November 29, 2007 @ 10:41 pm
Kat and I saw The Mist tonight, and oh boy, do I need to talk about it.
This “review” will be spoiler-filled, so if you don’t want to have any details, much less the ending, spoiled for you, stop reading NOW!
Okay, I’m going to break it down bit by bit, saving the infamous ending for, well, the end. (I can say “infamous” because in every single review I’ve read so far, it is without a doubt the most disputed element of the movie.)
Before I start, I have to say that I have never seen my wife so angry about a movie before. She said she has never hated a movie more than The Mist.
Me? I liked it. For awhile. Until the end.
The Story
Bad storm brings strange mist filled with tentacles, pterodactyls, and giant spiders (among other things). David Drayton and his young son are trapped in a grocery store with a bunch of others, including a religious wacko who sees all this as the End of Days. The movie isn’t so much about the nasties in the mist as it is about the nasties in the grocery store.
The Monsters
I’ve been waiting many years for someone to make a movie out of The Mist. Mostly because I am completely creeped out by spiders, and The Mist has got some nasty ones. These spiders are as big as dogs and they shoot acid-coated webbing. Overall I felt the special effects in the film were a little too cartoony for me in spots, but the spiders didn’t disappoint.
The Ending
Oh boy. Well, I’ve gotta tell you what it is before I go on, so here goes. Please don’t read on if you don’t want to be spoiled.
Okay, so Drayton, his son, Amanda Dumfries, the old lady, and the old man pile into Drayton’s jeep and drive off. They head back to Drayton’s house to get his wife — surprise, she’s dead, spun up by the spiders (in the original story, the road is blocked and Drayton never finds out what happened to his wife; I guess you can’t have that kind of ambiguity in a Hollywood movie). So they head south, as far as their gas will take them. They run out of gas. They stop. They hear the monsters closing in. Drayton takes out the gun. Four bullets left, five of them in the jeep. So Drayton shoots everyone in the car and steps out to let the monsters have him. But wait! The army shows up! And the mist is dissipating! Thank God! he thinks. We’re okay! The army’s here! We’re saved! Oh wait… I killed everyone. Crane shot of Drayton screaming and crying. Fade out.
Okay, so I hated the ending. I hated it for many reasons, the least of which was I didn’t feel it fit. I just don’t buy Drayton killing his young son, as well as the other three people in the car, right after they made the big decision to leave the supermarket because they’d rather die fighting than just sitting around. Yeah, Drayton looks all tortured and torn up about it, but I still can’t believe he’d do it. I can’t believe the three other adults in the car would let him do it to them. I just didn’t buy it.
I feel like the ending was thought up by the kind of juvenile horror fan who thinks the genre is only about violence and gore and making the viewer walk away feeling like shit. To these people it isn’t possible for a horror movie to be in bad taste, because if someone feels that way, oh well, it’s a horror movie, right? That’s the point! Yeah, well, I’m a horror lover from way back, and I don’t agree with that definition at all. Horror can be horrifying, or offensive, or disturbing, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a certain finesse involved. Even a silly blood and boobies movie like Hostel had a better ending than The Mist.
The unfortunate part was that the ending would have been completely fine by me if it had happened about two minutes earlier, if Drayton had killed everyone in the car and then the movie fades to black, or Drayton runs out into the mist, or any other ending other than the cheap trick of having the army show up two seconds later and Whoops! you should have waited, now the mist is gone, the calvary is here, and you shot your little boy! Isn’t that funny? Do you get the irony?
Ohhhhh, I liked this movie so much up until the ending. Yes, the acting wasn’t great (although the woman playing the religious nut was excellent), yes, the special effects weren’t topnotch, but it was so much more than the sum of its parts, and it had so much working for it that I really felt it was a perfect companion piece to the novella. Up until the part where the movie deviates from the novella, which of course was the ending — an ending that was the total opposite of the one in the novella, I might add. I’ll spoil that one for you, too, because I don’t want you to think the source material was an equal downer. So if you don’t want to know how the novella ends, stop reading now… okay? At the end of the novella, Drayton and the others make it to a motel and it turns out Drayton has been writing down the whole story on hotel stationary. The mist is still around, no army guys have shown up, and he hasn’t shot his kid or any of the others. The message is that although they don’t know what’s happened, or if the mist is ever going to go away, they have hope. Hope. The exact opposite of the ending of the film, in other words. Gah, I’m so disappointed.
And as a horror fan I can get the whole downbeat ending. I can handle the shocker ending. But this isn’t the same thing. As I said before, it would have been a downbeat ending, or a shocker ending, if Drayton had killed the others and then the film ended. But they had to make it all into a big morbid joke by having the army showing up two minutest later, and a few seconds after that, oh look, the mist is clearing up. Terrible.
My wife HATED the ending. So much that it ruined the rest of the movie for her. I didn’t feel quite as strongly, but I agreed that the ending wasn’t appropriate.
Kat felt cheated that we had gotten to know and care about these characters and that to dispatch them in such a gruesome and stupid way was disrespectful and ruined the entire experience for her. Kat isn’t the kind of girl who turns her nose up at horror movies. She doesn’t just watch them because I make her. She likes horror movies. She just watched Planet Terror a couple of weeks ago and enjoyed it. She doesn’t mind apocalyptic cinema, she doesn’t expect a happy ending, but this just went beyond all of that.
I didn’t feel horrified by the ending. I didn’t feel disturbed or offended. I don’t know how I felt. I can’t think of the right word. Maybe it’s too soon. Maybe I’ll figure it out in a few days. All I can say right now is that if they had ended the movie before the army showed up, I’d be defending the ending. The fact that they had to turn it into a big WHOOPS!… well, I just didn’t like that. That’s all I can say.
On a lighter note, I told my wife that alternate endings were filmed (which will no doubt pop up on the DVD) and she said, “Well, they picked the wrong fucking one!”
So, in closing, I have very conflicted feelings about this movie. If you didn’t already notice, ha-ha. I can’t say that I hated it as much as Kathryn, because there is a lot to like, but I have such strong negative feelings about the ending that I can’t say I liked it, either. Quite honestly, I can’t say I’ve ever felt so conflicted about a movie. Not in a long time.
My quandary is that the negative aspect isn’t negative in the sense that I would suggest you avoid seeing this movie. You should see it, if only to find out how you react to the ending. I think opinions will vary. Every review I’ve read by those who saw it with more than one person have said the same thing: I liked the ending, my friend hated it, or vice versa.
You should see The Mist. I just don’t know if you’ll like it.
Yeah, good review. I left the theater feeling cheated, yet again. So much potential, so little payoff.
Pacing:
I liked the book better… seem to remember it taking about 60% of the story to get to tentacles, not 15 minutes. Granted, book vs film, but still.
Religious leader-bitch:
Very well acted. The entire theater cheered when she got the forehead shot. But thought it was a little over played, and thought that the director was trying to make some comment on America and the religious right swaying the country yadda yadda. Might be in my head, but it still irked me.
Monsters / Mist:
Again, I remembered it being more like Jaws: 60% done before you see something, and even then, it was less action, more suspense. The scene with the flying things was kinda hokey to me, and modern horror films seem to take such scenes as an excuse for stunts (ala the Mist) instead of an opportunity for true suspense (ala something like the last 5 minutes of Silence of the Lambs)
Execution:
This is one thing they do well in King films: build the suspense. The shots of the grocery store when the alarm was going off, the military and fire trucks are scrambling around, and the first people running into the store for shelter… great stuff.
Up until the scene with the tentacles, I was happy. It reminded me of another King film, Dreamcatcher, where the build up was superb, and the rest poor.
The “infamous” end:
I didn’t feel personally betrayed as Kat did… and I don’t think I hated it as much as you. Mainly, I was impressed the director was allowed to get away with it. I share your thoughts on ending it moments before the tanks roll in. Have him walk into the mist, sobbing, and fade to black.
Or even have him walk around for a few days, show him sleeping by himself a couple of nights, hearing the monsters and waiting for his time to come… then do the calvary thing if you REALLY have to.
But the impression I got from the execution of the film was that it was literally 90 seconds after he offs his son (without any kind of “goodbye”, I might add) that the troops arrive. It came off as “if you’d only waited 2 minutes! You were so close! Don’t you feel foolish for coming so far and dropping at the finish line?!” and that I hated.
But again…I was almost happy enough that for once a Hollywood film showed something like that. Almost.
So what’s left? The Mangler, but that won’t transfer over. Did they ever try the Boogeyman? Oh, and Strawberry Summer…or was it Indian Summer? I can’t remember…
Actually, here’s a much better summation of my feelings on the film:
Jake, after 2 mediocre hours: *sigh* “If you were going to fuck this up, you could have at least gone whole-hog…”
Jake, after 2 mediocre hours and 7 minutes: “Oh. Well. There THAT is.”
Yeah, the pacing of the book was a lot faster. I can almost recall exactly the scene when they finally leave the grocery story. It goes something like Ollie opened the front door, then the back door, then something came out of the missing and cut him nearly in half. It was just so hard and fast and brutal. The movie tries to pile it on layer by layer, and mostly it succeeds, but…
Our theatre also cheered when the religious woman got shot. People applauded. I might have been one of them, although I knew it was coming. Ollie was one of my favourite characters in the book, and the guy who played him in the movie performed the role well.
I also felt there was a bit too much preaching (ha-ha) on subjects like politics, war, religion, etc., that were already being discussed in a much more metaphorical way. But then it’s always hard to have a religious nut in your movie and not make it come off as cliche.
The scene where the monsters got into the story was less dramatic in the book. Only one bug and only one flying thing got into the store. Not a whole swarm. That’s definitely Hollywood doing its part to “fix” the story.
I still feel the same about the ending, here the morning after, but I definitely agree that it’s surprising the director was able to get away with it. It’s pretty severe. So I have my appreciation for the brutality of a non-Hollywood ending, but then I feel they would still have had that effect if they ended it before the army shows up. Still brutal, but not a sick joke at the audience’s expense.
They’ve actually done “The Manger,” (and several sequels to it, I might add) but it’s not worth seeing. Trust me. Take about your shite. I think someone did a short film of “The Boogeyman,” as I recall, but I haven’t seen it in years. Nobody’s done “Strawberry Spring,” that I know of, but they should. It’s one of my favourites, and I recall that you liked it, too.
I’ll have to get your new mailing address. I have a few books to send your way.
Good summation of the film. I wish you had been with us so you could have seen how pissed off Kat was. It was pretty amusing in a rubbernecking kind of way. :)
I heard about the ending, but I didn’t realize it was that quick. Sounds to me that a better ending would be the bang-bang-bang-bang and then have him wander off into the mist…fade to black.
You know, I always kind of hated not knowing what happened to his wife, but at the same time, I like the way it was done. Life is like that..you don’t always get to find out.
Yeah, that’s totally what should have happened. Even though I’d still have a problem with this guy executing four people, including his young son, I would have found it much easier to take if the film ended with him sobbing in the car, with the camera pulling back until it was obscured by the mist, or like you said, with Drayton getting out of the car and wandering off into the mist. You wouldn’t hear the monsters get him, it would be ambiguous, but a lot more satisfying than having the army showing up.
I didn’t like not knowing what happened to the wife either, but then again, one of the things I like about King is that he doesn’t always feel the need to explain or give complete and total closure (one of my big problems with Koontz’s work). In the novella, you don’t even know for certain how the mist came. The military guys are in the grocery store, but they kill themselves before anyone can question them. It’s just assumed that it must have something to do with the Arrowhead Project.
I’ve always liked that abiguous approach to origins. I’ve used it in Jennings Grove. Some things simply are, and I think it works especially well in horror…the unknown has a fear all its own.
I know a lot of purists will tell you that you can’t leave that sort of hole in a story, but look at what overexplaining did to Highlander 2.
I think writers who overexplain do so out of a sense of inadequacy. They’re worried about not getting their point across, so they feel the need to give all this back story and origins about the characters, and so on.
I can’t remember who it was, but some writer said when you’re writing a first draft your job is to just write the story. Your job during the rewrite is to take out everything that isn’t the story.
And Highland 2 certainly would have benefited from that. :)
The ending was wholly implausible given the narrative about Drayton and the others to that point. If the survivors had taken their chances in the parking lot, and driven into the unknown until they ran out of gas, they would have held on longer and bothered seeing what the commotion was outside the car.
It was an ineffective twist ending, if that’s what Darabont was going for, because for that to work he needed to strew some breadcrumbs suggesting Drayton might act as he did earlier.
I had other issues with the movie, but the ending completely undid my investment in the story so there’s really no point thinking about it further.
Yeah, that’s pretty much why I didn’t buy it. I can take a shocker ending, even a downbeat one, but this one was just plain didn’t work.
It’s been a long time since people have posted here I’m guessing.
Anyways, I find the ending to be something King himself would have come up with, aside from the army showing up. Showing what actually happened to Drayton’s wife seemed appropriate, but killing those 4 people who he truly cared about without a second thought was a pointless and completely screwed up ending.
Before they leave the market, one of them says: “I’d rather die out there trying than in here waiting”
Being shot isn’t much better than waiting to die! In fact, it’s probably worse. Pretty much means your giving up on finding the end of the mist. But to the authors previous quote:
“On a lighter note, I told my wife that alternate endings were filmed (which will no doubt pop up on the DVD)”
I own the DVD right now: No alternate endings. Instead, you get to watch the entire movie in black and white….
Yeah, that line and the fact that Drayton seemed so against giving up made me really dislike the ending. It didn’t feel in line with the novella’s ending, which was about hope.
Too bad about the lack of alternate endings. Were there any delete scenes? If so, were they any good?
I had heard Darabont was going to push for a b&w version. It’s good that he got it. Curious to see how it looks.