*** Official THE MIST Discussion Thread (1 Viewer)

James Bs review. 3 and 1/2 stars

http://www.reelviews.net/movies/m/mist.html

I havent read a King novel since the late 80s. Gonna have to check this one out.

Yikes. And here I thought Pet Sematary was the most evil book I had ever read.

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H

You must - its a classic 'horror' story.

I can't look at the specifics of your post Chuck because I have not seen the movie yet. BTW are you a horror fan per se? I don't remember seeing you in too many horror movie threads.

Is your response to the movie solely predicated on the ending? The book version was open ended - would such an ending shift your overall opinion much?

I like good horror. I'm a mood-type guy, not gore.

The horror elements in The Mist are exceptional. I don't mind a tough horror film, which this most certainly is. I am genuinely unimpressed with most horror films these days, so I rarely see them in the theater.

Again, this is by no means a bad film. Were the ending more open-ended, I would probably be a much bigger fan (as I really liked and admired 98% of the running time, if not more). I can't really discuss what didn't work for me about the end at all. Any mere hint would spoil the film at some level, which I find highly distasteful. I've had to be quite careful in what I have said already

Once folks have seen it, I can be more specific. But yes, my gripe is ending-specific. The film itself is quite good. The horror aspects are horrific. There are no easy deaths in the film...each is graphic and excruciating and awful. The horror fan in me admired that. It added to the sense of alienation and despair.

My thoughts on the ending...in spoilers

As a parent, it hit me like a punch in the gut! It was wrenching! And it worked for me. Reminded me of the bleak ending from 70's movies, ie Electra Glide in Blue, Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry, Race With the Devil, and at the time we were in the middle of a war that polarized the country as well. I don't Darabont was consciously replicating that, but face it, we live in bleak times and movies often reflect that.

The best "monster" movie since The Thing.

OK - I'm out of here until I see the movie.

Think of it as a cautionary tale to NOT lose hope. See--David gave up too quick. They all did. Almost all of the deaths in the movie come because they were motivated BY HOPELESSNESS, not hope itself. David, to escape Carmody before she kills them. Brent, to prove David wrong. The twist there at the end, the punch in the balls I referred to, comes because of the one person in the movie who let her fierce hope shine, she is vindicated. She left that supermarket and she was vindicated.

Darabont is slick because he makes all this hopelessness on David's part look like it's the right course of action. But it's a course of RE-action. Hope doesn't really factor in--and he pays for it.

That might be one interpretation you could look through.

And yeah, my bad, I'd forgotten Pet Sematary. Probably on par with this movie. But I was speaking more about the fact that King never wrote anything as mean as THIS MOVIE feels.

RA:I'd love to see it that way, but I can't. The MINUTE they run out of gas, he goes for the gun? Not even a moment to spend with his kid? Not a few hours to eat groceries? He was motivated by hope when they left. I agree they were leaving Carmody, but he really thought they might get somewhere.

As for the mother he saw...she was motivated by guilt and fear when she left. She left her CHILDREN alone...with the oldest being 8. That's pretty irresponsible. So I don't think hope pushed her out of the store. I think it was terrified guilt.

I see that as a viable interpretation, but it doesn't gel with my experience as a parent
Maybe No Country (the last film I saw...I need to go see Enchanted ) has me thinking in terms of fatality and "mote of dust". I don't know. I appreciate that thought, RA. But as I said above...it needed to push a little farther at the end for me to buy that.

Yeah, the instant I saw it, I knew that no amount of set-up was going to make this forgivable for some. No matter what, for some, that is going to be an unearned ending. It's not a knock, it's just--people have their thresholds when it comes to entertainment.

I'll say this though, for Darabont:

I honestly thought, for a split second there, he wasn't going to cut outside of the car. I thought I had like an extra 2 minutes to go in there. I thought I was going to watch this guy, with blood splattering on his face, one-by-one kill the people in that car. I was actually mildly RELIEVED when it cut to the outside and the first flash went off. And then I was sickened again

I think the lack of wait between the gas running out before they look at each other was made plausible, tonally, by how FAST the movie was running at that point. It only seemed like a hasty decision AFTER the movie ended. At the time, I was totally wrapped up in it.

True though:

there's guilt involved with that woman. But there's determination and caring, as well. She felt bad, but not bad enough to give up hope that she could fix it. That's a different KIND of hope, but it's hope nonetheless. Maybe desperate, but desperate hope is better than none at all. I don't think David was really HOPING for anything out there, he was just trying to get away before Carmody stabbed his kid. As far as groceries go--they didn't grab em, did they? I don't remember Ollie taking em after shooting Carmody. Which didn't happen in the story, if I remember it right. She lived. This is how black souled this movie is: People willingly CHEERED when Ollie took her out. An old bag boy shot the religious zealot in the gut and in the head before running out to the lovecraftian horror from planet x and they CHEERED.

My friend at the screening called this: It's not gonna make any money at the B.O.

But neither did Shawshank.

People will come around. I'm pretty sure of it. And the filmmaking is pretty damned good, regardless. I know he took the crew he used on the Shield, but this felt like Battlestar, to me. It was sorta satisfying to see the tone of those shows realized in a movie theater, and to see that people weren't ready for it.

I don't know how many screenings this happened at, but there was a lot of boos at the end of the movie when I saw it. Patrons at my theater really seemed to be quite put off by how the film ended. I heard a lot of "that sucked" in the lobby.

What's funny is that the employee screening I went to on Tuesday night earned the same sort of reactions. Its going to be really interesting to see how well this movie does at the box office.

Personally, I thought the movie was decent, it was just so...bleak. Jettisoning the semi-hopeful ending of the book and inserting the new finale didn't lack in the boldness department.

The screening I went to today was far diffrerent.. at least the rumblings I heard... or lack of them.. During the second to the final scene you could hear a pin drop..... then when the final characters rolled on the screen... you heard a gasp......

My whole thought was like what others have said.. why didn't he wait a little longer... wait till the car was engulfed with "them"... Until that happens... I wouldn't of ended it.......

I really liked the movie.......

The ending was bleak no doubt. I prefer the book ending where it is left amibigious. If Darabont had made his ending where they all had survived it would have be a cop-out Hollywood ending.

I'm willing to bet there is an alternate version where that happens.

I really hated the use of the Lisa Gerard arabic wailing music during the end sequence (Enough already! It's been 7 years since Gladiator for christ sakes ). And the CG tentacle took me out of the flick a little.

But the rest was really well done.

I wouldn't say the film was "enjoyable" . Although all the scare set-pieces were very thrilling in a classical way, Darabont's tone was never aiming to be some kind of "enjoyable experience". The basic thrust of the film is too focused on uncomfortably observing the break-down of humanity to be some kind of rousing entertainment. But this approach is totally applicable to an ice cold, bitter pill horror narrative - which this film most certainly is.

I'm positive the film wouldn't have been so affecting had Darabont made it as his follow-up to Shawshank (as he originally planned). The low budget/guerilla style/back-against-the-wall filmmaking (and his obvious seething anger at America post-911) seeems to have kept him extremely focused to the task at hand.

I agree with Robert Anthony that it will age well. And Thomas Jane gives good Kurt Russell.

I loved this one. As far as the ending, I've been complaining to friends for years that a bunch of films would be dramtically improved with this type of an ending, leaving the main character emotionally shattered. Nice to see that it actually works. One of the best horror offerings I've seen in a while. I also like how the more standard monster moments are as graphic as any other genre film, yet never feel exploitative.

Another thing that I noticed is Frank Darabont just seems to understand how to adapt a Stephen King book to the movies. I haven't read the Mist, but I wa expecting a way more subtle film based on his track record. the other Stephen King guy for making movies is Mick Garris who did the TV versions of The Stand and The Shining, and those in comparision just didn't work for me, budgets fully considered.

Darabont is like the anti-Mick Garris.

Man, I hate it when threads get split up - it really makes it difficult to follow the discussion.

Saw this on Saturday...bleak, yes...awesome horror movie that will ultimately be considered a classic, most definitely.

I go back and forth on the ending...I walked out feeling empty, sad, and completely disoriented. So that's pretty cool...

I actually thought that added to the bleakness of the situation.. I really like the music..

Found that piece of music on You Tube. It's The Host of Seraphim by Dead Can Dance: