the verdict : spine - chilling drama from horror maestro stephen king , featuring an outstanding , oscar - winning performance from kathy bates .
geez , french and saunders had a field day when they set to work on parodying this !
sorry , non - british readers may not be familiar with french and saunders - my apologies .
the pair are british comediennes ( jennifer saunders later went on to become edina monsoon in " absolutely fabulous " ) , who did a series of film spoofs a few years back , including alien , the exorcist and misery .
needless to say , amidst her chucklesome impersonation of kathy bates ( the resemblance was quite uncanny ! ) , dawn french got pretty nasty with her sledgehammer when in reach of jennifer saunder 's legs ! but despite the lingering memory of their sketch , and although i 've now seen the film a couple of times now , that " hobbling " scene was no less disturbing !
i 'm still left screaming at the telly in revulsion !
that may be the most memorable scene , but it 's certainly not the only worth watching .
stephen king , whose film and tv adaptations tend to vary in quality , strikes gold with this simple yet strikingly compelling tale .
it 's a nicely crafted psychological horror , which effortlessly succeeds in drawing you into the plight of writer phil sheldon ( james caan ) .
rescued from a car accident by annie wilkes ( bates ) , who introduces herself as the writer 's " number one fan " , he soon becomes her prisoner .
both the script and kathy bates ' beautifully masterful performance
( for which she won an oscar ) work arm - in - arm as we quickly begin to realise that beyond her bubbly exterior the woman is basically as nutty as a fruit - cake ( or is that fruity as a nut - cake ? ) .
bates relishes her demanding role , and her performance is nothing short of a masterpiece .
at times she seems like an innocent victim of her own obsessive behaviour , at times she 's a rather tragic character , and more often than not she 's just damned scary !
this is basically a very simple tale , but it achieves a large degree of eloquence in its simplicity .
it 's an involving , engrossing experience - and considering it 's basically a two - hander , mainly set in one locale
, it 's a remarkable piece of cinema .
there are no jazzy special effects or cheesy action sequences - this one relies solely upon rob reiner 's stylish directing and the wonderful performances of bates and caan .
oh , i have n't really mentioned caan yet - he does a good job as the writer who 's a prisoner of his own success
( annie is obsessed with him and his books ) .
but , as you no doubt gathered from the above - bates is well and truly the star of the show .
along with the pig , of course !
anyway , the tension is built - up with masterful aplomb , and some scenes are almost agonisingly tense .
there 's the dinner scene where seldon goes to nerve - shattering lengths to poison her wine .
he succeeds , but . . .
she knocks the glass over !
i bet you threw a pillow at the screen as well !
in the immortal words of homer
j .
simpson - " d'oh ! !
"
other nerve - wracking scenes include the bit where annie has gone off to town and sheldon starts snooping around the house .
we cut to annie in her car -
she 's on her way home .
. .
he realises this and tries to get back to his room . . .
cut to the car again , she 's getting near . . .
will he make it ?
ok , so these sequences are n't exactly original , nor perhaps unpredictable - but they work !
boy , do they work !
if a film has you on the edge of your couch , biting your nails and shouting at the screen in suspense , then it 's doing something right !
of course , the most nauseating sequence is the aforementioned " hobbling " !
annie realises her captive has been out of his room , and she 's going to stop him once
and for all .
cue a block of wood placed strategically between his ankles and a huge sledgehammer , and . . .
i feel ill just thinking about it !
nasty .
it all builds up nicely to the final scene where sheldon finally gets the upper hand , and once and for all tries to kill the crazy psycho !
and then we 're given one of the most ridiculously over - the - top fight scenes i 've ever seen .
she gets hit over the head with a typewriter , set on fire , head smashed against the wall - and she just wo n't die !
sheldon is n't in terribly good shape either .
if it were n't so gorey it would almost be laughable .
but it 's a terrifically effective film , and therefore the daft climax is easily overlooked .
misery is a tight , tense , intense and chillingly entertaining thriller .
the directing is first - rate , and the performances - bates in particular - contribute to making this a suitably nightmarish little gem .
wonderful stuff .
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