Misery is a psychological thriller horror movie. It's based on Stephen King's 1987 novel with the same name. Production was done by Castle Rock Entertainment and Nelson Entertainment with distribution by Columbia Pictures. Misery was written by William Goldman and directed by Rob Reiner.
The story is, famed novelist Paul Sheldon is planning the next phase of his career after finishing the last book in his successful Misery romance series. While traveling back to his home, he's caught in a blizzard and crashes his car which results in him being badly injured. He's soon rescued by a big fan of his novels. At first she's very kind, but he quickly finds out she's not what she seems.
My Thoughts
One praise I'll give is there are a few comedic moments. Not too many and they don't wind up either clashing with the movie's tone and/or ruin the tension. They're mainly just there for a breather. A let's take a step back for a brief moment then get right back on track.
Speaking of tension, wow. The suspense is perfect. Any time Paul makes a plan to escape or tries to outsmart Annie, a sense of dread just engulfs you. This film can really mess with you psychologically.
Now let's move onto Rob Reiner's directing. The movie looks really good. Not to mention, but Reiner seemed like he took some of Alfred Hitchcock's tricks when making this. However, he still managed to make this movie his own.
The other fantastic aspect of Misery is the performances from Kathy Bates and James Caan. First Kathy. She earned that Best Actress Academy Award. She's phenomenal. It's amazing how she's able to go from sweet to psycho in what feels like the snap of a finger. And what's amazing is this was her breakout hit, but yet it feels like she's done these award winning roles before. Then there's Caan. While he was overshadowed by Kathy, he still provides a great performance as well. The most challenging then he had to do was act on top of acting. What I mean is he has to act like what the character is normally, then he has to have his character pretend that he's falling in love with Annie, even though he isn't. That is a tremendous challenge, and James Caan successfully nails it.
Now for the woman herself, Annie Wilkes. This is definitely one of the top villains in not just in a Stephen King adaptation, but one of the top villains in cinema. She's clearly and unhealthy living in her own twisted little world. There's also the way she goes about killing. She kills because she wants to protect her made up world, kills for personal gain like say to get a promotion, but the scariest of all, there's one scene where Paul is looking at her memory lane book, and she committed murders while treating patients as a nurse. But there's no motivate giving, so there's a good chance she probably just killed for the sake of killing. But what truly makes Annie disturbing, is the fact she can be real. Think about it. Think of all of the celebrities that were killed by an obsessed fan, or were almost killed by an obsessed fan. There's a very good chance they're just like Annie.
I love Misery. It's a great movie to watch both regularly and for the Halloween season.
My final rating is, A MUST WATCH!
That's all for now. Come back on Saturday, Oct 26th, for my review of Venom: The Last Dance. Until then, enjoy the rest of your day.
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