Darabont Destroyed a Chance at a Classic

Rating: 3/10 (26 November 2007)

I cannot understand why folks equate a horrible ending with a Horror movie. Nor can I understand why anyone would believe changing the ending of a classic Stephen King sci-fi/horror adventure like The Mist makes it better. Especially since the film was doing wonderfully till the "surprise ending", which went completely, and ludicrously, against David Drayton's character. I enjoy well made apocalyptic horror movies; the Descent was fantastic (original cut); remake of Dawn of the Dead; the original Night of the Living Dead, etc, lets go on forever. But the original The Mist, which I've read many times, and listened to in 3-D audio, was a classic open-ended adventure story, with elements of horror. I had a lot of hopes for this movie. Like many King fans, I've been waiting for the original story to be made into a film since I first read it in 1983. It had a great, every-person's hero in David Drayton, and Thomas Jane was perfect to play the part. I loved the atmosphere, and I marveled at how well Darabont was getting the original story down tight as I watched it. I knew in my head how it had to end, because I've seen it in my head over and over again over the years. A muted hope for he and his son.
When the last five minutes began (and I knew nothing about a last act change suggested by Darabont), I kept thinking, no way. He is not going to do this. It makes no sense at all. It's not artistic, it's just ignorant, hackneyed story-telling, a "surprise" ending simply to disturb people. But he did it. Sure enough. Spoiled a perfect movie experience by going for a sucker punch to the gut. You bet it's startling. You bet it's cold. You bet it's horrible. And you can bet that if Stephen King had tried to sell that ending to a publisher 27 years ago, they would've sent it back post-haste. Why? Because David Drayton's character showed absolutely no prior indication during the story of having this fatalistic flaw. No foreshadowing whatsoever. From the word go in the novella and in the film, David is a caring, compassionate, and brave human. As a father of two, I can tell you that he would've sat there in the front seat of that SUV with his child until they were all so weak from thirst and hunger that he would've been barely able to lift his head, let alone the pistol. It is more logical, given his character, that he would have made some attempt at freedom. He would've reasoned that suicide was the very last choice. Not come to a stop and then within five minutes blow everyone's brains out. And it is very unlikely that all four adults would be on the same page when it came to the end-all solution the movie portrayed. I'm pretty certain the feisty old lady in the back seat would have shot a spray can full of flames in David's face before she let herself be killed.
So here was a chance at having a B-horror/sci-fi modern classic on the same par perhaps as The Invasion of the Body Snatchers or The Quatermas X-periment, only to have it end on a false and hopeless note.
So for those of us who are disgusted with having waited over a quarter of a century for this story to be made into a big screen film, the same existential joke Darabont played on David Drayton, he played on us. It's over. Too late to go back. Never should've put our faith in a Hollywood director who thinks cheap, low blows make for good endings. What a drag.