Day 14: The Mist (2007)

A Month of Horror

I have always wanted to do a marathon of "HORROR" throughout the month of October, one where I would revisit a new horror movie every day from the first to the thirty-first.  I will revisit the classics as well as new entries into the canon.  There are many movies that define this time of year, and I hope to showcase 31 of them this month...

October 14: The Mist (2007)

When I first heard about Frank Darabont was making a film out of Stephen King's "The Mist", I was pretty excited.  He had already done a fantastic job with "The Green Mile", and an even more impressive job with "The Shawshank Redemption" (both King stories as well).

The difference here would be that Darabont would be veering into King's more horrific stable of stories for the first time.

The final product definitely lived up to my somewhat high expectations.  When I first read the shot story, or novella, of "The Mist", it was a creepy tale.  Seeing it translated by someone as multi talented as Darabont, only expanded on that initial vibe.

Under Darabont's studious gaze, "The Mist" becomes, ironically enough, another tale of imprisonment, only this time the central characters are imprisoned within an unfathomable nightmare, and with unfathomable cellmates.  Elements of the Stanford Prison Experiment permeate the story as the denizens of a small town slowly succumb to the madness of the situation they are exposed to...

Following a freak violent storm, a mist descends on their hometown, trapping several locals in the grocery store.  Things quickly go from bad when they realize that Lovecraftian horrors lurk in the swirling mists, to worse when they slowly start turning on each other.  There will always be different tensions in any group dynamic and the tensions wrought by Marcia Gay Harden's devout Mrs. Carmody, and Andre Braugher's gruff Brent Norton, to the sympathy felt for Jeffrey DeMunn's Dan Miller and Natahn gamble's Billy Drayton (Jane's son) only serve to reinforce the dangers and threats of those group dyamics.

Different groups band together and fall apart, and eventually, Thomas Jane's protagonist David Drayton, his son, and a few other survivors make a break for freedom, only to discover that freedom often comes with a price, and sometimes, it also comes too late.

This is a film with plenty of jump scares, and also one that oozes a permanent sense of dread that roils throughout each frame like the titular mist.  It also happens to feature one of the starkest, most bleak endings of any "popular" horror film in recent recollection, a fact that makes it almost instantly recommendable.  If you can, seek out the black and white version, for an even more starkly horrific experience.

Tomorrow, based on an anonymous post on the blog, I plan to take a bit of time off and check into to an inn...  Hope to see you there!