The Long Mile of Hanks & Darabont

Rating: 8/10 (23 July 2005)

The adaptation of the Stephen King serial novel is given the A-class treatment by Frank Darabont, the same guy who did The Shawshank Redemption(1994), which has gained a great rep since the nineties ended. With a running time of 3 hours, plus the end credits, the pic needs to keep the viewer's attention on an above-average story - which it does. Darabont's style reminds me mostly of Stanley Kubrick's, another Director who tended towards long films. Somehow, Darabont manages to imbue almost every scene with some point of interest, whether it's Hanks' decent everyman struggling with more out-of-the-ordinary scenarios & decisions, or the nearly magical mouse which piques our curiosity in the prison (where much of the story takes place). Of course, it helps to have Hanks as the main actor to carry the picture. The sense of magic is what gives the story that extra lift. King's characters are transposed to the screen with empowering iconic attributes - the basics of humanity are represented in the guards & prisoners: strength, fear, sadism, grief, regret, compassion - all revolving about the 2 big basics of good vs. evil. How they all respond to the signs of magic touching their lives is what attracts the viewer's interest. Since it's not really grounded in reality, the pic sets up the comeuppance of the traditional 'bad guy' (a truly scummy guard) to satisfy the viewer's sense of justice, in ways we know will never happen in our cynical real life.