Mild scares, no satisfaction

Rating: 6/10 (21 February 2008)

This movie is a good example of the average movie based on a Stephen King book. The book is better. While I won't harp on about CGI and production values because they aren't essential to the quality of a movie and its impact, this movie could be much better on other fronts.
The film makers tried to go in several different ways in this movie, and really none of them are all that successful. I won't give away any spoilers, but if you have seen the trailer, you know that the movie explores human survival instinct and their tendency to turn against each other, and this is realized through several events. The problem is, even if you have not seen any trailers, this is foreshadowed from the beginning, and it all happens in too short a time frame. It's just not convincing, thanks in no small part to the mediocre acting especially from the lead role and the crazy fanatic woman. It is commented on within the dialogue that the speed in which human will turn against each other is frightening, but the exploration of this concept is also a big fail.
Apart from these various subplots, the movie does provide some good scenes of suspense, some nice jump from your seat shocks, and also nice creature design (the spiders are my favourite).
What was disappointing is the ending, which I won't reveal due to spoilers, but it left me feeling cheated. Once again, I could see where they were trying to go with this kind of ending, but once again, it doesn't meld well with the kind of movie that this is, and my advice to filmmakers is that this sort of ending that is meant to be meaningful is much better left to less B-movie films, such as No Country for Old men, which was much better, and executed this kind of thing well.
Over all, fairly good but mildly disappointing.