By the numbers

I guess it's a Stephen King kind of day. After posting the trailer for The Mist on here earlier today, I ended up seeing 1408, another film adapted from a King short story, at the budget theater this afternoon. I'm typically not a scary movie type of guy, but the trailer for this one had done an effective job in selling the story. Plus, I'll usually go see anything that Samuel L. Jackson is in.

The premise is sound enough; John Cusack plays an author who writes about famous haunted locations, despite being a skeptic that there is any such thing as paranormal activity. That skepticism is then put to the test when he spends a night in the mysterious room 1408 at the Dolphin Hotel in New York. Despite a strong story and decent actors, the film left me a fairly empty afterwards.

They appeared to have done the bare minimum with what they had here. Both the execution of the action and the performance of the actors leaves a lot to be desired. Throughout the film there are a number of moments that leave you intrigued to see how they'll play out, but they never ended up getting fully played out. Likewise, I thought we would learn more about the primary characters but they are kept at a superficial level. Sam Jackson as the hotel manager is a particularly confusing character. The final scene that we see him in leaves you to wonder what role he truly had in all that happened in the film.

There are a few decent scares in it, but the film in general isn't thrilling enough. The whole idea is that Cusack's character is a skeptic who has his beliefs turned upside down while staying in the room. Yet he stays grounded enough, which prevents the viewer from becoming concerned with his well being. Why should we be scared of what's happening when he acts more annoyed than scared about what's happening.

The one thing that I will give them credit for is their fake-out ending. It appears that the film is going to end with a horribly cliched ending that we've seen countless times, but then swerves you and keeps going. Having said that, the way Cusack ultimately frees himself from the room is an idea I came up with about 10 minutes in after he first went into the room.

I won't say that this was a bad film, because really there's nothing actively wrong with it. It just came off as disappointing, given what I had hoped it would be. I haven't read King's short story, so I would be interested to know if a lot was cut from it for the film or if it's a pretty true adapatation.

I would say that your best bet would be to rent this when it comes out on DVD, if you are still interested in seeing it. However, the better plan would probably be to just watch the trailer again and let your imagination fill in the rest of the blanks. Chances are you can create a more imaginative and interesting story than the one that unfolded on the screen. Grade: C+