And now as continued from last time for my top twenty favorite Kings. (In case the header photo wasn't informative enough.)
Almost certainly a less sensible movie than many of the ones aforementioned, this one’s undergone a renewed appreciation of late. In a way that’s good. It’s as representative a slice of 80s horror as Friday the 13th, pt. 3 and was never as bad as it briefly had the reputation as being. (Like disco or Star Trek: The Motion Picture, the conventional wisdom on this one really changed somewhere over the last ten or twenty years.) In no way could it be considered a masterpiece, nor even a legit-great flick. It has, though, undeniably, a definite je-ne-sais-quois.
Is it the premise itself? The massive amounts of destruction? The cocaine buried in the mix? The campy performances? The AC/DC? The burning toilet paper scattered across the highway? The Green Goblin? The menace of the machines? The Emilio of Estevez? Its 80s-ness? The tension between familiar-King-characters in a situation beyond the author’s control/ powers? Unknown. All of the above and then some.
All I know is, I always enjoy watching this movie, and I always say at least once to myself "Oh boy, this is terrible." It's one of those movies. I probably don't need to tell you this, but that combo can on occasion be even more fun than a movie more traditionally-made.
Well now, the award for Most Improved Movie in My Personal Reckoning goes to this one. I didn’t quite love this movie, but for starters, it’s really pretty to look at, something I didn’t remember at all from the first time I saw it.
And it’s got a lot of heart. What it feels like is a personal film from Mick Garris, perhaps his ONLY personal film that I’m aware of. It works. There's a point when you're watching this where you can choose to go with it or turn it off; go with it.
Sadly I cannot find the notes I took while I was watching it. So I’ve got little specific to go on except the above. Which is a shame, as enjoying it on this 2020 King-movie-revisit was a pleasant surprise. I don't remember the original story too, too well; I tend to get it mixed up with "Nona" in my head. (See comments elsewhere about the people manning my mental file cabinets and their habit of misfiling things.) I was doing a big King Short Fiction re-read but then got off track and lost the mojo. I'll pick it up again sooner or later, but I think this movie goes its own way. One of the occasions I'm happy it did so. I look forward to watching this one again.
Here’s another one that seems to have only risen in prestige in the years since no one even knew it existed.
Which is kind of funny. I mean: it’s not a good movie. But we’ve covered that – it doesn’t have to objectively be “good” to be awesome. Graveyard Shift is not awesome – let’s be clear there, too. But it is fun. At least in theory. I have to say, I recently got the special edition blu-ray and Dawn and I watched it and for the first time I thought “Well… I don’t need to see that for awhile.”
Whereas for about ten watches prior to that (all taking place over the past eight years) it was getting more and more enjoyable, each time I watched it. I’d half convinced myself it WAS a good movie and just took a little digging. And who knows? That’s true of plenty of movies, probably this one too. But, I think I may have found my plateau of enjoyment with it. If so, it was a wild ride, Graveyard Shift, and like a letter-cube settling into place on a Boggle board, I think you may have finally found your spot.
The end-credits song belongs in whatever Museum of Stephen King opens in the years to come.
This is an odd movie. It’s well-made and engaging enough and follows the events of the novella fairly closely. Which is good – the original story is great fun. Except it ends (literally) on a note of hope, while the movie ends on the precise opposite of hope.
Is that the right choice to have made?
I don’t know. Works for some people. For me, had they ended it more like the novella, I’d have placed this higher. It’s the type of ending that shocks you but does it really illuminate / tie together what came before? The downer editing forces you to consider everything you’ve seen as either the “shit happens then gets worse then you die, tough titty, loser” nihilism popular with certain 21st century horror but not at all popular with me. Or the ending forces you to consider "the mist" as some kind of metaphor/ statement about… what? Depression? Despair? The audacity of hopelessness?
Tell you the truth, I’m surprised it’s where it is on this countdown. I have a feeling when I re-do these down the road it might fall a bit. It's well-made, but I split with people on the ending.
I have not watched the show. I kinda don't see the point of turning this into a show, I'll be honest. Perhaps I'll be pleasantly surprised.
Mark Pavia’s first film has a devoted cult following. And deservedly so – despite some clunky moments here and there, this is a very effective movie, with a good script, a strong (and rare lead) performance from Miguel Ferrer, as well as Julie Entwistle, who for some reason never went on to fame and glory. Why not? Clearly she had the goods. Pavia, too, (her husband incidentally). With the modest success and good reviews of Fender Bender let’s hope this guy gets more turns behind the camera, and especially more turns adapting King. I was excited a few years back when it looked like he was going to be making an anthology film out of "The Reaper's Image."
If there’s one part of this movie that fails for me on subsequent viewings, it’s the guy playing Renfield (Michael H. Moss). A good physical presence but some of the dialogue is delivered a in a sort of cosplay-Orson-Welles style.
Here’s an underappreciated movie. Although watching it for this post I was slightly impatient with it. Probably not the fault of the movie, though. Long days round here lately – by the time movie-time rolls around at night, I’m not always in the most patient frame of mind.
Johnny Depp gives a great performance, as does John Turtorro. We're so used to great performances from those guys it's tough to appreciate, sometimes, the little subtle touches they bring to things.
Very well-made film that preserves and showcases the twist quite well.
This one is as high in the list as it is solely due to Max Von Sydow’s performance as Leland Gaunt. How delightful is he here? Pretty darn delightful. It's the type of performance that - like Tim Curry's in the It mini-series - paves over whatever potholes are in the rest of the movie. Unlike that mini-series, though, there's less to pave over here.
The expanded version is a much better adaptation of the novel; I suppose it should be considered the director’s cut. It adds a great deal of the novel that was excised from the theatrical cut. But both versions work pretty well on account of the strong casts. It helps if you love the book, which I do.
I’d never seen this one until gathering my materials together for this post. I actually kind of loved it, to my immense surprise. It was always one of those “Why and how did they ever turn this short story into a book” items in my brain. Understandably - but unfairly, as it turns out.
Is it a masterpiece? No. Is it way closer to being one than it has any business being? Absolutely. “Masterpiece” is of course subjective. It’s an easygoing and dare-I-say sumptuous remix of old school horror and Tobe Hooper’s unique approach. (I’ve discovered through reading The Truth Inside the Lie that I really don’t know Hooper’s catalog anywhere near as well as I thought I did, though, so that statement has an asterisk. ) It expands King’s original story (a silly but effective old-school-horror-in-modern-clothes effort) into something even more monstrous. It retains the old-school-horror (virgin blood, belladonna, yadda yadda) and renders the absurd premise as believable, somehow.
I can't recall where I read it, apologies, but the film also doubles as Tobe Hooper's metaphorical assessment of his career in Hollywood. No need to even read that deeply into it to observe this, the analogs are fairly easy. (The machine = Hollywood, the family = the studio/executives, the cop = the independent director, his friend = his fans, etc.) This angle makes The Mangler not only an underappreciated King film but an unappreciated examination of 90s filmmaking in general, particularly the studio/indie dichotomy of those years.
I’ve a feeling I may bump this one down in a few years/ after a few more watches. You heard it here first! OMG #WatchThisSpace
Until I do, this is a great and somewhat-rare treat for King fans: a meticulously faithful adaptation of the story that still feels like pure cinema rather than just a read-along-storybook, as adaptations with lots of voice-over can seem sometimes.
Most of the ones that follow, actually, follow their source material quite closely. Probably no coincidence they land where they do in our countdown.
This one hasn’t aged well for me. But it seems to have aged like proverbial fine wine to everyone else, so I mostly keep my mouth shut. When the score is everyone five thousand and me zero, I think the issue is likely on my end and not the film's. And considering its director has two King adaptations in my top fifteen, it must be clear even to me on some level that everyone is right.
I try to pinpoint what it is that bugs me when I re-watch this now. Is it the performances? Somewhat. Too much narration telling me how to feel? Somewhat there, too. There's a sort of forced-march-of-nostalgia going on in some places. But there's plenty of that to compare it to, nowadays, where "Forced March of Nostalgia" is practically a genre you can pick on Netflix, and Stand By Me is miles above any of that crap.
So I guess it's not that the film hasn't aged well for me, it's that my relationship to it seems proportional to the context around me. When I was twelve it was my favorite thing ever. Then it wasn't. As a forty-six year old, I appreciate in a way I never could previously how well it did its job, even if I enjoy it less. Weird, eh?
Here's a movie that can be reduced - like a fraction - to less flattering descriptions. Tom Hanks plus Shawshank over gospel equals box office/ syndication/ Oscar glory, or something like that. A Marxist read on the film would be something like "passion play in blackface to absolve the capitalists of their racist crimes." The Opiate-Delivery-Mechanism Gospel According to Paul Edgcomb, or perhaps according to Mister Jingles.
But that shows the limitations of such reductive reviewing. The film works, as the novel works too. Sure you can say hey, this is just a warmed-over gospel metaphor, ("just") and maybe "problematic" to use such an overwrought term as that. It doesn't matter. That's neither the most relevant nor the most fulfilling takeaway from viewing this film. It's a great and very effective theatrical production, for one. Like Oliver Stone's JFK * you don't have to agree with either the conclusion or intent of the story just to admire its excellence as a production.
* It's a more interesting comparison that it might seem; someone should spend some time comparing and contrasting the two films. Both deal with an apostle-to-new-truth-like change in the protagonist's lives due to an assassination, the invisible hand of the "free market" as nefarious systemic metaphor, etc. Food for a later date perhaps.
Had the nation not had a touch of Tom Hanks fatigue in 1999, it's likely he'd have won another Oscar for this one. Shame Michael Clarke Duncan didn't win; he was nominated but Michael Caine took it home for The Cider House Rules. Which I've still yet to read, damn it.
The only thing wrong with this movie is the only thing wrong with the book: the epilogue. And there’s by no means wide agreement on whether there’s anything wrong with the book’s epilogue in the first place, so depending where you come down on that one, this will or won’t bother you at all.
Beyond the ending, though, this could have so easily been a disaster in the wrong hands, and it's quite the opposite. Great stuff here, a showcase for the considerable talents of Carla Gugino, as well as Bruce Greenwood who has become a reliable go-to in recent years. Nice to see that. He needs the right TV role. Or hell: how about casting HIM as Roland? Not the first or more obvious choice, but as I tried to think of iconic roles he could bring to life, that one flashed across my mind. In retrospect, he was the only thing they got one hundred percent right with the Lens Flare reboot.
Enough about Bruce Greenwood. It may be his character's game, but it's Carla's movie. This is a film whose reputation will only improve, I think.
I’ve come to realize that like Tobe Hooper I don’t know George Romero’s catalog half as well as I thought I did, either. So I’m not sure where this one falls on the Greatest Romero Ever list. My guess would be third or fourth, but it should at least be in the top five/ ten conversation.
People don’t talk about this one as much as they should, or so it seems to me. Maybe they do, what do I know what people are talking about? Maybe if I went to Stephen King dot com or the official chat forums I’d see page after glorious page of appreciation for this movie.
I suspect it’s one I might actually bump down a bit next time I do these, but for now I can thank The Truth Inside the Lie and its deep dive on the book for turning me on to this in a way I hadn't initially appreciated.
These are tied for my seventh favorite King movie because I honestly can't tell which one I love more. They both got into my head and King-reckonings around the same time (6th grade, VHS) and activate the same King-positive neurons in my brain. Simply put, I adore these movies.
Of the two, Creepshow is probably the "better-made" film. It's got that faux-EC design and the whole meteor-shit business. But better-made only goes so far in a subjective race; hell, The Dark Half is better-made than Creepshow, probably, but I'll take it over The Dark Half or most other Romero.
To honor such ambivalent passions and the thread of positivity between them, I present them here in tandem. James Woods, Leslie Nielson, Alan King, Ed Harris, EC - I was introduced to all of them for the first time in this era of repeat-watching-on-VHS via these two movies.
King’s so-called feminist period lasted from 1992 to 1995, although seems to me the work before and after is pretty feminist-friendly, too. But when people say “King’s feminist period,” they mean Gerald's Game, Rose Madder, Insomnia, and this one.
Of all the above, Dolores is my favorite, so it’s probably no surprise it’s one of my favorite King movies as well. It's fairly well-regarded among critics and audiences but somehow still feels underappreciated to me. A great film apart from being a great adaptation and one of Kathy Bates’ finest roles.
And speaking of Kathy Bates:
Where were you the night of November 30th, 1990? I was at the Walnut Hill movie theater in Woonsocket, RI, on a first date with a girl I'd be entangled with for a few years. Kind of an ominous title for a first date, no? We should’ve went to see Three Men and a Little Lady in the theater next door, maybe things would’ve ended differently.
I’ve had my ups and downs with this movie over the years. Loved it, then had it had bad connotations after things didn’t work down the line with the girl above, then I just kind of forgot about it for awhile. When I re-discovered it in the mid-00s at first I was critical of it then slowly began turning positive on it again. I've reread the book twice in the last ten years and each time I appreciated what they did with the movie even more. Adding the sheriff character was a good idea, as well as Frances Sternhagen. Both of whom feel like King characters even though they’re not from the book.
Kathy Bates is a hell of an actress. Her Annie Wilkes is a perfect mix of diabolical, nurturing, poignant, and off-her-meds nuts. And James Caan is great as Paul Sheldon. Hell, you don’t need me to sell the damn thing. Like the next few, a classic you can still trust after all these years.
"Sometimes it makes me sad, though, Andy being gone. I have to remind myself that some birds aren't meant to be caged. Their feathers are just too bright. And when they fly away the part of you that knows it was a sin to lock them up does rejoice. But still, the place you live in is that much more drab and empty that they're gone.
I guess I just miss my friend."
First time I saw this, I had to excuse myself and go into the bathroom and cry a little bit after I heard that, I'm not ashamed to say. Which never happened to me when reading the novella, although I read it many times before I ever saw the movie. Sometime around 2000, when the girl I'd been seeing for most of the 90s moved away. I guess the idea was she was a bird with bright feathers and I was stuck in prison. Funny how that comes back to me now, years and worlds later, and I still remember how that realization felt. Ah, the relationships of youth.
I always bring up these relationships when I review these things, but is that really so odd? I'm not reviewing these for Esquire or Sight and Sound. A lot of movies and music are tied up in our relationships. Anyway! No one should get the wrong idea. No one's lamenting anything. Not even getting older.
As with Misery or all these things you sure don't need me to sell this movie to you. It's one of those It's a Wonderful Life movies that will be aired on Thanksgiving or Easter for the next fifty to sixty years I bet.
I mentioned this in my remarks about the 2013 version last time: "The time/ momentum seemed / still seems right for Carrie to be remade and replace the De Palma version now over forty years old in the collective imagination. And this wasn’t bad, really; it’s just… not that. It should’ve swung for the fences. Did it? No one gives a performance anyone is still talking about, and that’s a problem. This is the sort of movie where that needs to happen. Or perhaps its cultural moment has passed? Maybe the imagery and events of Carrie have been absorbed into the culture and collective unconscious now, blunting its ability to reflect or shock us. We have assimilated Carrie, or perhaps been assimilated by it, so we can’t react to it that way, even if done well. "
I plan to rewatch this for Halloween season viewing this year, so I hope to add some further remarks in the comments. Depending when you’re reading this (and if it even happens) this review may be expanded. For now I’ll suffice to say De Palma is a polarizing director, but I find many of his films fascinating to watch. Though not in many a year. The stuff he was doing from the mid-70s through the mid-80s fascinates me most of all. Someone at some link I no longer have wrote about how The Exorcist 2: The Heretic is not a sensible sequel to The Exorcist, but it is a sensible progression in the career of John Boorman. This is true of De Palma, here, though not the sequel aspect, of course. That's a sort of cyphr for figuring out De Palma's movies, I think, the context of what in his own work he's reacting against or moving toward or away from. Carrie can be viewed equally well on those terms, as a King adaptation, as a 70s film, or just as a horror/ coming of age movie.
Unlike many and with all due respect, I prefer it to the book. As I do for:
David Cronenberg is another fascinating director. A bit less polarizing than De Palma, though probably not by much. I plan/ hope to watch The Dead Zone for Halloween 2020 as well, so same sitch as above.
Sitting alongside Cat’s Eye and Creepshow in my personal mental warehouse of Early King Fandom, this film retains all of its impact almost forty years later. Some say “now more than ever.” I’ve seen that written somewhere on this movie every few years since it came out, though. Its message is perennial, bipartisan, and poignantly conveyed through some brilliant and understated performances. (You'd never know Herbert Lom is the guy always trying to kill Inspector Clouseau from his moving performance here.) Its dreamscape of melancholy remains among the most remarkable achievements of Cronenberg’s career, a career with no shortage of remarkable achievements.
You know, I really should do a best-of Cronenberg post one day. Don’t know why I’ve never thought of this until right now. I think I’ve seen everything except Maps to the Stars.
It’s hard to come up with anything to say about this movie. Hasn’t it all been said? Reviews of the film these days read more like reviews of all the arguments about it, particularly the book vs. movie/ King vs. Kubrick divide.
I’ll try to sidestep all that as much as I can. Allow me to bullet point some things I love about this movie:
- If The Dead Zone is like a stroll through melancholy, this one is like soaking in a bath of dread. (Maybe the bath with the hacked-up lady from Room 237? Gross.) I’d never felt that from a movie before. It led, eventually, to exploring how a film could be designed to so effectively evoke such a feeling. Basically, in order to get to sleep one scared-sleepless night after watching this movie, I remember consciously thinking “someone had to put the camera in that room” and it opened up not just this movie but ALL movies to this sort of consideration.
- Jack’s performance as Jack Torrance. It’s not for everyone. Spielberg relays on a Kubrick documentary that once he told Kubrick that Jack’s performance was a little too much for him, and Kubrick likened it to James Cagney. I don’t know Cagney’s acting style or the specific film Spielberg mentions well enough to know if that’s accurate, but it makes sense to me, generally, as Kubrick’s approach to directing Jack in this movie.
- I like everyone’s performance in this movie, actually, from Danny Lloyd to Shelly Duvall to Scatman Crothers to the littler but so important tonally parts like Stuart Ullman (Barry Nelson) and Lloyd (Joe Turkel). They all add up to something. Part of the reason the film feels the way it does is because each performance is arranged the way it is.
- Ditto for every shot and steadicam sequence.
- In a way these are Captain Obvious points to make. I’m describing the simple grammar of film, editing, set design, etc. But damn if it’s not all harnessed so well here.
- All the snow. The ending. The changing of the jacket before the fish soiree.
- The soundtrack and sound design. Taking the atonal mayhem out of the concert halls and dropping it into the multiplexes of America as accompaniment to a horror film is the sort of public school prank I can get behind.
And finally, I love it just as a brilliant realization of the book. Many don’t, including (like any of you need me to tell you this) its author. So it goes. As for me, it’s my 2nd favorite King book, probably my favorite Kubrick movie, and here it is at the top of the charts of my favorite King movies.
