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.
6/10
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.
6/10