'90s Trash?: Graveyard Shift (1990)

 No matter how bad your 4th of July Weekend could have been, it can't be worse than this! 

This is Stephen King's Graveyard Shift, a 1990 Horror Film.  The titular Director doesn't like the Film.  He didn't like The Shining or Children of the Corn either.  Is it as good as those Films?  Eh, no.  The Plot involves a group of people, lots of rats, a strange creature and a Mill.  What a fun combo.  Its Director- Ralph S. Singleton- only has 2 Credits to his name (as a Director).  It is 2 Episodes of Cagney & Lacey and this.  Yep. 

His Resume is more interesting when you factor in his Credits as some sort of Production Manager (Unit/Location/etc).  This way, you can lump together such Films as Captain America II: Death Too Soon, Harlem Nights and The French Connection.  Sure- why not?!? 

As far as the Cast goes, we have Brad Dourif, Stephen Macht and Andrew Divoff.  The Stars of Child's Play, Amityville (1992: It's About Time) and Wishmaster united! 

To find out how this Story that is less than 20 pages long can translated into a 90 minute Film, read on...

In a Cold Open, a man working in a Textile Mill kills some rats (that always linger about) before something makes him fall into the Machine and get killed.

A wanderer ('That Guy' Actor David Andrews) ends up in Town and is just looking for some work.

A man- Stephen Macht- who runs the Mill (who's an asshole) hires him, but he's got some drama.

He's hitting on one woman (who ignores it) and dates another, who he proceeds to treat like crap.

Stealing the Show for a pair of major Scenes, Brad Dourif is an Exterminator who deals with some of the rats, but eventually gets killed.

Oh well- he was fun and mostly-pointless.

As the work goes on, random people are killed by the Rats and some sort of POV creature that they tease.

What is it?!?

Our Hero and a group of workers get bonus pay for working over the July 4th Weekend cleaning out the long-messy Basement of the Building.

What could go wrong?

They find a Sub-Basement, get attacked by the creature and discover what appears to be at least a Century's worth of human remains.

Oh.

Also the Boss kills our Hero's Girlfriend, since, pathos.

The Boss and the Creature have a big showdown...which ends in seconds.

I mean, it is a normal man with a knife against an 8-foot Bat/Rat Creature.  What did you expect?

Since it is a Horror Film, our Hero's escape is short-lived as the Creature shows up for One Last Hurrah.

After some tense moments, he activates the machine via Pepsi Slingshot and kills it, making the Film come full-circle (as it knocked that first guy into it at the beginning). 
The End.

A fun, but pretty nothing bit of horror fluff.  Graveyard Shift does nothing new.  Graveyard Shift isn't riddled with errors and gaffs.  Somewhere in that glorious, boring middle lies stuff like this.  The Acting is fine. 
Dourif does well with his limited time, while it interesting to see Divoff just plain 'lose his shit' here.  He's always so measured and controlled in Films, so it's a bit like that Scene from the '90s Body Snatchers where Forrest Whitaker breaks down (and retroactively loses his future Oscar). 
Andrews is fine, if unimpressive as our Lead.  He's just so generic. 
Macht as the Boss has some Character, but doesn't evolve beyond Asshole Boss.  It's weird how the Film can't decide if the deaths are some form of punishment (like horny teens dying in Slasher Films) or tragic losses (like in non-Slasher Films). 
The scorned (and physically abused) Girlfriend falls down some stairs and gets eaten alive.  Yea?  Boo? 
The strong woman who works with Andrews (and almost makes the Film pass the Bechdel Test) is just straight-up stabbed and dies.  Boo.. right? 
Some of them (like Token Black Guy) get mean, prolonged deaths for no reason, while others are killed in a flash. 
Is there a message or was there just a kill quota? 

As to why King doesn't like the Film, well, I'll get into that in a future Fiction vs. Fiction (UPDATE- It only took me 15 Months!). 

For now, just know that Graveyard Shift is a decent Horror Film and nothing more, in spite of my love of retro Pepsi Logos.

Next time, I go back to the Black and White Era to cover a long-owned Film.  Will I find a John Carradine Film that IS NOT embarrassing?  Stay tuned...