Gripping, Well-Acted, Townsfolk Trapped In Supermarket Supernatural Horror Story

Rating: 6/10 (29 November 2009)

The morning after a violent storm, David Drayton and his son Billy drive to the grocery store to pick up supplies. Once inside however, an impenetrable mist covers the town and anyone who ventures into it is torn apart by some monstrous force. Can David escape and save his son from this mysterious terror ?
This fine adaptation of a terrific novella by Stephen King is a proper, out-and-out, full-on horror flick. It's doubly scary because the horror is just as much about what happens to the people inside the store as the diabolical creatures outside. Mrs Karmody's lunatic rantings and stomach-turning misanthropy in the name of religion are frighteningly real and believable. The movie also has an incredibly grim ending (unlike the novella, which has an unresolved odyssey, Ã la The Birds), perhaps the most downbeat I've ever seen with the exception of The Seventh Victim and Night Of The Living Dead. Like many good horror/suspense films (see the work of John Carpenter particularly), it puts its heroes in an extreme siege situation and then watches them slowly tear each other to pieces. If you are looking for some compliments on the intelligence and philanthropy of mankind in the face of adversity this is the not the movie for you. The cast are great; it's hard to play this type of material completely straight and not seem ridiculous, but it's crucial to the success of the suspense and everyone scores. Harden is amazing in the plum role, spitting out her bilious speeches, her whole body twisted with animosity, whilst Jane (who resembles a youthful King) is a solid centre to the film. The entire support cast seem to grasp the tone exactly, with some fine turns by old pro Sternhagen, and Darabont regulars DeMunn and Sadler. Equally good are the scary special effects, by Howard Berger, Greg Nicotero and Everett Burrell; the night sequence where the bugs smash their way into the store and wreak bloody havoc is as hair-raising a scene as any in modern cinema. Mark Isham also provides an odd, dreamlike, choral score, accentuating the surreal quality of the situation and the depths of the characters' grief at their predicament. All in all then, a grown-up scary movie where the suspense sticks a knife in you and then twists it; another first-rate lensing of King's work from the talented Darabont. Trivia fans should note that the story was first published as the coda in Kirby McCauley's 1980 horror anthology Dark Forces, but also appears as the opener in King's 1985 short story collection, Skeleton Crew.