Rating: 
Summary: Fantastic!
Review: The Book Firestarter is great and so is the movie. Though some of the stuff from the book wasn't in the movie I feel that it was pretty faithful to the book and I can understand why they didn't include the garbage disposal incident, it just would have been too gross! Drew Barrymore was great as Charlie and even at around 8 years old you could tell what a wonderful gifted actress she was, she really inherited the famous Barrymore acting skills! Well, really at around 5 or 6 years old she proved what an amazing actress she was in E.T.! David Keith was very good as her father Andy and I also really liked George C. Scott he was a perfectly creepy Rainbird. I didn't find the book or movie very scary, I found both as more mystery/suspense which is what I like and it also had Drama. I too found it sad what was done to Charlie and her father, especially Charlie she was just a little girl and what The Shop did to her was despicable, and afterall they made her what she was, because of an experiment they did they caused her to be born with the ability to start fires with her mind and she couldn't always control it! I highly recommend this movie!
Rating: 
Summary: She has the power.
Review: The book is good but I don't understand why it was only suitable for persons of 18 years and over? There isn't happening that much which you can't see in a regular cartoon. But it's an oldie and maybe they thought it would upgrade the story. I liked David Keith and George C.Scott the played well. A must to see for Stephen King fans but also read the book...
Rating:
Summary: Snuffed Out
Review: This 1984 adaptation of horror master Stephen King's novel of the same name, is usually noted only for its use of pyrotechnics, and the performance of Drew Barrymore. Of course, the fact that she played loveable Gertie in E.T., put her on the map, and folks were eager to see her in a far more dramatic role. Unfortunately, in the end, the film's problems outweigh anything good about it. It's just an OK film.Charlie McGee, (Barrymore) is a pre-pubescent girl whose moods of anger and frustration are manifested in the telekinetic creation of raging fires. It seems her parents participated in dangerous government experiments in the 60s, and their bodies were altered in ways that affected the physical and mental makeup of their child. Andrew (David Keith), her dad, tries to protect her from the government, who wants to harness her powers for weapons use, and an Indian named John Rainbird (George C. Scott), who thinks the child must die. Directed by Mark L. Lester, the film stays true to King's concepts, and has solid effects work. The problems with the movie lie mostly with some key casting and pacing. Legendary actor George C. Scott seems woefully out of place, as are Art Carney and painfully over the top Martin Sheen. Barrymore and Keith try to balance things out But only go so far...The pace of the movie is a bit lopsided. The climax of the picture seems to take too long. Lester even employs some of the same tactics Brian De Palma used for 1976's Carrie--ho hum. The DVD has no bonus material. It would be interesting to get Barrymore's take on the film today--given her status--though. Recommended strictly as a rental for King Devotees
Rating:
Summary: Big Screen adaptation of King novel
Review: This film was one of the first King adaptation movies I saw. I have actually bought this myself to own, though this is mainly because of the concept (original at its time) of a pyrokinetic child. As with most King adaptations, the film doesn't compare to the book. It looses the pain and suffering of her father, and the strange effects he has on people (specifically, the man fascinated by his waste disposal unit....). However, it is an enjoyable yarn. The special effects are quite good for the time, and the sight of a six year old loosing control over such a deadly force is enough to make most people shudder. I would recommend buying it for the scene at the farm alone! It is not a brilliant film, though. You can poke holes in it if you're in the mood, and there is no real horror or terror there, it's just fun. Try renting it first!
Rating:
Summary: CLASSIC DREW!!!!
Review: This is a good movie if you like science fiction supernatural movies then I would reccommend that you buy this movie because this is a good movie and I liked it a lot I remember when I had came on cable t.v when I was a kid. Drew did some great acting and she had took care of anyone who got in her way and anyone who harmed her in any kind of way this is a movie about a kid having a special poower about starting fires to anyone or anything she was posessed with this power and she used it !!!!
Rating:
Summary: colud of been a little better.
Review: This is not the best film based on a Stephen King book, but you can lok at it thi wa, at lest it is not as bad as IT (nothing colud be as worse as that). any way Drew Barrymore did a good job, but Martin Sheen eats up all the scenes and going all out in his role. all i can say about the story is it is about a little gril who gets things on fire when she is pissed off and there is this really f***ed up Indian guy. it is siad that that John Carpenter was going to do this. he sound have (hey man he can always do another film verison). by the way i am 17 years old, it is does that i don't know how to sing up and all that. nuff siad.
Rating: 
Summary: Surprisingly...not scary
Review: This movie is Stephen Kings...but it is not scary! It has a great plot (well to me) and the special effects are pretty good for their day in age. Buy it/rent it/SEE IT!
Rating:
Summary: Fire On High
Review: Though not exactly a masterpiece, FIRESTARTER is a far better thriller than the critics led people to believe when it was first released in 1984. Based on Stephen King's 1980 novel, this film stars Drew Barrymore (fresh off her role in Spielberg's 1982 masterpiece E.T.) as Charlie McGee, a very young girl whose parents (David Keith, Heather Locklear) were part of a government-sponsored scientific experiment that gave the participants various types of psi powers. Barrymore's power is unique and, to put it mildly, incendiary. Just by thinking about it, she can start fires--pyrokinesis. And she is most apt to do that when she is under stress or angry. Given the fact that agents from a secret government agency known as the Shop have been after her, one can see why she'd use them, even though she doesn't want to. But the top two men (Martin Sheen, George C. Scott) in the Shop want her powers to be harnessed into the ultimate weapon. The thing they forget, of course, is that they should be careful what they wish for; they may get it. And in the explosive, fiery finale, they do indeed get it. Though not quite up to the cinematic standards set by CARRIE or THE SHINING, FIRESTARTER does benefit from a very good performance by Barrymore, and Keith isn't too bad either. Sheen (who played a political heavy in another King adaptation, THE DEAD ZONE) and Scott (the 1970 Oscar winner for PATTON) make for two very good villains. The special effects work by Mike Wood and Jeff Jarvis, who worked on both E.T. and POLTERGEIST, though not totally unflawed, also works wonders. Like another reviewer, I think FIRESTARTER could easily have passed for a 'PG-13' rating, instead of an 'R'. Unfortunately, such a rating didn't exist yet when the film came out in the winter of 1984. Combining science fiction with suspense and the supernatural, FIRESTARTER is an effective thriller, well worth watching, even if Stephen King is not your particular cinematic bag.
Rating:
Summary: Drew Barrymore and Heather Locklear?
Review: To see these two in a movie. Could it happen twenty years later?
Rating:
Summary: Movie and book are underated and misunderstood
Review: What I think people don't understand about this story is that in
the year 1984, alot of the "Big Brother" theories were coming to life, meaning there were alot more authors writing stories about the secret factions of the United States Government. The Shop is the faction that Stephen King created, and the novel Firestarter takes you on the complete ride of what it feels like to have nowhere to hide. The movie is terrific, but in some parts I do feel like it may have been quickly knocked together, so they left out some important parts in the script. In the novel, Andy and Vicki McGee naively take part in a government experiment in college, but have no idea what they've gotten themselves into. The Shop is portrayed as diabolical, cold, and heartless. 'Either you be brainwashed, or you'll be exterminated. It's your choice.'
And THAT was what made it scary. Charlie and her power was not meant to be the frightening part at all (even though it is at times (: ) The frightening part is that a little girl is born into a situation in which there is no way out. So that's why I think that the movie and the book are underated by most critics.
But Firestarter is my all time favorite King book next to The Shining.
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