stephenkingI’ll be the first to admit that there’s plenty in this world that I don’t understand. These things include but are not limited to: Why girls fart, Why I can’t seem to grow a beard, and Why movies based on great books by Stephen King tend to suck hard. Somehow though, despite my previous strike-outs (I’m looking at you, The Stand), I still had some hope left in me. Then I got hit by a double whammy. I checked out 1408 and then Pet Sematary. I read the story that the former was based on a couple years ago, but I just read Pet Sematary this week so it was very fresh in my mind. Both movies fell flat in my opinion. I just don’t get this. Here you have some fantastic content in the form of King’s books and yet the movies based on these books, often times with screenplays written by King himself, end up coming out like disjointed piles of crap.

I don’t really know what happened with 1408. I remember seeing the trailer awhile ago and thinking “Wow, that looks awesome.” Then I read the story and still wanted to check out the movie. I had heard that the theatrical cut wasn’t great but that the director’s cut was better so I went straight to that one…and was promptly disappointed. What looked to be a great psychological thriller that should scare the crap out of me ended up being an hour and a half of John Cusack throwing a fit in a hotel room. Even the awesomeness of Samuel L. Jackson couldn’t save this one. I can’t comment much on the comparison from the book to the movie because I can’t remember much about the story. Let’s move on though. More >