Moviefone Editorial

Tag: Firestarter

  • Louise Fletcher Dies Age 88

    Louise Fletcher in 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.'
    Louise Fletcher in ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.’ Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. YouTube channel.

    Louise Fletcher, whose subtle, creepy performance seared a classic, conflicted movie villain into the public consciousness – and won an Academy Award in the process – has died. She was 88.

    Estelle Louise Fletcher was born in 1934 in Birmingham, Alabama. Her father was an episcopal priest and both of her parents were deaf. That would lead to an emotional element when she won her Oscar for ‘One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest’; she utilized sign language as part of her acceptance speech.

    Introduced to acting by an aunt she and her siblings spent a year and further summers with to ensure they learned to speak, she attended school at the University of North Carolina and then headed to Los Angeles, where she started to find acting work making guest appearances on shows such as ‘Bat Masterson’, ‘Maverick’, ‘The Untouchables’, ‘Wagon Train’, and ‘Perry Mason’.

    Yet after an uncredited movie debut in ‘A Gathering of Eagles’, she decided to give up acting and focus on family. It was Robert Altman who persuaded her to return to the screen for 1974’s ‘Thieves Like Us’. Her performance caught the attention of Milos Forman, who thought she might be right for ‘One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest’s rigid, rule-enforcing Nurse Ratched.

    In addition to the Academy Award, she became only the third woman to win the BAFTA and the Golden Globe for a single performance.

    Producer Michael Douglas, director Miloš Forman, Louise Fletcher, and Jack Nicholson from 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' at the 48th Academy Awards.
    (L to R) Producer Michael Douglas, director Miloš Forman, Louise Fletcher, and Jack Nicholson from ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’ at the 48th Academy Awards. Photo courtesy of Oscars.org.

    A less fruitful period followed. Though she worked fairly consistently, she suffered typecasting, appearing as doctors, psychiatrists and authority figures in movies such as ‘Exorcist II: The Heretic’ and had the title role in ‘The Lady in Red’. She also appeared in ‘Strange Behavior’, ‘Strange Invaders’ the original ‘Firestarter’, ‘Invaders from Mars’ and ‘Flowers in the Attic’.

    She had more luck reuniting with Altman for Hollywood satire ‘The Player’ and working on ‘Blue Steel’ for director Kathryn Bigelow.

    Fletcher had more luck on TV, starring in TV Movies including ‘The Karen Carpenter Story’ and scoring an Emmy nomination for series ‘Picket Fences’ as a woman who rejects her deaf daughter (played by fellow Oscar winner Marlee Matlin).

    Sci-fi fans will know her best as Kai Winn, the scheming religious leader from the planet Bajor in ‘Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’, who sought political power and went to great lengths to achieve it.

    She would go on to describe the feeling of winning her Oscar as exhilarating but fleeting, and she was glad she didn’t win earlier in her career. “I got the Oscar when I was 41,” Fletcher told the New York Times. “If I was 23, it would have been hard to deal with. Hell, at my age it was hard to deal with. It was like being thrown an explosive.”

    Fletcher died at her home in Montdurausse, France, surrounded by family.

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  • ‘Firestarter’ Trailer Lights Up Online

    Ryan Kiera Armstrong in "Firestarter' courtesy of Universal Pictures
    Ryan Kiera Armstrong in “Firestarter’ courtesy of Universal Pictures

    There have been so many adaptations of horror master Stephen King’s work at this point that it was inevitable we’d start to see re-adaptations, as happened with the likes of ‘Pet Sematary’ and ‘It’. Today it’s the turn of Blumhouse’s new take on ‘Firestarter’ to make its psychic presence felt with a first trailer and poster.

    ‘Firestarter’, which King published in 1980, is the story of a girl whose parents participated in clandestine government agency experiments which have granted them certain psychic abilities and given their daughter extraordinary pyrokinetic powers.

    The book was first adapted into a movie in 1984 directed by Mark L. Lester and written by Stanley Mann, starring David Keith, Martin Sheen and a young, post- ‘E.T.’ Drew Barrymore as the main character.

    From the sounds of the official synopsis, the new movie will follow a similar path to the 1984 version, though it’ll be interesting to see how it deals with them themes of isolation, puberty, and mental health.

    Here’s the story: “For more than a decade, parents Andy (Zac Efron) and Vicky (Sydney Lemmon) have been on the run, desperate to hide their daughter Charlie (Ryan Kiera Armstrong) from a shadowy federal agency that wants to harness her unprecedented gift for creating fire into a weapon of mass destruction.

    Andy has taught Charlie how to defuse her power, which is triggered by anger or pain. But as Charlie turns 11, the fire becomes harder and harder to control. After an incident reveals the family’s location, a mysterious operative (Michael Greyeyes) is deployed to hunt down the family and seize Charlie once and for all. Charlie has other plans…

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    ‘Firestarter’s cast also includes Gloria Reuben (who appears to behind the shadowy agency looking to control Charlie’s fiery abilities), Kurtwood Smith and John Beasley.

    ‘The Vigil’s Keith Thomas is in the director’s chair here, with the script by ‘Halloween Kills’ co-writer Scott Teems. The ‘Halloween’ connections continue with news that John Carpenter is composing the score alongside regular collaborators Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies.

    In keeping with the remake aspect, the new movie’s poster is certainly looking to invoke the 1984 version’s flame-filled theme.

    We’ll have to wait and see whether this movie ends up launching a ‘Firestarter’ franchise – the original was followed by one TV-movie sequel, which followed a grown Charlie played by Marguerite Moreau. And this year alone, we have at least one other King adaptation headed to theaters: ‘Salem’s Lot’, with ‘Mr. Harrigan’s Phone’ and the ‘Pet Sematary’ remake sequel filming, plus various others in development.

    Produced by Blumhouse, the team behind ‘The Invisible Man’ (and many other recent chillers), the new ‘Firestarter’ will be looking to make sparks in theaters and on Peacock from May 13. Yes, that’s Friday the 13th for anyone keeping track; but don’t tell Jason Voorhees – he’ll just get jealous!

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