A gut-punching horror film that captures with almost perfect pitch the pervasive dread of Stephen King’s best work. Okay, sure: this is a giant other-dimensional bug movie, with a creature-feature set-up (a group of civilians trapped in a small space, facing this aggressive unknown), and laden with many of the sorts of corn-poney character tics that sometimes drowns King’s work. Even with such constraints, though, Frank Darabont works some wonders: the creatures are generally be-misted, foggy hints of things we’re left imagining, or–when dragged into the limelight for stop-motion or goofy-puppet attacks, they’re consistently freaky; the group trapped in the supermarket hew to certain stock traits but the actors and the writing make the human dynamics something consistently stronger than you’d expect from a skeletal plot outline (particularly fine are Toby Jones and William Sadler).
But what fucking nailed me was the way the camera would turn and face–unflinchingly, for far too long–raw human fear and anxiety. Sure, the set-up’s silly, but you take the leap (there are things in the Mist!) and suddenly Thomas Jane trying to console his terrified crying boy for what seems like three full minutes is beyond unnerving–it’s deeply unsettling. There are so many moments like that, so many times where you fall into the sense of doom which hangs over the film (and, be warned, NEVER lets up) — and by god this film scared me as much as anything I’ve seen in years. Not the boom-shock freak-out you might expect when monster bugs attack, not the grotesque spilling of blood and body parts (relatively tame) . . . nope, the film is most horrifying when the monsters are at bay, and the people are simply trying to figure out what to do when they know, deep down, there’s nothing to be done.
My favorite moments in King’s fiction–even in a big-screen good’n’evil mash-up like _The Stand_, where the point seems to be to move through that existential allegory toward heroic, Romantic resolution–are those moments where the horror is simply what’s around, while we struggle just to get by. The inevitability of death, the inability to fight back, the inexorable creep of hopelessness. _Pet Sematary_ is his crowning achievement here, but I recall the story “The Mist” finding in its B-movie homage a similar sick-to-my-stomach dread. This movie got that sensibility right, and it’s good. I really enjoyed it.
oh, great! another in mike’s “son anxiety” series. did you cry like a baby, mike?
I cried like a man!
No, no crying. And I don’t think it was the “son” or child thing that got under my skin; rather, I think the film sets up the idea of the “hero” who, acting smartly, makes things better, takes reasonable action, resolves the situation… but can’t. Couldn’t. Won’t. And listening to this take-charge, no-nonsense, good-guy Dad seek to console his kid, you realize (and perhaps so does the kid, who won’t stop crying) how empty his consolations are. By holding on this scene, Darabont amps up the dread–normally, we’d see a shot like this, and 10-15 seconds of good manly calm-voiced authority would calm the kid down, and we in the audience would also feel relieved. (Things *will* get better! Phew.) Doesn’t happen here.
Sheesh. Happy fucking Thanksgiving! I took a chance on a new cinema which is somewhat closer (in driving time) to home than my old favorite, but you know the suburbs . . . it took about an hour for the sound system to catch up so I was fuming and planning my angry e-mail, BUT . . . The Mist takes a hold and it won’t let go. The sense of doom is nail-bitingly omnipresent, the characterizations tightly controlled (in particular Marcia Gay Harden, Toby Jones, Francis Sternhagen, William Sadler, even the kid from Babel), the camera work appropriately claustrophobic. And that ending! Interesting to have seen this and No Country for Old Men in the same weekend; talk about a doozy of a double feature. That all being said, I’ll toss out a ball. What do you think of King’s (and Darabont’s) use of the military? Given the current cultural climate, I’d say the film wants to have its cake and eat it too. To say any more would give too much away, but there is a contradictory tension in this film that I can’t seem to reconcile. Still, this film creeped me out and felt lean and economic even at 127 minutes.
I’m gonna bury a quick review of I Am Legend here, so Mauer doesn’t go apeshit about this, but… Will Smith kind of sells the movie. What works, as so many reviews have noted, is the first hour–which follows Smith’s Robert Neville (and his dog) around a humanless NYC, shooting at deer, following his routines with rigorous attention to his watch, slipping too often into memories, barely holding it together. It’s pretty haunting and low-key, spooky, occasionally teeth-clenching — and Smith is really just damn good, restrained and lost and (yup) subtle. I put it here because, like The Mist, this at least at first is that best rare breed of horror most interested in dread, less interested in bang boo blood.
Then it goes kind of to shit in the last 30-45 minutes, never really sucking but utterly forgettable. Still… half-worth it for a really fine hour. Having read Alan Weisman’s _The World Without Us_, it was intriguing to see some glimpses of that human-less world he’d drawn so well. Glimpses.
And in addition to being a boring ending, the film yet again gave up on the novel’s pretty fine close, which instead of making the mutants/vampires mere villains realizes a kind of reversal, where the last man becomes a kind of ‘ghost’ in the light, a scary avenging demon who creeps in and destroys the new community. The film is uninterested in this, instead returning to the hokey cliches of human redemption, but Matheson’s work fits very well with Weisman’s: mournful examination of a world where the human disappears into legend and ruin.
Obviously, I repeat my recommendation of The Mist, which is really just a damn good and haunting film. But when it pops up on cable, maybe give Legend an hour of your time.
I’ve read in a few places that Will Smith is good in this. Maybe he is. The human-less NYC appeals to me a lot, esp. after reading the World Without Us earlier this year. And I’ll probably rent this one when it goes to DVD.
i don’t know why mike buries reviews of films in threads about other films–is it really so hard to just start a new thread?
but whatever. we watched the mist tonight. it was not as scary as i expected–i’m surprised to read that mike was apparently more scared than i was–but it was pretty unsettling. apart from a few scenes where there’s too much exposition on humanity that strains credulity (grocery stores in new england are apparently staffed by people who think deeply on the human condition), and despite marcia gay harden taking bigger bites out of the scenery than even the largest bugs, the film keeps up a pervasive mood of impending doom. very cool half glimpses of giant monsters in the mist, and very fine use of music as well. however, neither sunhee nor i could quite figure out how to read the film’s ending.
[massive spoilers follow]
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in a sense marcia gay harden is correct, right? it is a kind of end of the world caused by scientific hubris, and while she dies, the people she’s attracted presumably survive. meanwhile the heretics take off, are killed and kill themselves, and it is only after an abrahamic sacrifice (the one that she had called for) that one of them survives. in any case, i want you all to know that if i ever lead an escape from a grocery store and we run out of gas and it looks like all is lost, i’ll wait till the monsters actually show up before shooting you all in the head.
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i also once again wonder if mike and i see the same cuts of most movies. about all i remembered of mike’s original review while watching was his mention of some scene in which thomas jane’s son cries forever. but no such scene presented itself.
Given your empathic skills, maybe you didn’t realize the kid was crying?
Or maybe it’s my excessive empathy. I’m very caring.
And if we are ever trapped in a supermarket, I will shoot you in the head and use you as flesh. Monsters or no monsters. Just whenever we are in a supermarket.
I didn’t bury this review. I buried a review in this review.