Simon Thompson presents his top ten Stephen King adaptations…
Stephen King is an author who needs very little introduction if you have lived on planet earth for an extended period of time and have access to all the latest up-to-date communication technologies. With a vast, prolific output of novels and short stories spanning all the way back to the 1970s, the guy is one of the great popular storytellers of our age, and while there are of course a few duds here and there in his bibliography (which is to be expected given that he’s been writing for twice the amount of time that I’ve been alive) when he gets it right, there are few horror-suspense authors currently living that can match him (maybe Clive Barker at his best – although that’s a chalk and cheese contrast of styles).
What makes King a brilliant author is that even if horror and suspense aren’t your cup of tea, his in-depth characterisation, worldbuilding, and overall ability to write a gripping sentence draw you in no matter what. As one of the most adapted novelists of the last fifty years, the quality of Stephen King’s cinematic renderings massively varies, with many of his best books, Needful Things, Salem’s Lot, It, The Dark Tower series, and The Stand all receiving inferior miniaturisations on screen.
But this is a list celebrating when filmmakers have brought his work to the screen seamlessly, as for every lacklustre Stephen King adaptation there are ones which more than stand up to the quality of their original source material.
The Running Man (1987)
Stephen King is an author more associated with horror and fantasy than he is science fiction, but The Running Man, adapted from his 1982 novel of the same name written under the pseudonym Richard Bachman (a persona King created to explore darker themes he didn’t think his readership would take to if they knew it was him writing) as an accomplished dystopian thriller.
Set in the far off year of 2019, The Running Man takes place in a dystopian future where America has become a totalitarian state, and the population is obsessed with a Battle Royale style gameshow The Running Man in which prisoners are forced to run their way to freedom and avoid being killed. Prisoner Ben Richards (Arnold Schwarzenegger) decides to use the game show to escape, although the sadistic host Damon Killian (Richard Dawson) has no intention of letting that happen.
While the movie is a very loose adaptation of the book, turning the story into a prime Arnold action movie romp, underneath The Running Man’s bombast is an economically paced, intelligent dystopian science fiction thriller which, given the news of there being public executions now being considered on American broadcast television has become closer and closer to our own reality.
With a brilliant mixture of action, smart social commentary, and one of the strangest cast lists this side of Southland Tales (I mean how many times are you going to see Arnie, Richard Dawson, Mick Fleetwood, Jesse Ventura, Jim Brown, Eddie Bunker, Professor Tanaka and Yaphet Kotto on the big screen together in your life ?) The Running Man is the kind of action movie that Hollywood has long forgotten how to make, with the less being said about whatever the hell that Edgar Wright remake ended up being, the better.
The Dead Zone (1983)
David Cronenberg’s The Dead Zone is an offbeat thriller, which veers more into science fiction than it does horror territory (although a plot point involving a sheriff’s deputy is King at his horrific best), that tells the story of Johnny Smith (Christopher Walken). Johnny, awakes from a five year long coma and discovers that his girlfriend Sarah (Brooke Adams) is now married and moved on with her life.
In midst of dealing with this heartbreak, Johnny also discovers that he has psychic abilities, that allow him to tell someone’s future just by physical touch. When Johnny shakes the hand of Greg Stillson (Martin Sheen) an aspiring politician, he realises that if Stillson is elected president in the future it will lead to a nuclear holocaust, leaving Johnny with no option other than to assassinate him.
The Dead Zone is a the-system-is-corrupt-to-the-core-movie in the same vein as The Parallax View, The Fury, Blowout, Marathon Man and Cutter’s Way filtered through the lens of an EC comic. Walken and Martin Sheen are both perfectly cast in their respective roles, and if you want to see 80s David Cronenberg directing a paranoid conspiracy thriller, then The Dead Zone makes for a perfect Halloween watch.
The Mist (2007) and 11/22/63 (2016)
I’ve grouped these two together because these are two King related projects that I love for different reasons, and also because they tend to go under the radar a little bit when it comes to discussing King adaptations which work.
Based on a 1980 novella, and directed by Frank Darabont (a filmmaker with a real knack for King adaptations) The Mist is the story of David Drayton (Thomas Jane) and his son Billy (Nathan Gamble) who alongside many other residents of Bridgton, Maine, become trapped in a supermarket as the town is engulfed by a thick mist concealing predatory Lovecraftian creatures.
The best way I could describe The Mist is that it’s a smaller scale version of King’s epic novel The Stand mixed with George A. Romero’s Dawn of the Dead. Religious fundamentalism is a favourite recurring theme of King’s, and it’s explored in The Mist through the character of Mrs Carmody (Marcia Gay Hayden) one of King’s most chilling villains, and given that this is the guy who created Pennywise, Randall Flag, Leland Gaunt, and Annie Wilkes, that is saying something.
If monster movies aren’t something you gravitate towards, it’s worth knowing that The Mist is more of a drama about how ordinary people react to extreme circumstances than it is a creature feature.
Alternative history is a subject which absolutely fascinates me, and something that I can happily spend many hours going down a YouTube rabbit hole thinking about. The assassination of John F. Kennedy, and the question of the knock on effects of what would have happened if it had been prevented is one of the mid to late 20th century’s most queried topics, and is explored brilliantly in 11/22/63.
In the present day, high school English teacher Jake Epping (James Franco) is presented with an unprecedented chance to go back in time and change history, when his close friend, diner owner Al (Chris Cooper) presents him with a time portal (which Al has no idea about the origin of just, that it is there). Al, being terminally ill, asks Jake to go back and prevent the assassination of JFK, an event that he’s tried repeatedly to prevent and failed every single time. Initially sent back to 1960, Jake finds that changing the past is far from an easy or simple thing to do.
Half political thriller and half fish out of water science fiction adventure, 11/22/63 is a testament to just how versatile a storyteller Stephen King truly is.
Dolores Clairborne (1995)
Dolores Clairborne is King revelling in the unreliable narrator trope, and having a ball doing so. The film tells the story of an urban journalist Selena St. George (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who returns to her small town roots to help her estranged mother Dolores (Kathy Bates going 2 for 2 in King movies), a domestic servant who has been accused of murdering her elderly employer (Judy Parfitt).
With an intelligent script by Tony Gilroy, and a lush autumnal colour pallet by director Taylor Hackford, Dolores Clairborne has a brilliantly distinct look which lingers right after the credits have rolled. Ostensibly a murder-mystery, the film veers into gothic-romance, horror, family drama, and even becomes a psychological thriller at points yet still maintains a consistent tone and a sense of mystery that never lets up.
Kathy Bates and Jennifer Jason Leigh, provide some of the finest acting of their respective careers, with Bates, being cruelly denied a best supporting actress nomination at the Oscars in my book.
Without veering too much into spoilers because this a film which really depends on you knowing the bare minimum about the plot for it to be effective, Dolores Clairborne is a complex work anchored by one of King’s most three dimensional and human protagonists.
Carrie (1976)
Based on King’s 1974 debut novel, Carrie is one of the best American movies of the 1970s, with its director Brian De Palma both being on top of his game and the perfect filmmaker for the source material. With his debut King immediately showed that he is the master of small town based horror stories.
Carrie White (Sissy Spacek) is a lonely, bullied, teenaged girl who when not being ostracised and mocked by her peers, lives under the yoke of her physically and psychologically abusive religious lunatic of a mother (Piper Laurie). Carrie begins to notice that strange occurrences are happening around her, and that she might have telekinetic abilities.
Things begin to look up for Carrie, when she’s invited to her high school prom by her crush Tommy Ross (William Katt) but, to not to give anything away, the night goes far from according to plan.
Carrie works because it uses a small scale setting to explore serious subjects that are large in scope such as child abuse and school bullying, with an atmosphere that becomes sharp enough to cut a steak. Sissy Spacek and Piper Laurie are both excellent when they are playing off each other, and in only his second movie John Travolta provides an eye-catching performance as high school bully Billy Nolan.
If you love 70s horror and by some tiny miracle you haven’t watched Carrie yet, then boy are you in for a treat.
Stand By Me (1986)
Adapted from King’s 1982 novella The Body, Rob Reiner’s Stand By Me is a great story, because you can watch it at every point of your life and have a completely different relationship with or interpretation of it from your previous viewing. When successful writer Gordie LaChance (Richard Dreyfuss), reads the obituaries column of the newspaper, he finds that his childhood friend Chris Chambers has been tragically killed.
The news sends him spiralling, into a flashback of a specific summer from his childhood in the small town of Castle Rock (a fictional location which features in many other King stories), where Gordie (portrayed as a child by Wil Wheaton) and his friends Chris (River Phoenix), Teddy (Corey Feldman), and Vern (Jerry O’Connell) went on a journey into the woods to find the body of a dead boy who went missing.
Stand By Me deftly balances being a coming of age story and a sweeping Mark Twainian adventure at the same time. It’s rare that you come across a film which is funny, sweet, and tragic all in equal measure but Stand By Me is just that. The child acting by the four leads is just outstanding, with their natural chemistry radiating off the screen to the extent you completely believe their friendship, as well as Kiefer Sutherland’s star-making turn as the town bully Ace Merrill providing him with steady work being a heel in other 80s favourites such as The Lost Boys.
Stand By Me purportedly is King’s own personal favourite of all the big and small screen treatments of his work, which for an author with a love/hate relationship with adaptations is high praise indeed.
The Shining (1980)
Yes, I know that Stephen King despises Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of his novel of the same name, one of his most famous and beloved works. And while I personally love the book and movie for very different reasons, the latter is the perfect example of why something doesn’t always have to be a faithful adaptation for it to stand as a high quality work in its own right.
Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson), is a recovering alcoholic writer, who, struggling with writers block and in need of some extra cash on the side while he works on his latest play, takes a job as the winter caretaker at the remote mountainous Overlook Hotel. When Jack brings his wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall) and son Danny (Danny Lloyd) with him to the resort, Danny begins to be disturbed by psychic premonitions that the Overlook will greatly harm him and his family the longer they stay there.
The Shining is both a masterclass in creating a compelling story taking place in only a single location and a psychological slow burn capturing one man’s slow descent into sheer madness. Kubrick’s long tracking shots and wide angle lenses (that he had mastered using when he made Barry Lyndon) help to create a nervous atmosphere and make the isolated hotel location fully come alive.
With unforgettable scene after unforgettable scene, The Shining is such an iconic horror film that you could piece together a complete new version of it, with all of the various parodies and homages that have been done to it over the years.
Misery (1990)
The nature of being a fan of something or someone is a very strange thing indeed, for example Danny Brown, Radiohead, and Mike Patton are musicians whose work I’m obsessed with, but because I like to think I’m a reasonably well adjusted human being I wouldn’t kidnap them after a road accident, nurse them back to health and hold them against their will once they came to.
Paul Sheldon (James Caan) is a successful romantic novelist, whose Misery Chastain books have brought him fortune and fame. The trade-off however, is that he’s stuck in a creative rut, constantly pigeonholed into a writing a series and character he’s grown to despise. To free himself from having to write the series, he decides to take the nuclear option and kill off his beloved heroine.
As he’s driving his car in a severe snowstorm, he crashes on the side of the road (breaking both is legs, and his shoulder) only to be found on the side of the road and taken in by Annie Wilkes (Kathy Bates) who, being a former nurse, uses her expertise to treat him. When Paul wakes up, Annie informs him that she’s his biggest fan and notices that he has the manuscript for the latest unpublished Misery Chastain book, which he lets her read. Once she gets to the end and sees Paul’s choice to kill off Misery she traps him in her home and forces him to change his story to a happy ending.
Misery is a claustrophobic thriller, built upon around a mesmerising two hander between James Caan and Kathy Bates, with the latter giving the performance of a life time as the insane, yet chillingly believable Annie Wilkes. Creating tension within a single location narrative is tough, but through having Paul being stuck due to his physical condition in the home of an abusive monster gives the horror a realistic tone that adds to its effectiveness.
With Rob Reiner at the top of his game as a director and screenwriter William Goldman perfectly translating what made the original novel so scary onto the screen, Misery is a personal must-watch for me every Halloween.
1408 (2007)
Mikael Hafstrom’s 1408 is a criminally underrated King screen rendering, that I’m glad is finally getting the recognition that it deserves. Although it wasn’t exactly a box office flop when it originally came out, it was movie that still went far too under the radar when it came to discussing quality King adaptations, something which has thankfully changed with the passage of time.
Mike Enslin (John Cusack) is a successful writer who specialises in debunking the paranormal and investigating supposedly haunted places. While on a book tour, he receives an anonymous postcard with the picture of a hotel called The Dolphin on it and a note saying “don’t enter 1408.”
Intrigued by the postcard, Mike visits The Dolphin where the hotel manager Gerald Olin (Samuel L. Jackson) repeatedly warns him not to enter 1408 and that only bad will come of being in there, yet eventually Mike wears him down and he ends up staying in the room, learning the error of his decision in the process.
1408 is the kind of neat and tidy thriller that in age of 300 million dollar superhero movies and straight to streaming pig slop, Hollywood has long since abandoned making for the most part. Both Cusack and Samuel L. Jackson are superb in their respective roles, and Matt Greenberg, Scott Alexander, and Larry Karazewski’s script does a good job of retaining King’s wry, sardonic sense of humour, sense of setting, and satirical view of humanity.
The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
Saying that The Shawshank Redemption is a modern classic is pretty much redundant at this point, given how much the movie tops various opinion polls and audience favourites lists. Adapted from King’s 1982 novella Rita Hayworth and The Shawshank Redemption, the movie tells the story of Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins) a successful banker, wrongfully convicted of killing his wife and her lover, and is sentenced to a double life sentence in the Shawshank penitentiary.
Once inside, Andy forms a friendship with Red (Morgan Freeman) another prisoner serving a life sentence, known to the other inmates for his skill at smuggling forbidden items into the inside of the prison walls. Andy’s stoic nature as well as his financial intelligence, a quality which the Warden (Bob Gunton) recognises and therefore promotes him to running his vast money laundering scheme, allow him to adapt and survive in an environment designed to break his spirit.
Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman are both perfectly cast in their roles, and the total package of Darabont’s subtle direction, Thomas Newman’s moving score, and Roger Deakins’s naturalistic cinematography is why this movie is as good as it is.
The Shawshank Redemption is such a powerful story because it’s a eulogisation of hope and the sheer power of the human spirit, underpinned by Andy and Red’s friendship. Andy’s sheer willpower never to let the system break him, despite being subjected to brutality by it in every conceivable way, makes him one of cinema’s most indelible protagonists. The sense of catharsis that the movie’s ending provides demonstrating that Andy’s philosophy of hope is right, is why it has resonated across so many different audiences.
A box office bomb when it came out, due to poor marketing and people being dissuaded by its subject matter, thanks to a combination of word of mouth, which led to it receiving a re-appraisal through its VHS release, and it being played constantly on TV has given it a second life, which thankfully continues to this very day.
What are your favourite Stephen King adaptations? Let us know on our social channels @FlickeringMyth…
Simon Thompson
