THE MIST (2007)
[
IMDb ] Director: Frank Darabont
Frank Darabont is a very good writer and director and the only
person in the world who can tackle the difficulty of creating
something believable out of Stephen King's books.
THE MIST is creepy, has some really good scenes here and there and
terrific actors. I don't mind the religious stuff (I'm Swedish) and
I don't care about the sad ending.
The good parts is that the actors are great, the build up and
tension is strong, it's crystal-clear and doesn't really leave
anything up to imagination.
It does have some drawbacks though. The first one is that it's a
little bit dated. The Korean film THE HOST does everything this film
does, but much better and much stronger. And it looks better too!
This feels a little bit like Darabont dusted of a shelved film from
the 80's (allthough with sfx from the late 90's).
It has a low budget, which also means you don't really go for any
cool shots, cool locations or cool death scenes. Most is pretty
basic.
But it works and it's actually scary sometimes. And it works the
best when it tries the hardest to take itself serious and be
realistic.
The absolutely biggest problem is the ending though. The realism
stops ten minutes before the film does, and it feels rushed and not
thought through at all. It feels like Darabont wrote the greatest
ending in the world - and then someone else came in and told him he
had to re-write it, three days before he had to shoot it and him
being drunk while re-writing it. That's how the ending feels.
That's sad, because the rest of the film is super-realistic (even
though we have monsters from other worlds crawling around) and
mostly well done.
So, even though this is a basic, a bit-too-late film with great
actors and nice touch - it falls short from being the masterpieces
that Darabont usually creates. But it IS an in-between-films thing
that he probably just made over a weekend with a couple of friends,
since he wanted to make a movie. :)
Worth watching, at least once.
Score: 6
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