MovieChat Forums > Christine (1983) Discussion > I love Dennis in the book

I love Dennis in the book

posted 10 years ago by MissEFierro
5 replies | jump to latest

Stephen King really knows how to go into details that you don't even know you need to know. Dennis is such a normal teenage boy in the book, he's telling the story a few years later, but it's just so good. I love his relationship with Arnie. I always hate whenever something bad happens in movies the person always acts like they care, but leave the main character until it gets bad. Dennis was along for everything. It's just a really cool friendship they had.

I like the movie Dennis too. I really bought his friendship with Arnie, even though Keith Gordon said him and John Stockwell weren't really friends while filming.

[–] LadyDi4476 9 years ago

One of my absolute favorite aspects of the book Christine is the friendship between Arnie & Dennis. For me it's not about the car as much as it is about those two characters and how much they loved each other like brothers.

-Di

[–] cincykid07 9 years ago

Yeah Dennis is a really good friend to Arnie in the book and the movie. John Stockwell gave an honest portrayal. I also like how they delved into Dennis' life with his family, especially his younger sister whom he was very close with. The book really fleshed out his character and the relationship. On the other hand, Dennis wasn't a total saint as he and Leigh end up hooking up in the book behind Arnie's back. In the movie they are just friends; either to make the Dennis character look more stand-up or probably due to time constraints of editing. Sadly, I really did enjoy the chapter of when Arnie catches Leigh and Dennis together, I though that was really good story telling.

[–] ArcherAdam 9 years ago

There's actually some scenes that were cut that made Stockwell's Dennis more like the character portrayed in the book. Check out these unfinished deleted scenes. In the final one, Dennis and Leigh meet at burger place while Arnie watches them kiss from his car. There was quite a lot of Dennis' and Arnie's relationship cut from the movie.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7bb4a7na7g

[–] PinkPancreas 9 years ago

I agree- I loved the Dennis character in the book and thought John Stockwell did a great job of bringing him to life in the movie. I like in King's novels how characters sometimes pop up again in his other novels. I have always thought and hoped Dennis would pop up again somewhere so we could see what he was up to...

[–] nmitrione (293) 7 years ago

I like the movie but I always felt it never did enough character development. Arnie in my opinion never seemed to be very likable in the movie. It would have been great to see why Dennis and him were such good friends that Dennis was willing to risk his life for him. Plus there were a lot of guys going after Leigh, why did she select Arnie? It doesn't seem like she would date him just because of his car, in particular since she hated the car.