The Boogeyman
 
Also see: The Woman in the Room
 
Movie
Title: Nightshift Collection
Director: Jeffrey C. Schiro (Interview)
Year: 1982, Tantalus Pictures
Length: 28 min. (Dollar Baby)
DVD available: No (Preview)
In database: Yes [VHS/PAL]
 
Cast
Lester Billings Michael Read
Dr. Harper Bert Linder
Sgt. Garland Terence Brandy
Rita Billings Mindy Silverman
Coroner Jerome Bynder
 
 
Book
Title: Night Shift
Dutch issue: Satanskinderen en andere verhalen
Original story: The Boogeyman
Dutch title: De Boeman
Author: Stephen King
Year: 1973, Cavalier Magazine
 
Synopsis

Nightshift Collection - Released at the height of Stephen King's popularity in the 1980s, this home video pairs three short films adapted from the horror author's earliest (and most revered) short-story compilation, Night Shift. The first tale, "The Woman in the Room", marked a promising genre debut from writer-director Frank Darabont, who would later garner critical acclaim, as well as Oscar and Golden Globe nominations, for The Shawshank Redemption, adapted from King's superb non-horror novella, and The Green Mile. A study of internalized horror and fear of mortality, "Woman" involves a distraught young man's inner torment over the suffering of his terminally ill mother and his ultimate solution to both her woes and his own.

The second entry, Jeff Schiro's "The Boogeyman", though not as technically polished and sublime as the first, is nevertheless wonderfully entertaining, providing horrors of a far more visceral nature. It is told from the perspective of a deeply disturbed man, who confides in his therapist that his childhood fears of the closet-dwelling title monster may have caused the death of his own children, perhaps by his own hand... perhaps something else.

The dollar baby "The Boogeyman" is based one of King's early stories, "The Boogeyman" first appeared in March 1973 issue of Cavalier.

Added in 1995 was "The Disciples of the Crow" which was the first "Children of the Corn" adaptation, and much better than any of the movies that bare the story's title. The gritty, low-budget style of these shorts actually enhances the pervasive sense of dread, together with tight plotting and fine performances which heighten the level of terror, placing this compilation a cut above most Hollywood renderings of King's work.

 
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