The Mist
2007 Dir. Frank Darabont There be evil in that there mist! Stephen King adaptations can be tricky. And often quite schlocky. For every Carrie or The Shining , we get a The Mangler . Not that this is a bad thing, mind. I mean, look whose blog you're reading! I positively delight in this stuff. Having helmed The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile , Frank Darabont is no stranger to King’s work. The Mist provides us with his first adaptation of one’s of King’s horror stories, though it’s easy to see why the director chose this novella to film. All the ingredients are ripe to make a gripping ‘small-band-of-people-seek-refuge-in-one-location-from-mysterious-force’ movie, akin to Night of the Living Dead or any number of John Carpenter films. The Mist however, manages to exploit the formula for all its worth and Darabont turns in a finely honed piece of taut and suspenseful cinema that still manages to feel fresh and, most importantly, surprising. The characters are...