Lovesusti
The Worst Film Ever
ShangLuda
Admirable film.
BallWubba
Wow! What a bizarre film! Unfortunately the few funny moments there were were quite overshadowed by it's completely weird and random vibe throughout.
Humbersi
The first must-see film of the year.
Neil Welch
When his wife is killed by mobster Dolan after she witnessed him committing murder, grief-stricken Robinson hatches a plan to exact retribution. You see, Dolan regularly drives between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, and sometimes there are roadworks...Dolan's Cadillac is one of Stephen King's simplest short stories, lovingly crafted around a number of technical issues the answers to which were supplied to him by his big brother. Those technicalities are not necessary in the film - what happens happens, we see it but we don't need to know exactly how - and, instead, other aspects of the story are amplified (and, indeed, added). The main story beats remain consistent, however.Christian Slater treads a fine line between inhuman urbanity and crazed loon as Dolan's fate unfolds. Wes Bentley is fine as the grieving and somewhat unhinged Robinson, and Emmanuelle Vaugier is adequate as the doomed Elizabeth.This film passes the time but is otherwise fairly unmemorable.
dunmore_ego
The director of DOLAN'S CADILLAC, Jeff Beesley, was told by his agent, "If you can't knock this movie outta the park, you might as well forget it - go back to pumping gas." Uh, Jeff, I got some bad news....From a Stephen King short story of the same name (from the 1993 collection, Nightmares and Dreamscapes), screenwriter Richard Dooling misses the point completely and somehow thinks he can improve on a writing legend's plot elements - much like the rewriters of THE SOUND OF THUNDER (2005) had the brass balls to think they could improve on a Ray Bradbury story. DOLAN'S CADILLAC - a straight-to-DVD release - is another great Stephen King story wasted onto the small screen.Robinson (Wes Bentley) and wife Elizabeth (Emmanuelle Vaugier) are a regular Las Vegas couple, whose life is upended when Elizabeth witnesses human-trafficker Dolan (Christian Slater) execute people in the Nevada desert. Dolan has her killed. Robinson gets revenge in a very unique, exacting way.Dolan is chauffered around in a bulletproof Cadillac as fortified as a tank. In the short story, Robinson uses this fact to entomb Dolan in a highway grave, the first person narrative pathologically taking us through the meticulous life-planning and interesting physics of devising the trap. In the book, the "arc of descent" becomes a blueprint for Robinson's subterranean trap and a metaphor for his psychological and physical deterioration. While in the movie, the arc of descent is something that Dolan pulls out of thin air while standing at a pee trough. Was that the writer's subliminal message to us?: I'm URINATING ALL OVER STEPHEN KING! King's characters are efficiently made two-dimensional by leaden Wes Bentley (whose terrifically vapid performance in GHOST RIDER must have scored him this role) and Christian Slater, getting drunk on Jack (Nicholson, not Daniels). The highway trap is merely a flat drop covered with tarpaulin. No science required.In trying to extend King's story to movie length, instead of inserting all those interesting master plan elements, which would have drawn out the time compellingly, screenwriter Dooling puts in banalities: Robinson buying a Dirty Harry gun, Dolan extending his trafficking to children, Chinese mobsters, an FBI guy (Al Sapienza from THE SOPRANOS) and loads of black mascara for Wes Bentley in lieu of acting.To hear director Beesley speak of his filmic debacle in the DVD Featurette is to wonder whether he has ever viewed his own film: "...extremely entertaining... a great ride... a Saturday night popcorn movie..." And here's the one that made peanuts fly out of my nose: "At its heart it's very much an art film." Choke. Gasp. Bwohahahahahaha!King's story was an homage to Edgar Allan Poe's The Cask of Amontillado in subtle, disturbing ways; story described in detail how Dolan's highway grave could never be discovered. Beesley's movie gives us a scene of Robinson shifting a final stone slab into place over Dolan's screaming face, for the sole reason to echo Poe's (and King's) words, "For the love of God, no!" But this final homage is Beesley's final illogical mistake. The manner in which Beesley's trap is built is rife for discovery by authorities; the final stupid stone over Beesley's own face.Poe and King have assured themselves their places in history. Beesley has assured himself a career at the Shell Gas-N-Go.Fill 'er up please, Jeff.
invicta1313
As a lifelong reader of Stephen King, I got this on-sale-for-five-bucks-at-redbox movie expecting an epic flop. I didn't even realize they'd made a movie out of what is (I shiite thee not) one of my top 3 favorite Stephen King stories of all time, but I saw it had Christian Slater and Blackheart from Ghost Rider and...gravy.Honestly, I bought the movie thinking that Slater was the protagonist, so imagine my shock when I found out he was playing Dolan. When I read the story as a kid, I think I imagined Dolan as more of a Robert DiNiro, Al Pacino or even Mickey Rourke. Given those biases, I really had a hard time buying Slater as Dolan. At first. However, I really saw him come into his own in those scenes where he's looking at the girls, the very end in the Caddy and some of his sleazier moments. Still, I think that Slater was a little too young-looking to portray a gangster.I'll agree with most other reviewer's assertions that the last third was the best part. But I will add that even if the rest of the movie completely sucked, it was still worth it to see those two play out the final scene that Stephen King painted years ago. The scenes where Richardson stood screaming at his shredded gloves was right out of my imagination. Fantastic.In short, I give about 15 minutes of this movie a 4 and the rest a 9, so it averages out to an eight. Definitely worth the $5 I paid for it by easily a factor of four.
darkdragon8987
This movie totally rocks!! Especially for all of you who fell in love with Christian Slater's performance in "Heather's". He has this "face" that just cannot be duplicated- the eyes, that grin, the eyebrows, the wicked voice. But he never could really grasp that perfection again. Oh, he was GREAT in "Murder in the First"; GOOD in "Untamed Heart", "Hard Rain", "Broken Arrow", and "True Romance"; OKAY in "The Contender", "Young Guns 2", "Robin Hood"; and although "Pump Up the Volume" was a little weird, it was actually enjoyable. My point is, after "Heathers", it took Slater 22 YEARS to again reach that perfect character. He (being the bad guy), performed his BEST acting ,since "Heathers", in this movie. Very memorable performance. And the perfect role for him. Then there's Wes Bentley- mostly known for his "dark" roles ( I mean, look at that face, those eyes- he just screams those types of roles!). But after great performances in movies like "Ghost Rider", "American Beauty", "Soul Survivors", "The Ungodly", and "P2", you will be pleasantly surprised with Wes' role in this movie. He's a man in pain, after losing his wife to a killer, yet he's kind of hard to figure out. Yeah, he's gonna go after the guy for revenge, but it's his methods that kind of confuse you. You're actually completely unsure of Wes' full intentions until THE very end of the movie. If you're a smoker, you'll want to go for a smoke, if you're not, you might want a cigarette anyway! The cool thing about the movie as a whole is, the fact that there's not fifty characters running around , to keep up with. Just a handful of great performances from beginning to end. And the movie does us the favor of going straight from the beginning to the end, without a lot of bullshit, stalling, or boring periods of time to endure. I couldn't think of anything that I would change, or add to this movie. It was moving, exciting, sad, eerie, unpredictable, and definitely original. No, I haven't read the book, and I don't intend to- I haven't had a movie "grip" me in this way in a long time, and I don't want to chance altering that. I have to add, that Al Sapienza, who I had NEVER heard of in my life, was also excellent in this movie. He has a certain "it" factor going on, and he played his role well.( Nice on the eyes, as well). My opinion: If you like a good thriller (not horror), with continuous entertainment from beginning to the end, then you have got to check out this movie. ( Especially those of you, like me, that have been desperately waiting for Christian Slater to "push" that "bar" again- HE FINALLY DID IT!! GAVE IT 100%!!). Enjoy.