nineties horror.

The only thing I always come away with was that I was never quite sure what the Tommyknockers' evil plan really was. It's sort of hinted/guessed at near the end, but never set in stone. I guess one drawback of only having the films (silent!) antagonists show up for the last ten minutes of the film means you're left wondering what they were trying to accomplish with their nefarious powers. Maybe it's in the book. But who's going to go to the trouble of reading a book in this day and age? It's fun enough and the very final scene always stuck with me over the years as a real dramatic high-point.

this movie was so bad compared to the book. There was so many things that happened in the book that didn't happen in the movie. Ev Hillman gave Hilly the magic set on his birthday, the movie he had it before his birthday. In the movie he did his trick at his party, in the book it was at a friends party. In the book it was described to me anyway that the ship was flat and silver. But in the movie it was boxier and square. In the Book Ruth blew up the clock tower, movie her dolls killed her and she went missing. Movie Butch Dugan got killed by a coke machine instead of shooting himself in the head in the book. There was no mention of the Bangor Daily News guy. BUT those things were just little things compared to the end of the movie. When him and Bobbi went into the ship and the tommy knockers were alive (book they were dead) and then they found the missing brown boy in the ship and freed him then Bobbi and the boy got out while Gard flew the ship in the sky and blew it up but in the BOOK Gard killed Bobbi tried to help save the little boy with the transmitter but he thought he failed but the kid ended up in the hospital room with his brother. And then Gard got into the ship and fire was everywhere and all the people who became were after him got into the ship and it took off to where he didn't know and then the book ended.

The movie was nothing like that. It was disappointing and the book was pretty good.

decent flick is well made and creepy but suffers from a plodding pace and overacting and weak production values for a TV movie this is pretty good and very watchable and mildly entertaining worth the look although it's nothing special

I loved Salem's Lot, liked The Stand and It and initially had mixed views on the Shining thinking it somewhat pointless but found it far more impressive on re-watch. But I didn't like the TommyKnockers, in fact I found it almost unwatchable. It has nothing to do with its faithfulness or lack of to the source material, I just couldn't get into it on its own terms.

Are there any redeeming values? Well the music is reasonably atmospheric, and Mary Helgenberger plays her part excellently, also it does start off promisingly.

However, the special effects are rather slapdash and cheap, not helped by some rushed editing and flat camera work. The dialogue is clunky and stilted, the story moves at an uneven pace with some choppy and unimaginative scenes and gimmicks- I found myself scratching my head at points especially the lipstick idea which felt thrown in and didn't feel like Stephen King at all-, the love scenes are cheesy and slow the adaptation down and the ending brings the word silliness to a whole new level. The pace is pedestrian as well, the direction is sluggish and the acting apart from Helgenberger is not great. Jimmy Smits is very miscast and awkward and Traci Lords is incredibly irritating and out of place.

Overall, a disappointment. 2/10 Bethany Cox

A buried UFO slowly turns local inhabitants into gizmo-building alien mutates.

Say what you will about author Stephen King, but he is a giant in the horror industry. In fact, he may be the most giant of the giants. And adapting his work has been hit and miss, with just as many misses as hits. Some might even say more misses.

And the misses seem to be more heavily concentrated on the TV films, because they are stretched out to extended hours. Sometimes scenes seem repetitive because of the commercial breaks and so on. In particular, "Langoliers" is an awful, awful, awful adaptation. And "Tommyknockers" is just the opposite. The characters are developed, the extended time only builds suspense rather than grows old. This is the job done right.

I love bad movies. Therefore, I love this movie. This is a bad movie. I love it. Don't let the positive reviews fool you, this is a delightfully terrible piece of movie-making. It ranks up there with the worst Stephen King adaptations, with overwrought acting and terrible special effects. It would be best served by MST3K.

Marg Helgenberger and Jimmy Smits turn in some of their worst work to date.

Traci Lords isn't even sexy.

The "Tommyknockers" are funny, and not even startling, never mind scary.

And then there's the patented ham-handed Stephen King kid dialogue. It's just crap.

I love it.

An eerie force that emanates from an infamous patch of forest causes weird things to happen in a small Maine town. A writer (Marg Helgenberger) becomes obsessed with its origins in the woods while her beau struggles with alcoholism and is perplexed by what's happening (Jimmy Smits).

Based on the Stephen King novel, "The Tommyknockers" (1993) was originally a two-part TV "miniseries," which just makes it a long movie at three hours. It was inexplicably rated R for (supposed) sci-fi terror/horror & a tasteful sex scene, but it's more like PG-13 at worst. The plot hails back to the sci-fi/horror of the mid 50s (I'd mention an obvious book/movie from that era, but I don't want to spoil anything for those not already in the know).

The story would've worked better if it were tightened up and released as a two-hour movie. As it is, there's some padding and so my mind occasionally wandered, particularly in the mid-section. But, if you don't mind the 3-hour runtime, the flick does a good job of establishing the town and its inhabitants amidst the increasingly bizarre events. The warmth & love of some characters is counterbalanced by the caving to carnality of others. Everything comes down to the final twenty minutes where the film delivers the goods with a compelling and somewhat horrific payoff.

On the female front, Helgenberger looks real good in jeans while Lords is (to be expected) oversexed, but she's effective enough in the acting department.

The movie was shot in Puhoi, New Zealand, which is a half hour drive north of Auckland. Some interiors were done in warehouses in Auckland, such as the inside of the such-n-such. CAST includes John Ashton & Joanna Cassidy as cops, Robert Carradine & Annie Corley as restaurant owners, Traci Lords & Cliff De Young as postal workers and Allyce Beasley as the latter's wife, a deputy. E.G. Marshall is also on hand.

GRADE: B/B-

It's the small town of Haven Falls, Maine. Bryant Brown (Robert Carradine) owns the local diner. Sheriff Ruth Merrill (Joanna Cassidy) is a doll collector. Nancy Voss (Traci Lords) is the vain postmaster who is having an affair with fellow postal worker Joe Paulson (Cliff De Young) who is cheating on his wife Deputy Becka Paulson (Allyce Beasley). Bobbi Anderson (Marg Helgenberger) discovers something mysterious in the woods and feels driven to start digging it up. Jim Gardner (Jimmy Smits) is her recovering alcoholic boyfriend. Trooper Butch Duggan (John Ashton) is sweet on Sheriff Ruth who was his partner's wife. People in town start putting together gadgets that are powered by a green light and reading others' minds.

I wonder if this is better as a shorter movie rather than a 3 hour mini-series. There isn't any mystery since almost everything is laid out right away anyways. It feels too extended with sections that has no tension. The acting is generally good with solid TV actors. It's definitely not cinematic. It's a middling adaptation of yet another Stephen King novel. It's like an extremely extended Twilight Zone episode.

I hate to say it because I am a fan of Kings but this was poorly done. And thats saying alot considering I was in this movie. I noticed though that even with other King movies that there seems to be a cheeping out at times. Like the badly done spider in the movie, "IT" I felt this was a good film until the muppet like spider turned up.

Stephen King was bored one afternoon, so he scribbled out a story about some buried artifacts being uncovered and possessing people's brains. In this town, there's not much in the way of brains to take over. You know that somebody's possessed; how? They have green neon eyes, that's how. Why you hear little kids singing a jump-rope rhyme is never explained, but it sure is annoying.

Let's back up a moment. This is one of those King novels that was turned into a mini-series. Leave about 30% of the footage on the cutting room floor to shave this to its proper run time, and it would be better. The entire first two hours is character development: a complete waste of time because possessed people lose their personalities anyway. The blonde bimbo never has a personality-before or after possession-but I digress. The main problem is that the townsfolk are eminently boring. Those that get possessed, have weird green eyes, but they're still boring. There are some moments of gross-out bloody deaths, but somehow the film makes even these dull.

A quick note: the cast is not at fault for the shallow characters. The acting is rather professional and convincing (considering what they had to work with), and rises miles above the juvenile writing. The only fault the actors had was allowing their agents to sign them up for this pointless misfire.

The film does scratch out a few useful moments here and there; the closing sequence is interesting, even though it predictably fails to resolve anything.

Rent Plan 9, instead. At least that film is funny.

Taken with the spirit of 'The 50 Foot Woman' or Twilight Zone episodes with string holding up the flying saucers it's watchable. Gard isn't a funny drunk like Burt Reynolds in Smokey And The Bandit and it's mostly ho hum he had a bottle hid there?????? Yawn. Bandit made it believable at least.

Sci/Fi has given us so many wonderful inventions like Independence Day where they created WiFi which just happened to match the invaders computers although none of the other technology was the same. And the Tommyknockers had mind control headsets to operate their ship. Never mind that the aliens heads were very long and the probes would penetrate the brain at it's top.......just luck that the harness was custom made for Gard.

How they could have handled Bobby physically changing is not really explored but the last time Gard jumped her bones he noticed in the book there were things like fingers growing down there...........finally he figures out this isn't really her he's with.

They could have used cops with an IQ above room temperature when the kid vanished. Standing on a solid wood box,no hole in the tablecloth,solid brick foundation wall behind and no hole in the ground but Ruth never figures out he couldn't have gotten past a yard full of people but give Hilly the Penn & Teller 'Fool Us' trophy and lets go search the swamp and everywhere except around the UFO. But they also never searched the barn so all was consistent.

Not a bad way to kill an evening unless you're expecting an epic documentary on aliens and science.