Sometimes They Come Back starts with Jim Norman (Tim Matheson) returning to the town where he grew up after 27 years along with his wife Sally (Brooke Adams) & their young son Scott (Robert Hy Gorman) having had to take a teaching job there at the local high school. The town holds painful memories for Jim which come flooding back, all those years ago Jim's Brother Wayne (Chris Demetral) was killed in a train tunnel along with three teenage bullies who were trying to steal money off them, Jim was the only survivor. One of Jim's new students Billy Sterns (Matt Nolan) is killed when his bike is forced of the side of a bridge by a car, then a new student named Richard Lawson (Robert Rusler) takes Billy's place in Jim's class but Jim is shocked to recognise him as one of the bullies from the day his Brother died. Another student named Kate (Tasia Valenza) is then found hanged in an apparent suicide, her place in class is taken by Vinnie Vincent (Nicholas Sadler) who again Jim recognises from all those years ago. Have the spirits of those killed come back to haunt Jim? Is he imagining it? Watch it to find out...
Directed by Tom McLoughlin this was the first of a trilogy of supernatural horror films which have little to do with each other bar the titles. The script by Lawrence Konner & Mark Rosenthal was based on the short story by Stephen King which I have not read but is apparently quite different especially the ending which would not come as a surprise considering the ending that made it to the final finished film is pretty poor with far too much awful sentimentality which comes off as embarrassing & cringe inducing. A bit of a shame really as the rest of Sometimes They Come Back is decent & fairly watchable, the first twenty odd minutes plays out like a drama as Jim recalls the events of all those years ago in various flashbacks but then the story becomes more interesting when Lawson turns up out of the blue followed by his ghostly friends soon after. No real explanation is given as to why they return from the grave apart from the fact they want revenge, well all I can say is I don't think they have any right to demand any kind of revenge as it was their fault they were hit by a speeding train & it's Wayne & his Brother who should be looking for revenge. Sometimes They Come Back also tries to portray a moral message, you know the sort of thing like the way the past can come back to haunt you, don't brood over the past, don't try to change things & not to run away from a bad situation but to stand up & face them otherwise they'll never leave you alone, yep pretty much everything is here you would expect from a film dealing with horrible events from ones childhood. The film takes itself very seriously & it can drag a little in places but I found it a decent way to spend 100 odd minutes.
Director McLoughlin does an OK job, it's hardly going to win any awards for style but I have sat through worse. There's a really bad special effect of a toy train crashing into a toy car which looks very fake, there's not much in the way of blood or gore I'm afraid. A few rotting zombies which to be fair look pretty good, a few severed body parts thrown out of a car window & a bit of blood is as gory as it gets.
Sometimes They Come Back was made-for-TV & to be honest you can tell, it's competent & well made although somewhat flat & a bit dull to look at. The acting was OK.
Sometimes They Come Back is yet another Stephen King adaptation in a list that is seemingly endless, it's not the best but it's by no means the worst. It's certainly worth a watch if you've nothing better to do. Followed by two unconnected sequels, Sometimes They Come Back... Again (1996) & Sometimes They Come Back... for More (1999) both of which I have seen & also thought were decent enough.
Directed by Tom McLoughlin this was the first of a trilogy of supernatural horror films which have little to do with each other bar the titles. The script by Lawrence Konner & Mark Rosenthal was based on the short story by Stephen King which I have not read but is apparently quite different especially the ending which would not come as a surprise considering the ending that made it to the final finished film is pretty poor with far too much awful sentimentality which comes off as embarrassing & cringe inducing. A bit of a shame really as the rest of Sometimes They Come Back is decent & fairly watchable, the first twenty odd minutes plays out like a drama as Jim recalls the events of all those years ago in various flashbacks but then the story becomes more interesting when Lawson turns up out of the blue followed by his ghostly friends soon after. No real explanation is given as to why they return from the grave apart from the fact they want revenge, well all I can say is I don't think they have any right to demand any kind of revenge as it was their fault they were hit by a speeding train & it's Wayne & his Brother who should be looking for revenge. Sometimes They Come Back also tries to portray a moral message, you know the sort of thing like the way the past can come back to haunt you, don't brood over the past, don't try to change things & not to run away from a bad situation but to stand up & face them otherwise they'll never leave you alone, yep pretty much everything is here you would expect from a film dealing with horrible events from ones childhood. The film takes itself very seriously & it can drag a little in places but I found it a decent way to spend 100 odd minutes.
Director McLoughlin does an OK job, it's hardly going to win any awards for style but I have sat through worse. There's a really bad special effect of a toy train crashing into a toy car which looks very fake, there's not much in the way of blood or gore I'm afraid. A few rotting zombies which to be fair look pretty good, a few severed body parts thrown out of a car window & a bit of blood is as gory as it gets.
Sometimes They Come Back was made-for-TV & to be honest you can tell, it's competent & well made although somewhat flat & a bit dull to look at. The acting was OK.
Sometimes They Come Back is yet another Stephen King adaptation in a list that is seemingly endless, it's not the best but it's by no means the worst. It's certainly worth a watch if you've nothing better to do. Followed by two unconnected sequels, Sometimes They Come Back... Again (1996) & Sometimes They Come Back... for More (1999) both of which I have seen & also thought were decent enough.