The Mist

When I read the Stephen King novella "The Mist", I immediately visualized it in my mind, and thought it would be a great movie. Many, many years later, it's about to come out in the theaters.

The Mist by Stephen King

If you aren't familiar with the story, it takes place in a small town in Maine (of course). It's the day after a big storm, and a strange mist is rolling across the lake. The protagonist of the story is David Drayton, an artist, who gets trapped at the local grocery store with his five year old son.

A mix of locals and seasonal residents are trapped with him, including one Mrs. Carmody, a fanatical religious nutjob who (in the novella, anyway) seems to take great delight that the End Times Are Upon Us - she takes this disaster as evidence that God has come down to smite the wicked.

I always imagined Piper Laurie as Mrs. Carmody (probably the influence of another Stephen King movie, Carrie), but Marcia Gay Harden can definitely do that New England whackadoo type. Although this is also making me think that Kathy Bates would have been completely awesome as Mrs. Carmody.

I loved this novella, in part because I think Stephen King is at his best when he is at his briefest. I've always enjoyed his short stories more than his novels (even though I've enjoyed his novels - some of them more than others, but...). I'm sure that the movie won't be as good as the book, because it never is, and the book was exceptionally vivid in the mental picture it created - in my mind, at least.

I'm looking forward to seeing the movie - I know that filmed versions of King's stories can be fantastic (Stand By Me, The Shawshank Redemption, Misery), but they can also be terrible (Christine, Cujo)



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