Reading over that description, I’ll have to remind you all that this is the good part of the movie. Kasdan (who’s usual terrain is ensemble pieces of a different sort, like “The Big Chill” and “Mumford”) delivers great fun of the I’m-freaked-out-so-I’ll-laugh-nervously variety. John Seale’s winter cinematography is stunning, setting just the right mood. James Newton Howard’s score is deliciously unnerving. We start to invest in the characters and all four actors do nice work, particularly Lewis and the wonderfully funny Jason Lee, who finds himself straddling the top of a toilet seat to contain an unseen, eel-like beastie that has just birthed itself in the most revolting of ways, in a sequence that is so scary it had me shaking like a leaf. Alas, this is all for naught.

Morgan Freeman - one of our finest actors - shows up as Colonel Kurtz, the leader of a government operation called Blue Unit that is designed to hunt down aliens on Earth (it seems they’ve been roaming around for a while). Suddenly, “Dreamcatcher” stops emulating “The Thing” and becomes a remote version of “Independence Day”, as well as a plague movie, a possession movie, and a cheesy CGI gorefest. There’s a bizarre aerial attack sequence, an alien named Mr. Gray who inhabits one of our heroes and speaks in a sneering British accent, hatching alien eggs, a plot to take over the world, and finally the appearance of an emaciated Donnie Wahlberg as the grown-up Duddits, who will inevitably save the world with his Scooby Doo lunchbox in tow - a plot device that is so painfully stupid that you will begin to wonder if someone dropped a hit of bad acid in your Coke and it took hold at around the film’s 60-minute mark, and slowly but surely contorted your environment into the wackiest, weirdest and most nightmarish hallucination ever. But no, that’s just the movie.

Kasdan and co-writer William Goldman are a little overzealous in their attempt to be faithful to King’s novel, tossing in everything but the kitchen sink (no, wait... the kitchen sink is there). The military subplot is completely senseless, wasting the talents of Freeman and Tom Sizemore (as Kutz’s second-in-command), who have the film’s most laughable dialogue and look dumbfounded. There’s little rhyme or reason to anything that happens in the second half of “Dreamcatcher” - right down to its hilariously abrupt climax. Why does Kasdan start using annoying swipe cuts as scene transitions? Why must Jonesy’s “memory warehouse” be such an integral part of the plot? Why are the aliens British? Why? Why?? Why!?!?

“Dreamcatcher” concludes with amateur-hour filmmaking and splashy but unconvincing visual effects - excesses I would not expect from Lawrence Kasdan (did I mention he co-wrote “The Empire Strikes Back”? Sweet Jesus...). But, that first movie - the one without the helicopters and giant CGI monstrosities - is sure a wonderful mood piece. Not that the aliens themselves are the problem - though derivative of "Alien", they have a rather cool design. For a college film class project, I propose that someone takes the first hour of “Dreamcatcher” and then splices on an alternative second hour. Perhaps even negotiate to get Thomas Jane, Damian Lewis, Jason Lee and Timothy Olyphant together and reshoot it. Leave the military angle out.

Now, that is something I would pay to see.