Based on a Stephen King novel and directed by John Carpenter, Christine is about a classic car with a mind of its own and a taste for blood. The story follows a high school nerd, Arnie, and his jock friend Dennis. Arnie buys the piece of crap car for $250 and restores it. Arnie becomes cool and spends so much time with the car that he drifts away from Dennis and his new girlfriend that he basically got because of the cool car.

No matter how cool he gets, he’s still considered the school dweeb and the bullies won’t leave him alone. They vandalize Christine and that was a big mistake. Christine will make them pay.

In true Stephen King fashion, the story and characters are most important. The car itself isn’t even that scary, the nerdy kid who becomes obsessed with his possessed car is much more frightening. The transformation from the nerdy kid to the cool kid to the psychopath who only cares about his car is delightful.

As the car starts murdering the bullies, the detective on the case is convinced that Arnie has something to do with it. Meanwhile, Dennis and the love interest must come up with a plan to destroy Christine before Arnie goes too far to the deep end.

I love the John Carpenter score. It also has great character development and a dark tone that Carpenter has mastered. As a horror car movie, this is so much better than the Stephen King directorial effort Maximum Overdrive. Even with the rounded characters, I didn’t really love the actors or their acting to feel like I was invested in any of them.

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