The Mist (spoilers)

[neoolong]

It's Frank Darabont actually. Although looking at the interviews on the extras, it seems like Stephen King was rather impressed with the ending.

How is the ending a cheat?

Though it occurs to me that there would probably be a backlash if Tom Jane's character decides not to go through with it and the military shows up and saves the day.

[Ford Prefect]

It's like watching someone paint a masterpiece, and then slather excrement all over the canvas before the paint is dry. You've got nothing to show for your investment of time and energy but a piece of canvas with some shit on it.

All your focus on the ending to the exclusion of the rest of the movie is amazing. Yes, it's not a happy ending, but so what? Even if you end up not enjoying the ending, should it really colour every other part of the movie? Rather than dismissing the entire movie on the basis of the final ten minutes, why don't you see the movie, enjoy everything that comes before itand then tell your friends: 'well it was actually pretty good, though I didn't like the ending'.

And for that matter, why don't you actually see the ending, rather than just dismissing on the basis of it not being 'happy'. It's not a happy ending, but it's not cheap. It's a highly intense scene - more so than just about anything I've seen in the past couple of years outside There Will Be Blood.

[Stark]

No Ford, 'downer endings equal shit'. It doesn't matter how intensely powerful the drama is, or what emotions you can stir in the audience for hours afterward.

[Vympel]

It's a highly intense scene - more so than just about anything I've seen in the past couple of years outside There Will Be Blood.

It also has the advantage of not being completely bizarre nonsense, like There Will Be Blood.

DRAAAIIINNAGGGGE!!! I DRINK YOUR MILKSHAKE!!!! EAT BOWLING BALL AND DIEEEEEE!!!!

[Guardsman Bass]

It's a horror movie. Why would you go into it thinking that there wasn't a chance for an ending that wasn't all roses and sunshine?

It's Steven King. He's not known for "Bad End" endings - look at the Shining (especially the book), It, The Dead Zone, Firestarter...characters die, but it's rarely that kind of "suckerpunch" ending that leaves you feeling cheated.

And why the fuck shouldn't I expect horror movies to have a decent ending? The only good horror films I've ever seen have avoided that kind of bullshit.

Since when does "good ending" = "happy ending"? And I wouldn't say King's books have happy endings - they are usually somewhat bittersweet. Not to mention that this was based off of one of his novellas, and his novellas and short stories not infrequently have unhappy endings.

[Molyneux]

It's a horror movie. Why would you go into it thinking that there wasn't a chance for an ending that wasn't all roses and sunshine?

It's Steven King. He's not known for "Bad End" endings - look at the Shining (especially the book), It, The Dead Zone, Firestarter...characters die, but it's rarely that kind of "suckerpunch" ending that leaves you feeling cheated.

And why the fuck shouldn't I expect horror movies to have a decent ending? The only good horror films I've ever seen have avoided that kind of bullshit.

Since when does "good ending" = "happy ending"? And I wouldn't say King's books have happy endings - they are usually somewhat bittersweet. Not to mention that this was based off of one of his novellas, and his novellas and short stories not infrequently have unhappy endings.

It's not that good ending = happy ending - it's that, as far as I'm concerned, good ending != punch-in-the-gut ending. I've seen way too many shitty books given attention far beyond their merit on, apparently, no other basis than their having a horribly tragic ending.

It's like music - the most important parts are the beginning (to grab the audience's attention) and the end (to make sure they don't walk away feeling cheated). Just based on what I've heard of the ending to the film version of the Mist, I'd probably walk away from the movie feeling cheated.

[Stark]

Cheated because it wasn't a happy huggy ending? Why?

[ray245]

Cheated because it wasn't a happy huggy ending? Why?

It is more or less the unwritten rule in holloywood that movies MUST have a nice ending.

More or less.

[Tanasinn]

Not to mention that this was based off of one of his novellas, and his novellas and short stories not infrequently have unhappy endings.

Incidentally, The Mist is one of those novellas that ends on a hopeful note. King apparently liked the movie ending, though, and supposedly said that he would have used it, had it occured to him.

[Molyneux]

Cheated because it wasn't a happy huggy ending? Why?

Because if I've paid $8 or more for a ticket, I don't want to walk away feeling like shit?

Bittersweet endings are fine, I'm just opposed to heaping praise on something that leaves you wishing you'd never walked into the theater. Like I said before - Brazil. Or for literary examples, Death of a Salesman, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, and Ethan Frome. Hell, almost anything the students are forced to read in an English class.

[Covenant]

I'm mixed on this. I liked the movie as it was since it felt like it was really leading up to a sense of despair right then, and it gave me that, which was not only so tragic but also so satisfactory in the way it all panned out.

But I also do love an ending where the heroes never give up, and aren't punished for determination. However, the addition of the woman to the convoy (the one we saw leave early on) made me feel much better, since the story wasn't just about unintentional cruelty, it was most obviously about fear and hanging on for what matters most. So while sad, the only thing that the main character actually got hurt for was his giving up at the end, since if he'd hung on for a longer time, it'd have been okay.

So I felt it was satisfactory. The arc of the plot was complete, and while immensely unhappy, it didn't jerk the movie off it's rails just to solve the problem. What would have also worked was:

1) The dad and his boy don't give up--like, he knows there's a gas station 1 mile up ahead and he goes to go get it, and he's gets attacked at the station and wounded and is almost ready to just shoot himself--maybe he's been infected--but doesn't since he's carrying the gascan and will probably shoot himself once he gets to the car, sacrificing himself but not the rest of the people... and when he gets back they run into the military and people are saved and he gets treated and will be fine, because he had his moment of judgement and didn't give up. Same message, happy end.

2) Everyone gets shot as normal, but instead of Dad doing the shooting, the person who tumbles out of the car is the blonde or the old woman or the old man. If the blonde gets out, she still goes apeshit with depression, but she had no family here anyway so now she can go home, teach the kids, have some of her own, etc. If the old woman comes out, it shows how gritty determination is rewarded and how her life of sacrifice and stubbornness can trump everything else. If the old guy makes it--he's the same as the old guy who ran in from the mist, right? It shows that he's been doing more than everyone else so far, and lasted the longest because he never gave up and does eventually face the mist at the end.

Either way, so long as both dad and kid die and someone else gets out of the car, it's less depressing, since all of them have their own independant lives outside of a pictured child and wife, so they might have someone/something to go back to. You're still horrified by the end, but it punishes the dad for his fear (which the movie wanted to do) without torturing him.

[neoolong]

I still find it kind of ridiculous for someone to go into a fucking horror movie without the expectation that it might not end so well. Even if it is an adaptation of a King story.

It's still a horror movie.

[Stark]

Because if I've paid $8 or more for a ticket, I don't want to walk away feeling like shit?

Bittersweet endings are fine, I'm just opposed to heaping praise on something that leaves you wishing you'd never walked into the theater. Like I said before - Brazil. Or for literary examples, Death of a Salesman, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, and Ethan Frome. Hell, almost anything the students are forced to read in an English class.

I'm not seeing the link between 'drama stirs emotions' and 'is bad'. If a piece of drama makes me feel, it's good drama. Sugar-coated Hollywood nonsense can't make you feel anything beyond 'boo' and 'wow splosion'. It sounds like you're afraid of negative feelings, or that you think feeling something that isn't happy is bad in some way.

Of course, I'm sure there's fiction that has stupid 'shock zomg' endings that are weak or invalid or whatever, but if you think anything that makes you feel 'bad' is poor drama, that's just sad. At least you're not trying so sell your one-dimensional analysis as anything but opinion.

[Molyneux]

I still find it kind of ridiculous for someone to go into a fucking horror movie without the expectation that it might not end so well. Even if it is an adaptation of a King story.

It's still a horror movie.

And your fucking point is?
I've never seen a good horror movie that didn't have at least a bittersweet ending.

First Nightmare on Elm Street movie, generally regarded to be the best - she kills Freddy. Every movie since then has had Freddy coming back and invalidating the 'happy ending' of the previous movie, and been seen as going downhill.

Aliens has a decent ending; Alien3, often regarded as the beginning of the end for that franchise (though not as bad as much of Alien: Resurrection), invalidates that ending.

Ringu takes a sharp downward turn as soon as the "happy ending" setup is nonsensically thrown out the window - incidentally destroying the emotion that was built up from the discovery of the corpse.

Brazil, though not a horror movie, was great up until the ending, which even the director has described as "cinematic rape".

I'm not saying that it's an absolutely invariable rule, but by far most of the bad-end movies I've seen have been bad movies. If the only way the filmmaker can inspire emotion in the audience is by torturing the main characters, that's a sign of a lazy fucking filmmaker.

And yes, I do go into a film expecting some kind of emotional catharsis, be it horror or fucking slapstick. You got a problem with that?

[Andrew_Fireborn]

I'll just say, loved the movie, called the ending as soon as they ran out of gas. (And it amused the hell out of me.) [My full thought being, they're going to kill themselves, and salvation is going to be three feet that-away...]

Ending fit, and it's more closure than the bulk of King's short stories get. Heck, more than the original story had. (Nightshift was full of non-endings... Good stuff, but no real ending to alot of the stories.)

[SylasGaunt]

Also to be fair to our unfortunate escapees there really were monsters not that far off from the truck (you can see a couple of those spiders, car sized now.. is it just me or do they just keep getting bigger as the movie goes on?) dead and burning just up the road from where they ran out of gas.

[neoolong]

And your fucking point is?
I've never seen a good horror movie that didn't have at least a bittersweet ending.

That's because you're basically defining a good movie as not having an unhappy ending.

First Nightmare on Elm Street movie, generally regarded to be the best - she kills Freddy. Every movie since then has had Freddy coming back and invalidating the 'happy ending' of the previous movie, and been seen as going downhill.

What the fuck? Did you turn off the movie with ten minutes left? That's not how the movie ends. The movie ends with the whole fucking fight being a dream and she's stuck in there. With Freddy. In the first movie.

You know what, forget it. If you're just going to change the endings to movies to prove your point, then fuck it.

I'm not saying that it's an absolutely invariable rule, but by far most of the bad-end movies I've seen have been bad movies. If the only way the filmmaker can inspire emotion in the audience is by torturing the main characters, that's a sign of a lazy fucking filmmaker.

And yes, I do go into a film expecting some kind of emotional catharsis, be it horror or fucking slapstick. You got a problem with that?

Oh, and Empire Strikes Back. The heroes pretty much get fucked. Solo is in carbonite and Luke gets his freaking hand cut off and finds out that the bad guy is his dad. That's not a happy ending. So does the movie now suck? Guess it must or it's one of those rare ones that are an exception which are never defined.

[Molyneux]

What the fuck? Did you turn off the movie with ten minutes left? That's not how the movie ends. The movie ends with the whole fucking fight being a dream and she's stuck in there. With Freddy. In the first movie.

You know what, forget it. If you're just going to change the endings to movies to prove your point, then fuck it.

...huh. I could've sworn the first movie ended with her killing him...sorry, I fucked up there.

Oh, and Empire Strikes Back. The heroes pretty much get fucked. Solo is in carbonite and Luke gets his freaking hand cut off and finds out that the bad guy is his dad. That's not a happy ending. So does the movie now suck? Guess it must or it's one of those rare ones that are an exception which are never defined.

Seen on its own, yes, I did always feel that the Empire Strikes Back had a weak ending. It just leaves the audience hanging, waiting for the next movie. The rest of ESB is great, but in the ending department it's lacking.

Seen as part of a trilogy, it makes a fine middle segment.

We've now gone pretty far off from the actual point of the thread, so I'm going to just leave it as "it's my opinion, not fact, like whatever movies you want, I'll just think they suck" and let it lie.

Ethan Frome and Death of a Salesman still suck, though. And that's a completely objective assessment.

[Guardsman Bass]

I'll have to disagree with even that. I like "Death of a Salesman"; it's almost kind of tragically amusing how poor and deluded the main character is.

[Stark]

Seen on its own, yes, I did always feel that the Empire Strikes Back had a weak ending. It just leaves the audience hanging, waiting for the next movie. The rest of ESB is great, but in the ending department it's lacking.

Is that really what you're talking about, a 'gut-punch' ending? It's just a non-ending, a commercial break, it doesn't end on a massive downer like the other stuff you mention.

Out of interest, do you consider 'The Usual Suspects' to have a bad ending? It's not happy, but it's not really sad either, the good guys lose but it's played for a feeling of realisation and not 'zomg teh crimz got away!'

[Spanky The Dolphin]

I'm sorry Moly, but the ending for Brazil is great: a perfect bait-and-switch. Would you have preferred to watch Sam be tortured to death? Because that's really the only other way it could have ended instead of him escaping into his own mental fantasy.

[Ohma]

I'm sorry Moly, but the ending for Brazil is great: a perfect bait-and-switch. Would you have preferred to watch Sam be tortured to death? Because that's really the only other way it could have ended instead of him escaping into his own mental fantasy.

Furthermore the whole fucking movie was about him escaping from his increasingly crappy life in a hyper-bureaucratic dystopia by indulging in his own fantasy. How the hell else was it supposed to end save for him slipping away permanently?

[Molyneux]

Seen on its own, yes, I did always feel that the Empire Strikes Back had a weak ending. It just leaves the audience hanging, waiting for the next movie. The rest of ESB is great, but in the ending department it's lacking.

Is that really what you're talking about, a 'gut-punch' ending? It's just a non-ending, a commercial break, it doesn't end on a massive downer like the other stuff you mention.

Out of interest, do you consider 'The Usual Suspects' to have a bad ending? It's not happy, but it's not really sad either, the good guys lose but it's played for a feeling of realisation and not 'zomg teh crimz got away!'

No, it's not; it's exactly that, a non-ending. A "To Be Continued".

I did enjoy The Usual Suspects for exactly that reason. It's a far cry between that kind of thing and, say, the end of Brasil.

And yes, Brasil had a fucking horrible ending. If you disagree with me, I respect your (wrong) opinion.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Just seen it. Brilliant movie. It's amazing that shit like Death Proof is released by the Weinsteins here on time, yet this is passed over and forces my hand to acquire it other ways. Fucking stupid.

And the ending was superb. The whole ominous rift a la Half-Life and crazy fundie bitch, when combined with strong and actually smart characters (yes, smart characters in horror. Amazing) and some batshit insane creatures wandering around in a Silent Hill-esque mist was really quite well done. The drama and emotion was on the same level as the horror, which is something I've rarely seen done well, if at all in the past few years. Only horror movie I can note as being good before this was The Descent, and I'm sure Moly would just love the ending to that too, despite the good 90 minutes before it.

I hope it does get a cinema release here sometime. I'd love to go and see how the audience reacts. It was fun taking a monster movie loving friend to see Cloverfield, especially when she loved the parasites more than the monster. She'd have a field day with this and its critters and at least extra-dimensional is more plausible for such things.

[Trav]

It looked too good. It was overproduced, like a bad pop song. Cheapen it up a little; replace some of the CGI with rubber muppets. Give it a cheesy synthesizer theme. It's about monsters laying siege to a supermarket!

Some of the lines could've been re-written. I've always thought Steven King's dialog sounded weird when spoken out-loud.

The "documentary look" was totally unnecessary. It doesn't really add anything, it's just distracting.

These are little complaints though. I don't think it's great, but it's probably one of the better horror movies to come out in the past 10 years.

Also, did anyone notice an absence of large-chested models in tight t-shirts? What kind of bullshit is that? It seems like Frank Darabont thinks we are able to watch a movie without zoning out and staring at the nearest pair of breasts. Weird, huh?