The 1990 film is guilty on both counts \u2013 quick and exploitative – but his vitriol may have more to do with the material than mismanagement. Discounting a few novels he was already chipping at, \u201cGraveyard Shift,\u201d an 18-page short first printed in a 1970 issue of Cavalier<\/em>, remains the earliest Stephen King story adapted to date, written by a very different Stephen King.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After a star-studded first attempt – directed by Tom Savini, rewritten by Clive Barker, produced by Roger Corman \u2013 fell apart in the late 1980s, the rights reverted to King, who then shrugged them off to location manager Bill Dunn on the set of Pet Sematary <\/em>for a measly $2,500: \u201cYou pay as you go, as far as I\u2019m concerned.<\/a>\u201d On its face, the bargain was a favor to Dunn for helping him found the Maine Film Office, but his complete non-involvement, despite requiring they shoot it less than an hour from his house, tells a different story; King was only around to sell the option in the first place because he volunteered himself on constant call<\/a> for Sematary<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Another serendipitous presence on that set, however, was associate producer Ralph S. Singleton, who cut his production management teeth on five seasons of Cagney & Lacey<\/em>. For an independent, effects-heavy shoot, Dunn needed a director used to surviving tight schedules, and Singleton wrote the book on it<\/a>. Paramount agreed to distribute Graveyard Shift <\/em>as the hot Halloween ticket of 1990 and cameras started rolling on June 14th; from the word \u201caction,\u201d the film was a desperate measure in a desperate time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Stephen King wrote \u201cGraveyard Shift\u201d during his last semester at the University of Maine\u2019s College of Education, unaware he was halfway between textile jobs. The first helped him save for college during and after his senior year of high school, working from 3:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. at a mill eulogized in On Writing<\/em> as \u201ca dingy fuckhole overhanging the polluted Androscoggin River.<\/a>\u201d That Fourth of July, the foreman offered time-and-a-half to anyone willing to help clean the \u2018hole, including a basement infested with rats \u201cbig as dogs<\/em>.\u201d He missed out on the shift, but earned $200 for imagining what could\u2019ve been. It doubled as a consolation prize; finding no teaching positions after graduation, King worked at an industrial laundry making $1.60 an hour. Another time, another measure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The only concession between Shift<\/em>s is a thinning of the mutant rat herd since $10.8 million only allowed for one animatronic star \u2013 a 20-foot-long, 320-pound<\/a> bat-thing lovingly nicknamed \u201cArlene the Cuisinart<\/a>\u201d by FX designer Gordon Smith. Otherwise, the film preserves most of King\u2019s sparse story, to the fault of not larding enough slimy meat on the bones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cDrift-ah\u201d John Hall hitches into a sleepy town in rural Maine \u2013 not Castle Rock, although it is mentioned \u2013 comprised entirely of three locations at the same intersection: the rat-infested Bachman (natch) Textile Mill, its adjoining Gothic cemetery, and a greasy spoon across the street. The film gives him a dead wife and a Save-The-Cat payoff to his accuracy with sling-shot Pepsi cans, but \u201cboy scout\u201d David Andrews gets nuked off the screen before the opening credits are over; never was a death knell so sweet as \u201cAnd Brad Dourif As The Exterminator.\u201d He is the Quint of rats, down to a USS Indianapolis<\/em> speech about how his vermicidal tendencies stem from the traitorous Rodentia of C\u1ed3n Ti\u00ean that betrayed our boys to work with the V-C, although he \u201cain\u2019t one of them burning-baby, flashback fuck-ups you see Bruce Dern playing.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Shift<\/em> never fully recovers when Dourif\u2019s character, the best addition to the short story by a mile, pointlessly clocks out, as if Robert Shaw tripped overboard and drowned before ever seeing a shark. Fortunately, Stephen Macht unhinges his jaw wide enough to swallow the remaining scenery whole as the despicable Foreman Warwick. To compensate for the rest of the cast shrugging off accents, he speaks in Maine, Scottish, and Jamaican drawls simultaneously, inventing a dialect like an alien that learned phonics from a lobster house; in regards to stale coffee: \u201cCahn\u2019t be moore than an inst\u2019nt enem-ah by now.\u201d He has no redeeming qualities, no wants at all besides at least two mistresses and the blood of any employee who flirts with runners-up. His is the soul of the film, grotesque and unrepentant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In Danse Macabre<\/em>, Stephen King broke down his triune hierarchy of genre provocation, citing \u201cthe gross-out\u201d as the last act of a desperate author: \u201cI\u2019m not proud<\/a>.\u201d Just when his adaptations were trending classy again, a month before Misery <\/em>and the It <\/em>miniseries, Graveyard Shift <\/em>delivered a King story without any. Minus credits, it\u2019s 83 minutes of sweat, piss, blood, ooze, and not much else, humble grist for basic cable Halloween marathons; you already missed it in this year\u2019s FearFest<\/a>. The film does not deserve a six-way tie for worst Stephen King adaptation<\/a> by Rotten Tomatoes metric or the ire of its originator. In defiance of the ongoing arms race for his tonier<\/a> material<\/a> to<\/a> adapt<\/a> and<\/a> adapt again<\/a>, Graveyard Shift<\/em>, in both forms, is a shameless geek show of Stephen King\u2019s cheapest and ugliest tricks, from a period when he had to make his audience squirm by any means necessary. That\u2019s still worth its weight in rat shit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But for now, show\u2019s ovah<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Graveyard Shift” is streaming on Hoopla<\/a> and AMC<\/a>, and is available for digital rental or purchase<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/graveyard-shift-still-1024x576.webp\")
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