by George Beahm
The tale grew in the telling, as McCauley recounted in his introduction: seventy pages, then eighty-five pages, then a hundred pages, and finally 145 manuscript pages totaling forty thousand words.
“I expected an ordinary-length story and ended up with a short novel by the most popular author of supernatural horror stories in the world,” McCauley wrote.
In his notes to Skeleton Crew, King explained that the story was written in the summer of 1976, when he and his family were living in Bridgton, in a house on Long Lake; Stephen King, in the aftermath of a storm, made a run to the supermarket, when
my muse suddenly shat on my head—this happened as it always does, suddenly, with no warning. I was halfway down the middle aisle, looking for hot-dog buns, when I imagined a big prehistoric bird flapping its way toward the meat counter at the back, knocking over cans of pineapple chunks and bottles of tomato sauce. I was amusing myself with a story about all these people trapped in a supermarket surrounded by prehistoric animals.
The resultant story, pitting ordinary folk in a supermarket besieged by monstrous creatures, is a classic King story—and a classic horror story as well. King, who takes delight in putting ordinary people in extraordinary situations, knows that a pressure-cooker environment is ideal for stripping away the thin veneer of civilization, revealing people’s true nature: sometimes good and sometimes not so good. (He revisits this theme in Storm of the Century and Under the Dome.)
“The Mist” is a full-blown horror story and apocalyptic fiction at its best: Out of seemingly nowhere, for no apparent reason, monsters emerge out of a mist to attack. No one is safe.
As Michael Collings wrote in The Stephen King Companion (1995):
The length of a short novel, this story of unknown horrors suddenly descending on an unsuspecting humanity contains in miniature the distilled essence of King’s storytelling. It showcases virtually every technique, device, theme, twist of characterization and plotting, landscape, and atmosphere that King’s readers respond to so strongly. Its story is simple: one day, out of nowhere, a mist settles over a small town. A number of people, including the narrator and his son, are trapped in a supermarket when the first monsters arrive. From then on, the trapped handful of people battle for survival against the mist and the shadowy horrors it hides … and, in some ways more frighteningly, against themselves. Finally, a small group leaves the market to try to drive to safety, or at least to discover if there is an end to the mist. The story concludes with their holing up for the night in the lobby of a Howard Johnson’s. The mist is still out there; and so are the monsters. Worse, instead of becoming familiar with continued exposure, the monsters seem to be even more alien, larger, more threatening. But, as the final lines indicate, there is also Hope. Out of darkness and death emerge optimism, a thin thread of hope that keeps the survivors struggling to survive. With its microcosmic scope, its emphasis on human types as well as on individuals, and its constantly transmuting monsters that take on the force of allegories for psychological states, “The Mist” taps into archetypal patterns of fear and strength, horror and hope. It is one of King’s most tightly focused stories, presenting the illusion of vast human experience in an unusually compressed format.
A quintessential King story, and one of his finest, it was also adapted as a film by Frank “Don’t Send Me Back to Prison!” Darabont, with a reimagined ending that is bound to disappoint some reader-viewers because of its overt optimism and finality, in contrast to the published story’s more nebulous ending, which offers only a glimmer of hope.
There are also two splendid audio versions of “The Mist,” including an unabridged reading by Frank Muller and also a dramatization, which succeeds brilliantly for the same reason that radio shows like Arch Oboler’s Lights Out from radio’s golden era worked so well: They let the listener create his own special effects in what King calls “skull cinema.” As King once told Muller regarding straight readings, “the recording seems a lot closer to the mind of the writer” than any other kind of adaptation.
The dramatized version is recorded in binaural sound, which uses a special microphone to give the illusion of three-dimensional sound. The unsettling effect is substantially enhanced when wearing headphones. Case in point: When I was writing the first edition of this book in 1988, in the basement of a three-level townhouse, it was late at night, and I was listening to the ZBS recording with headphones on. My basement had two doors to storage areas. At one critical point in the recording, a door suddenly slams shut, and I nearly shat my pants. I had thought, for a frightening moment, that someone had come in out of nowhere, perhaps by way of the storage-room door, with a bloody ax in hand—imagining a scene from the kind of illustration Bernie Wrightson delights in drawing. That’s how convincing the ZBS recording is, and, as for my nearly soiling myself, I think the folks at ZBS would have been proud: They wanted to make the unreal appear real, and succeeded brilliantly. I can’t recall a time my heart beat faster than that night. I immediately shut the recording off and went upstairs, leaving the late hour and the darkness behind me.
If you’ve not heard the dramatization of “The Mist,” I recommend reading the story and then reliving it with the 3-D audio recording. I can think of no finer introduction to King, since in this horror story King achieves the most difficult of writing tasks: convincing the reader to suspend disbelief.
As I write this, I’m in the basement of another house, which has several doors, and it’s late at night. I’ve got headphones on, and the dramatization of “The Mist” on my desk. But having an aversion to self-soiled clothing, I’ll wait until daylight to give it a repeat hearing.
30
FRANK DARABONT ON “THE MIST”
AN INTERVIEW BY HANS-ÅKE LILJA
JANUARY 7, 2008
Entire books have been written about movies based on King’s writings. Some have been critical analyses, but most have been pop culture overviews, heavy with stills and anecdotal information, focused on the moviemaking process in front of and behind the camera. To date no book has been published on King’s movies that comprehensively puts them all in context and explains why some have worked so well and others are cinematic embarrassments.
Similarly, no book of interviews with directors who have filmed King projects has been published, which would make for compelling reading.
In looking at the many film interviews that have been published over the years, I wanted to reprint one that most people will not have read, an interview that wasn’t published in a general interest fan magazine or film magazine. I also wanted to pick an interview that I thought served the reader instead of being a fluff piece on the director. In other words, I wanted a no-holds-barred, straight-shooting director who doesn’t mince words.
I chose Frank Darabont.
I think you’ll agree with me that his insights on the moviemaking process and his discussion of being involved in one of his favorite King stories, “The Mist,” are compelling reading.
Lilja: Last time we talked you were about to shoot The Mist, and now it’s done and has had its premiere. Are you happy with the result?
Frank Darabont: Delighted. It was deeply satisfying to put this story I’ve loved for so long on film. The result is the story I always saw in my head when reading the book—and I’m very happy to say that Stephen King loves the movie. That’s our best endorsement, as well as my greatest personal satisfaction: the fact that it pleases him. Also very satisfying for me was the opportunity to try a completely different stylistic approach from anything I’d ever done before as a director, which was very exhilarating and liberating for me. It was a blast, tremendously fun in that regard, and a great learning experience. Mostly I’m very happy that we accomplished what we set out to do, which was to make a movie on a low budget and a very tight schedule—for the record, it was seventeen million dollars and a thirty-seven-day shoot. That’s not much money these days when major studios are regularly making genre films in the one-hundred-to-two-hundred-million-dollar-b
udget range. Our goal was to make an ambitious movie with limited resources, very much in the spirit of the grainy low-budget genre films I grew up watching and loving.
Lilja: Personally, I really liked The Mist. In fact, I think it’s the best adaptation of a King story to date. What reaction have you gotten on the film? Does everybody like it as much as I do?
Darabont: Thanks, I’m so glad you like it! Overall, reactions have been very gratifying. A lot of people love it and have blessed us with lavish praise; one critic said it’s the best movie of the year and one of the best horror movies ever. I don’t know if that’s true—time is the only real judge of these things—but I appreciate the opinion. The people who have embraced the movie love it for the raw quality, the intensity, and the uncompromising ending.
Of course, there are some people who hate it, too, and I think for those very same reasons. It’s real and harsh in a way they don’t expect. I think they went in expecting a “popcorn” monster movie with some thrills and a typical ending—a date-night movie, basically—but that’s not what they got. They got a bleak, nasty movie that kicked them in the stomach and said some deeply negative things about humanity they weren’t prepared to hear. That’s not the sort of thing they expect from “just a horror movie,” so it pisses them off.
That’s okay. You’re allowed to hate my movie as much as you’re allowed to love it. I always say there’s never been a movie that was loved by everybody. (I can read you a few scathingly bad reviews I got for The Shawshank Redemption when it first came out.) But with The Mist, I set out to make a horror movie, which by my definition is intended to horrify and disturb you. If the movie did that, I succeeded. Some people love those sensations and admire the result. Some people don’t; they’d rather go through the motions of a scary movie but not get kicked in the stomach. They prefer horror that doesn’t get too real, and The Mist got too real for some people, especially at the end. And that’s fair, too. Like I said, there’s never been a movie that pleases everybody.
What I love is that the film provokes strong reactions either way, but nobody’s walking out unaffected by it. And that delights me, because I don’t want to make a movie that leaves you unaffected, which is the worst way a film can fail … especially a horror film. The films I’ve loved most in the genre didn’t pull their punches—they wanted to fuck with my head. Mind you, I’m not comparing my movie with anybody else’s or claiming similar greatness—that would be arrogant and idiotic of me—but Night of the Living Dead leaps to mind. Man, do I love that film. What a subversive piece of filmmaking that was in its day, and it certainly didn’t let us off the hook with warm platitudes or a misplaced happy ending; instead, it kicked us in the stomach. So did Carpenter’s The Thing, another admirably disturbing and subversive film. And Cronenberg’s The Fly, another masterpiece. Again, I’m not comparing—I’m just bringing these movies up because they’ve always been genre inspirations for me, iconic high points that took their shit seriously and said something about the human condition. They were made for adults, not the teen-date crowd. They did what horror should do: take chances, say something, risk pissing you off. The Thing certainly pissed a lot of people off when it was originally released in 1982, though I thought it was a classic the moment I saw it.
Lilja: And what an ending! I just loved it. I still have goose bumps from seeing it. I must admit that it’s even better than the one King wrote [in the original story]. Did you have to fight to get everyone to agree on having such a dark and sad ending?
Darabont: You can’t have an ending as downbeat as this without many people questioning it along the way. Especially on the business end. It certainly scared off a lot of financiers who were otherwise prepared to fund the film. I had a meeting with one producer, very well-known, a guy with his own ministudio. He was prepared to make the movie for thirty million dollars and offered to write me the check before I even left the room. But he insisted I had to change the ending.
It was a tempting offer, but also one of those “do I sell out or not” moments in life. I asked him what he thought the ending should be. He had no idea: all he knew was that he wanted it to be any ending but this one. I told him I had no idea either, that this was the only ending that made sense to me … and I’d been thinking about it for twenty years! So we shook hands and parted ways.
I suppose for the sake of the money, I could have come up with some other ending. But the truth is, I didn’t want to sell out. I never have before and saw no reason to start now. I think it would have been lame to tack on a conclusion that let the main character and the audience off the hook. What would that even be? Suddenly the mist parts and the National Guard is handing them coffee and doughnuts and putting blankets on their shoulders? How obvious and not real. It makes me cringe.
So I ended up making the movie for Bob Weinstein, the only guy with the balls to say, “Hey, I love this, let’s make this movie.” Of course, I had to make the movie for almost half the money the other guy had offered me—seventeen million dollars instead of thirty. That involved all the typical things: I didn’t take a directing salary up front, everybody was working for reduced fees, we had to very strictly control the spending, etc. But at least I got to make the movie my way. I’m sure some people will think I’m a moron for walking away from all that dough, and others will admire my integrity—and, you know, both opinions are fair. But it’s not as if I had a choice, really. I have to make the movie I see in my head. I can’t render somebody else’s creative vision; I can only render my own, for better or worse. It’s not even ego—the path I have to follow is the one that makes sense to me; otherwise, I’d have no idea what the hell I’m doing.
Lilja: How did you get to think of such a grim ending? I can’t even imagine how David feels when he sees the military arriving.
Darabont: It’s funny … most people assume I came up with that ending entirely on my own. Even Stephen King thought so. And I haven’t yet gone on record to dispute that notion, but I will do so now. Here’s the truth: The idea for that ending is right out of Stephen King’s book, and I told him so when we were in New York together doing the press junket for the movie. He asked me where I’d gotten the idea. I said, “Steve, I got it from you! Look at this line in your story, here in the last chapter … we’re hearing David’s thoughts near the end, and it says: ‘There are three bullets in the gun, there are four of us in the car. If worse comes to worse, I’ll figure a way out for myself.’” (I’m paraphrasing that line right now, but that’s essentially what it says.) Steve got this great look on his face when I told him this, because I think he’d forgotten that he ever wrote it.
So all I did was take King’s darkest thought and follow it to its most logical and horrible conclusion. The idea for the movie’s ending is right there in the original text; I didn’t just come up with an idea out of the blue and tack it onto Steve’s story. I did what I always do when adapting King or any other author—look for clues in the story that give me insight into the author’s thinking and that I can make dramatic use of. I did the same thing quite a bit when adapting Shawshank and The Green Mile.
Lilja: I just couldn’t believe what I saw. And even if it sounds harsh, I really like that we didn’t get that typical Hollywood ending where all turns out for the best.
Darabont: Thanks, me too. Here’s my favorite anecdote about the ending. We did a test screening of the film in Burbank. Two guys came up to me afterward with tears in their eyes and said, “Frank, we love this movie, but we beg you to change the ending. It’s too much!” After they were gone, two different guys came up, also with tears in their eyes, and said, “Frank, we love this movie. We beg you not to change the ending. It’s perfect!”
As I said, it polarizes audiences. I always figured it would. That’s why I was willing to make the movie so cheaply—I always recognized we were taking a risk, but I also knew if we made it cheaply enough, the movie would still earn a profit. As you can imagine, I’m very grateful to Bob Weinstein for taking tha
t risk with me.
Lilja: Now I guess we just have to wait for the Oscar nominations to see how many The Mist gets? Both The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile have been nominated, and even though it’s harder for a horror movie to be nominated, there are a lot of actors in The Mist who ought to be.
Darabont: I appreciate your kind thought, but there’s no way we’ll get any nominations. A low-budget horror movie like ours isn’t even on the Oscar radar screen. I do agree my actors would be deserving of recognition for the work they’ve done—perhaps they’d get that recognition if they’d been in another kind of movie—but not this one.
Lilja: Your next Stephen King movie is The Long Walk, right? Where are you with that one now? Is a script written?
Darabont: There isn’t a script yet. I plan to write it this year.
Lilja: I guess that script will demand a lot if you’re going to succeed in making it into a feature film. The Long Walk is one of my favorite books, but you must admit that it’s not the first book you’re thinking of when you think of a Stephen King book being turned into a movie. What got you hooked on that particular book, and aren’t you worried that it’s not doable as a movie?
Darabont: What makes The Long Walk a great story is how stripped-down and spare it is. Not much plot—just kids walking, talking, and dying. It’s a very existential work; Stephen King meets Eugene Ionesco. And that’s what I love about it. It’s small and fascinating and weird, and I think the movie should be, too. It’s more of an art house movie the way Steve wrote it. I don’t want to reinvent it or blow it out of proportion to justify it as a big commercial film, which is how they screwed up The Running Man. I’m not sure it’s even possible with material like The Long Walk. Of course, doing it faithfully means I’d have to do it cheaply—far more cheaply than The Mist—but at least I can stay true to what Steve wrote. Perhaps as a cool little film for HBO or Showtime?
