The Mist

Year: 2007 Rating: R Overall Evaluation: 4.0 Significance Suppositions Story Style 6.0 / 10 4.0 / 10 5.0 / 10 3.0 / 10 Click HERE for evaluation criteria.

Style

Rated R for violence, terror and gore, and language. Lots of profanity (both mild and extreme) - some extremely gratuitous and even upsetting. Mostly blood and guts type violence and several gross-out kinds of scenes that aren't really scary so much as disgusting.

Story

Adapted from Stephen King's short story in his Skeleton Crew compilation, The Mist recounts the tale of a group of Maine-landers trapped in a grocery store by a mysterious mist and the evil things inside it. The real horror is, allegedly, the "monsters inside the store," namely the tried-and-false Hollywood religious kook who tries to convince everyone that the mist is a judgment of God by quoting Bible verses out of context and mixing in a [non] healthy dose of cultic mania. The hero wants to get as many people out as possible before the rest of the town falls for the kook's ravings and sacrifices the rational people to the monsters.

SPOILER ALERT

The majority of the town goes from clear thinking, down-home folks to crazed, child-sacrificing "Christians" because they spent two days in the grocery store with the kook. The hero manages to escape the townspeople get his son and a few other people out into his car to flee the mist. When they run out of gas he pulls over and kindly kills them all to avoid having to face the monsters. A minute later the mist clears as the military comes through with truckloads of survivors and tanks.

Suppositions

The basic worldview is anti-religious but pro-"supernatural". It might seem as though it is simply anti-religious-kook, but the kook is also shown in fervent prayer for people's souls (just before she utters the most disgusting, gratuitous, and just completely stupid line in the whole film). This confusing portrayal of religious figures is nothing new to King books and movies (e.g., 'Children of the Corn') and forms a major part of the plot here. The basic values of heroism and sticking together are eviscerated by the film's ending.

Significance

The film's message (when abstracted from all the ridiculous particulars) was positive. Although it was very poorly executed the basic message of the film is that people should stick together and not go crazy when they are afraid. It was a nice try but besides the cardboard characters, paint-by-the-numbers storyline, plot holes, and monsters that look like they came from the Star Wars cantina, the ending just didn't work with the rest of the film. I think one reviewer got it right when he called it "cruel and pretentious." What began as a tale of hope in the midst of trial concludes with the hero basically saying, "Well, we've run out of gas . . . screw it, let's just kill ourselves." Such a heavy-handed ending was simply not earned by the rest of the film. ('Gerry'-ex-machina anyone???)