Devine retribution or just a stupid accident? Also, beware of the final five minutes.

Rating: 6/10 (22 November 2007)

Let's discuss the ending of this movie. Without revealing the details of the ending, this movie's ending is, to put it politely, remarkable. Most of this movie is like a train going full speed ahead, destination unknown. The audience is going for a ride and things are happening really fast and everything is hectic. Then the train suddenly arrives at its destination, and there's nothing, complete zero. That's the way this movie ends. Why this movie's creative team chose to do this is for them to explain, but most good movies have memorable endings that fit logically into the overall story, but here, in the climactic final moments of the movie, the part of the movie that's supposed to make the entire movie worth watching, the story takes a sudden detour that is so contrived, so utterly and obviously inconsistent with the rest of the story and so inexplicably predictable that it causes one to reasonably ask: why? This movie violates the first and second laws of movie-making: 1. Never make a good movie with a bad ending. 2. A bad movie may have a good ending, but a good movie never has a bad ending.
Now regarding the element of religion in the story, this is one of the movie's strong points. The story offers a strong and compelling portrayal of how religious teachings can be used to whip up hatred, fear and promote violence. Here religion is used as means of terrorizing people, sowing the seeds of discord and inflicting mental anguish. It's much easier now to understand how, for instance, during the Middle Ages, when seemingly inexplicable disasters occurred, like the plague that killed millions, people, suffering and groping for answers, could start looking around for someone to blame, using religion to justify the most horrendous acts. And this kind of stuff still goes on today.
This is one of the better sci-fi movies, no question about it. Except for the ending, which is weak, the movie presents a powerful story that raises questions. Is the mist and what it contains an act of God? An act of man? Or a combination of both? Is it an experiment? An accident? Or what? But most compelling and entertaining was not the special effects or the unique story, but the performance of Marcia Gay Harden. Ms. Harden is the star of this movie. Her powerful and dominating performance transforms this movie into a cinematic masterpiece, a word which is not used lightly here. I expected another idiotic Hollywood scare 'em movie. It's tempting to reveal details of the story, but suffice it to say that after you watch this movie you'll never take insects for granted and whenever you see the fog, you may wonder: what's it hiding?
Some other comments. Amazingly, unlike most Hollywood movies, especially of the sci-fi genre, this movie offers a story that actually has substance. What happens when people find themselves in extreme life-threatening situations that overtake them without any warning? This movie offers a stark portrayal of how religion can be used not as a source of comfort and support but as a tool of terror. When bad things happen to be people, is this divine retribution? Unbelievable as this may seem, this movie actually explores this subject, which for Hollywood movie is absolutely astounding. Were the deaths of millions of people let's say for instance in World War Two a man-made catastrophe or was it punishment inflicted on humanity by some higher power for past transgressions?