Horror allegory of a community of people in a disaster period

Rating: 7/10 (15 September 2008)

When approaching "The Mist", keeping an open mind is possibly the best thing. It's based on a Stephen King novella, but it is no straight forward horror tale. The film is a moulding of fear and the decline in community bonding during a disaster. The story centres round a supermarket full of people in an idyllic lakeside town who are trapped in by a mysterious fog that has had people screaming of a mysterious entity killing fellow locals.
Won't want to give the story away on "The Mist" of what it is or not, but that is really secondary to the main gist of it all. The film is really an allegory of civil decline in a period of distress, with parallels from events surrounding Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans in the US. The mix in the supermarket include a fundamentalist Christian, a high-end lawyer, local blue collar workmen, army cadets and so on, whilst the main character is a father (Thomas Jane) who is desperate to survive with his son. The relations of the people together is what makes this a fascinating movie, and its the people who have as much to fear inside as to what there is outside.
I have to be honest that I'm not into horror novels but Stephen King is gifted and it shows here. If there were some bigger names in the lead roles then I'm sure this would have been lauded higher than it has been. However, that is not to deny some good acting, with a outstanding performance by Marcia Gay Harden as the self-styled/appointed doom sayer Mrs Cormody.
Definitely one to go for if you like an intelligent horror tale. Of late, there's been way too much torture porn in the horror film stakes crowding all else out, and this is a good redress for the whole ilk. A good viewing.