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The Lawnmower Man (1992)
The film is adapted from the merging of a 1975 short story by Stephen King with an original screenplay entitled "CyberGod." While King's story focused on the titular character, a rotund, animal-like Pan worshipper who strips naked and eats the newly cut grass like a goat while controlling his lawnmower with mystical powers, the film has the same character controlling the lawnmower by means of the untapped potential of the human brain, which has been stimulated by advanced, but unethical scientific experiementation. In both versions, the character, initially presented as an unthreatening worker, turns into a menace once his powers are manifested, but in the film, this is the result of stimulation of the brain by nootropic drugs beyond the titular character's capacity for human goodness.
The Lawnmower Man (1992)
The plot of Stephen King's 1975 short story "The Lawnmower Man" concerns Harold Parkette, who hires "Pastoral Greenery and Outdoor Services Inc." to cut his lawn. Parkette later spies on the serviceman, discovering his lawnmower mows the lawn by itself while he crawls after it, naked, eating the grass. The serviceman is actually a satyr who worships the Greek god Pan. When Parkette tries to call the police, the mower and its owner ritually kill him as a sacrifice to Pan.
The film's original script, written by director Brett Leonard and producer Gimel Everett, was written between May and August 1990 under the title The Lawnmower Man, and carried minor elements of King's original story, including the scene where Jobe kills Peter's father with the lawnmower "Big Red", and the aftermath in which the police state that they found some of his remains in the birdbath. The addition of a government agency known as "The Shop" was drawn from separate works of King's, such as Firestarter (1980) and The Tommyknockers (1987). Leonard stated that the main inspiration for placing the story in virtual reality was seeing Jaron Lanier and his VPL Research technology at a San Francisco event called "Cyberthon"; Brosnan later suggested using some Lanier's lines in the film, and both VPL's DataSuit and EyePhone appear in the film as props.[7]
Jobe Smith, the "lawnmower man" of the title, suffers from a form of mental retardation; he lives in the garden shed owned by the local priest, Father Francis McKeen. McKeen's brother, Terry, is a local landscape gardener and employs Jobe to help him with odd jobs. When Father McKeen finds insects around the church altar, he blames Jobe and beats him with a leather strap for forgetting his chores.
Jobe acquires telekinetic powers and takes Marnie to the lab to have sex with her in virtual reality; but something goes wrong in the simulation and Marnie cannot move and starts to panic. The experience is so traumatic that she is permanently brain damaged. Jobe's powers and abilities continue to grow, although the treatments seem to be affecting his mental stability, and soon he takes revenge on those who abused him when he was "dumb"; Father McKeen is engulfed in flames, a young man named Jake is tortured by a "lawnmower man" continually mowing his brain, and Jobe directs a real lawnmower to run down Peter's abusive father. Jobe makes the investigating police officers attribute it all to "bizarre accidents". 041b061a72