10 Stephen King Movie Adaptations That Deserve A Remake
2. The Lawnmower Man
Stephen King famously washed his hands of The Lawnmower Man, successfully suing to secure the removal of ‘Stephen King’s …’ from the title, due to his dissatisfaction at how it deviated from his original 1975 short story, as it had been merged with another screenplay that was doing the rounds at the time called Cyber God.
But that didn’t stop director Brett Leonard creating a solid early nineties sci-fi/horror, featuring Jeff Fahey playing Jobe, a dim-witted gardener who gets taken under the wing of virtual reality scientist and inventor Pierce Brosnan. Jobe is exposed to an online world beyond his comprehension, and is injected with an experimental drug that quickly enhances his intelligence, eventually transcending him beyond the human plane as he unlocks his mind which links with the virtual reality world, giving him supernatural powers including telekinesis.
His newfound powers draw him to take revenge on those who have wronged him, while he also seeks a plan to bring the whole of humanity under the control of his mind and its connection to the virtual dimension. The film works great, but the computer-generated effects which visually form the basis of the movie, despite being considered ground breaking and visually impressive at the time, look dated today. This is the part of the film that would strongly benefit from a remake, which could create a movie that looks stunning with the stylish use of modern SFX.