'Stephen King's The Mist' - B-movie art at it's finest!

The Mist (2007)

Director
Frank Darabont

Writer
Frank Darabont (screenplay)
Stephen King (novel)

Cast
Thomas Jane, Marcia Gay Harden, Laurie Holden, Andre Braugher and William Sadler

When I first heard of The Mist I didn’t think much of it. Most of Stephen King’s adaptions haven’t been great with the exception of 1408 which I think was an adequate ghost story. Also, seeing Thomas Jane in it gave me worries since he also starred in the lame Stephen King adaption Dreamcatcher, but one thing that did catch my attention was that Frank Darabont was directing. Darabont is mostly known for directing some of the best movies based off of King’s work; The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile (The Shawshank Redemption being one of my favorite films.) When I finally saw the trailer in theaters I didn’t feel compelled to see it because, well, the trailer gave almost the entire movie away! Or so I thought...

I should mention that I just saw this movie since it’s release on DVD. I wanted to see it in theaters on Black Friday but I was turned down since the projector screening it broke yet they had several "family films" playing. I tried a couple of weeks later and I was only about five or ten-minutes late was turned down again! Since they didn’t start the movie since nobody showed up and they were afraid it would run-over into the next showing. Probably not if I wouldn’t have to sit through a half-hour long Army commercial.

Fuck you, RMC Cinema’s at the Village Square Mall in Effingham, Illinois!

David Drayton takes his son on what seems to be a simple trip to the grocery store. Suddenly an ominous mist cover the entire town and anyone who ventures out into it is never heard from again. As people are trapped in the store over time they becoming increasingly paranoid and Drayton must make drastic decisions to keep his son out of harms way from both the creatures outside and the people inside.

Like I said before I wasn’t expecting much from this movie but the more I watched the more it grabbed me. Most of the characters on here seem like real people. Thomas Jane, surprisingly, came off really well as an "every-man," his performance seemed very genuine, not something I see in many popular actors nowadays. Marcia Gay Harden hams it up as a religious nut who creates a panic through the townspeople, but hamming it up is great. She’s a character you love to hate and her performance seems to fit in what could be defined as an inpired B-movie. William Sadler (The Shawshank Redemption, Tales from the Crypt presents Demon Knight) helped portray how someone would be able to change their way of thinking through a series of dramatic events.

The DVD includes a feature that enables you to watch it in black and white. I’m sure many wondering why such a feature exists. Simply because the movie plays out like a long episode of The Twilight Zone. Many of the episodes are about a destruction of society under fear, an age-old story that always keeps me fascinated.

Some may worry that their may be anti-religious undertones because of the depiction of Harden’s character but after watching it I felt it was much more about faith and that no matter how bad the situation gets or seems like it gets you should never give up. Which brings me to the movie’s controversial ending. I found nothing wrong with it and if anyone wants to argue about it I’m up for it! It’s very fitting.

Although some of the relationships seem a little weak, the CGI a bit too obvious and some of the aggression from the citizens seems a little force this is a great horror film. Darabont is a great director and you can definitely tell in The Mist. What may be intended as a B-movie is told to us in the highest quality. Just like the title says; this is B-movie art! This movie is probably the closest in atmosphere and frights as my favorite horror film, The Thing and it don’t get much better than that.

8.5/10