FEATURE: A Stephen King Halloween!...1408

13. 1408

(Mikael Hafstrom, 2007)

...now he could hear it coming, the dweller in the room behind the room, the thing in the walls, the owner of the buzzing voice.  "Six!" the voice screamed.  "Six,  this is six, this is goddam fucking SIX!"

The Long and Short of It

Mike Enslin (John Cusack), the author of a book series on haunted houses, has never had an authentically supernatural experience.  Then one day, he gets a postcard from the Dolphin Hotel with one sentence written on it.  "Don't stay in room 1408."

Adaptation Decay

Significant but Honorable.  Stephen King's short story is a compact bit of spookery, but at 52 pages, it's slim material for a feature-length film.  So the writers compensate by adding many, many more sources of horror, and, more importantly, inventing a back-story for Mike Enslin that involves a family tragedy.  Surprisingly, most of these additions work.  Although the abundance of scares makes the film sometimes play like a list of gags instead of a story, writers Scott Alexander and Larry Karazewski add a couple of brilliant late-film twists.  One involves Enslin escaping the room much sooner than expected, while the other involves what happens after the room's alarm clock counts down from 59:59 to 0:00.  Meanwhile, the back-story offers deeper motivations for Enslin's search for the supernatural.

Forget All That - How's the Movie?

Pretty damn good.  John Cusack gives Mike Enslin a good sense of pathos, with his skeptical humor belying undercurrents of despair.  Thank God for that, because 1408 is a one-man show for most of its runtime.  As mentioned, the film sometimes feels like a string of gags, and those gags grow in size and volume as the film progresses, which inevitably leads to less fright and more shock.  Let's face it - Enslin suffering a hurricane-sized deluge in 1408 is not as unnerving as him finding two chocolates on a pillow that was previously chocolate-free.  Still, as a funhouse ride, 1408 delivers the goods, and it's a pleasure to see a fright flick that manages to chill with a PG-13 rating.  Sidenote: it was Quentin Tarantino who nominated Samuel L. Jackson for the hotel manager role.  Why?  Because if Jules Winfield is scared of 1408, you should be too.

Alright, But Is It a Good Halloween Flick?

Mostly.  The film takes itself more seriously than a Cat's Eye or Creepshow; friends might be checking their watches during the "drama" bits.  But 1408's constant invention should keep viewers engaged.

Kingwatch 2012

No King sightings, although Mike Enslin plays an author whose grisly books sell better than his attempts at serious "literature."  The biggest nod to Stephen King's universe is the appearance of a free-standing doorway in the middle of the room.

Stephen King nuts will know that free-standing doors have an important function in his Dark Tower series: they're portals between worlds.  In 1408, there are hints that this door might be a gateway to the afterlife, so, hey, there you go.

But You Know What Sucks?

13. The Lawnmower Man

(Brett Leonard, 1992)

This brazenly unfaithful "adaptation" retained two scenes from King's original story of a pagan lawn-care-worker and jammed them into an a script about virtual reality.  King responded by suing them for using his name in the publicity.  Weirdly, The Lawnmower Man is more miscalculated than straight-up awful.  The premise is kinda sorta interesting, with abused dimwit Jobe (Jeff Fahey) discovering intelligence and power in the virtual worlds of Lawrence (Pierce Brosnan).  And then his powers cross over into reality.  The primitive candy-color CG effects have a retro charm, and the filmmakers liberally apply religious imagery (prefiguring The Matrix's story of a VR messiah).  What sucks is that the film heel-face-turns into a vacant revenge picture, with Jobe using his new telekinetic powers to kill everyone who ever wronged him.  It's not a total loss - I'm grateful for how Pierce Brosnan, when referencing a failed experiment, declares, "He was the best chimp I ever had!"

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A Stephen King Halloween

01. ?
02. ?
03. ?
04. ?
05. Stand By Me / Dreamcatcher
06. The Dead Zone / The Mangler
07. Misery / Sometimes They Come Back
08. The Mist / Firestarter
09. "Battleground" / Creepshow 2
10. Creepshow / "The Road Virus Heads North"
11. Dolores Claiborne / The Tommyknockers (TV)
12. The Stand (TV) / Maximum Overdrive
13. 1408 / The Lawnmower Man
14. Christine / Silver Bullet
15. Cat's Eye / Thinner
HM. Hearts in Atlantis / The Shining (TV)