Stephen King's The Mist

[Stefen]

This was awful. The first 20 mins or so shows potential, but it just gets silly very quickly. Maybe it's because I hate Marcia Gay Harden, but I couldn't stand her character. It was just unnecessary.

[diggler]

spoils


i agree it's not perfect but it's still a winner.  i think the crowd being more horrific than the monsters is the basic idea of the story, without that you wouldn't buy the characters fleeing the store at the end. i love the conversation in the loading dock about human nature: "as a species we're fundamentally insane!" most of the CG was handled pretty well, except for the tentacles in the beginning, but they were still sufficiently gross.

has anyone seen the black and white cut? darabont is really talking it up, i'm interested how it plays against the color version.

[polkablues]

has anyone seen the black and white cut? darabont is really talking it up, i'm interested how it plays against the color version.

I might buy the 2-disc just for that.  I think it's a movie that'll play really well in black and white.

[john]

spoils

has anyone seen the black and white cut? darabont is really talking it up, i'm interested how it plays against the color version.

Yes.

After viewing it, I was surprised to find out I preferred the color version. When I first heard there would be a black and white version, it really excited me It seemed appropriate, and I imagined it even magnify the atmosphere Darabont already creating. And parts of it are quite well done, with great balance and some wonderful contrast - but there are other parts where it feels like the camera movement contradicts the black and white.

Besides, the film already had this great balance of vivid color with more saturated moments. There are parts of this film where the mist envelops everything to the point that it practically looks like a black and white film anyway - only to interrupt it with a shock of deep red.

All in all, it's an admirable thing to do, and it's pretty neat that the studio humored it. Even preferring the color version I'm glad to have the black and white one in my possession.

Further thoughts on the film itself, after a second viewing:

(VAGUE SPOILERS)

I'm a defender of the ending. I liked it when I saw it, I still think I like it... but on repeat viewing it seemed really forced. Plus, even for a film in which an entire town/county/etc is destroyed by winged creatures - it's really fucking maudlin in the final stretch.

And I didn't realize until this time how annoying the score is.

All that aside, it's a pretty swell film to spend two hours with.

[SiliasRuby]

This was really good. I really got into the idea that it was like a B monster movie that could have been made in the 50's. The ending was fantastic, but its a real slug to the chest and pretty damn dark considering the difference in the original king story.