Product: The Dead Zone [VHS] (1983)
Rating: 4.0
Strongest adaptation of a King book
Christopher Walken's quiet John Smith is the heart of the story. Smith is a man who wants to teach his students, marry his sweetheart and be good to his parents - a small and normal life.Instead, he's involved in a horrific crash, is an a coma for five years and finally wakes to the loss of most of what he had and the acquisition of psychic ability. His doctor (Herbert Lom), once convinced of John's "gift", tells him this knowledge is not meant to be used.The other reviews do a good job of describing the plot. What absolutely makes this movie, though, is Walken's performance as John. Considered by many reviewers to be his career's best performance, Walken portrays Smith as a physically frail man motivated by his own decency to change what he can, no matter the cost.