MovieChat Forums > Misery (1990) Discussion > Very disappointing .. if you read the bo...

Very disappointing .. if you read the book

posted 12 years ago by walpen87
53 replies | jump to latest

They left out so many good scenes.

In the book I could really feel the hate against annie and all the suffering and pain. But it isnt that bad in the movie. Just a little bit worse than a real hospital. Even his legs heal pretty well.

And they left out the whole painkiller addiction thing .. all the gore-scenes (never leave them out .. it could make your film to an all time classic) .. Annies black-outs .. eating orgy .. the punishments (she just dropped some papers on his lap .. oh no x) .. killing of the cops .. the negligence of her animals ..

All this little things would have created a great atmosphere.
As a viewer I have the impression that Paul writes this book in just a couple of hard weeks. They didnt catch the time very well.

Maybe the movies isnt that bad .. but if read the book just a week before, you will have a bad time :D

[–] NoahBody 11 years ago

Very disappointing .. if you read the book

I have read the book several times. In fact I'd rank it fairly high if I was to stack-rank SK's books. I also very much enjoyed this film. Was it different in some ways? Sure, but film is a different medium and changes are to be expected.

[–] Cult_of_Kibner 10 years ago

Nah, the book is better but the movie's solid.

[–] 10 years ago

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[–] Strangerhand 10 years ago

Pfft, whatever! I've read the book and this film has never disappointed me though I've seen it many times since it was newly released in '90. In fact on the contrary I've given Rob Reiner's Misery 10 of 10 stars.

I suppose I should note that although Stephen King's novel is the better of the two--even though that's the case like 99% of the time anyway--the film is far from "very disappointing", man.

[–] JellyFish19 10 years ago

I read the book exactly 10 years ago, if I remember correctly it was from a first person (Paul's) perspective, so it really felt more painful and gory, but this was still a pretty suspenseful adaptation.

All those hopeful escape moments that were crushed in front of the viewer kept me on the edge, even when I already knew the ending. I'm sure this would be classified as a slasher horror movie if Annie would just chop of his legs with an axe like in the book.

[–] triofreehill 10 years ago

I kinda agree. The movie is really good, but the book is better. It's more complex, you feel more anxiety and the whole atmosfere is much more intense.
For an adaptation, it's really good. I just guess that King's writting makes the story more compelling. Maybe if he had written the screenplay, these amazing scenes wouldn't have been cut out.
But anyway, it's a good adaptation, and I really loved Kathy Bates' performance. She was exactly like I imagined 😃

[–] 10 years ago

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[–] davidemistero 10 years ago

books are always better than movies and don't have problems and limits of time as movies

[–] Cult_of_Kibner 8 years ago

books are always better than movies

Not in my experience.

and don't have problems and limits of time as movies

That's a double edged sword though. Sometimes authors drone on and on, dragging the story out longer than it needs to be.

[–] surgecess 9 years ago

I've read the book and I still ended up enjoying the movie. It's better to analyze it as its own piece, rather than a word for word recreation of the book.

[–] Kaliyugaforkix 9 years ago

I think it was decent for a Hollywood adaptation and everything that implies. Understandably they opened up the setting and added more characters because the book is such a chamber piece but they didn't come close to the original's darkness. That's the kind of thing King doesn't seem to do much now- nasty as hell; I don't doubt he was dealing with drug addiction. It probably gave him the edge he used to have.

Since most of the novel is so internalized like Gerald's Game they never stood a chance plumbing the depths the book got at. Its like a Cole's Notes. Maybe today the audience could handle foot amputation/blowtorch cauterization but they still couldn't properly illustrate the weird symbiosis between Sheldon and Annie, the way his creative life merges with real-time events as the Misery project takes shape. In the book Annie becomes the dark god Paul has to appease like Scheherazade on amphetamines, constantly offering up new chapters to assuage her wrath and getting lost in the storytelling despite himself. Its bleak. There's nothing like that here, just solid suspense-comedy (which is fine); it was probably the best direction to take if they weren't going for depth. I just wonder why people bother sometimes since visual translation usually means dumbing down for mass appeal. I guess that's the medium, without the right director the images do all the heavy lifting for you.

[–] poetcomic1 9 years ago

Stephen King's The Shining got made into a movie that was 'true to the book' and it was so bad it was unintentionally funny. Since 'Misery' is such a lean, mean near-perfect film 'more would definitely be less). I find Stephen King unreadable by the way though he can get out a great story idea.

[–] beedoobee 8 years ago

I loved both equally. If they had included everything from the book, it could have been a four hour movie. I actually think what Annie did to Paul's legs in the movie was better, and better showed her craziness. The cutting off of a finger, while brutal, is basically a one-time injury, while the pain of what she did in the movie would last much longer and I think much more sadistic and fit in with her insanity.