Stephen King is so prolific that it seems like there’s a new adaptation of his work coming out every month, such as one of the best thrillers of the year, The Long Walk, or the expansion of his novel, IT, the HBO Max series IT: Welcome to Derry. Both are faithful to what the master of horror established, while also doing their own thing. If you want another great tribute to Stephen King, make sure to check out Doctor Sleep. Based on King’s novel, which is a sequel to The Shining, Doctor Sleep is directed by King superfan Mike Flanagan. It’s a love letter to the author, while also giving us Flanagan at his peak as a filmmaker, especially with that perfect third act and one of the scariest moments in modern horror history.
‘Doctor Sleep’ Was a Critical Success
Stanley Kubrick‘s vision of King’s novel is a classic of the genre, and Collider has The Shining at number five in our ranking of the best horror films ever made. Making a sequel would have been a bad move, but then Stephen King did it himself with his 2013 novel Doctor Sleep, which follows Danny Torrance as an adult trying to save a young girl with the shine who is being hunted by an evil cult led by Rose the Hat.
Doctor Sleep had a lot to live up to as a movie, but it started out of the gate strong thanks to the hiring of Stephen King’s number one fan, Mike Flanagan, to both direct and write the script. Having already made great horror films like Oculus and Gerald’s Game (with the latter being another King adaptation), and coming off of the highly successful Netflix series The Haunting of Hill House, Flanagan had the credentials to do the book justice, and he came in with a high-caliber cast that included phenomenal actors such as Ewan McGregor and Rebecca Ferguson, and quite the find in newcomer Kyliegh Curran.
Doctor Sleep wasn’t a box office sensation, making just $31 million domestically on a $45 million budget, but those who didn’t see it missed out on a large-scale nightmare built for the big screen. Although Flanagan’s follow-up couldn’t be held in the same regard as The Shining, critics were still kind, leading to a 78% Tomatometer on Rotten Tomatoes. Salon’s review summed it up well, calling the film “the logical continuation to Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of The Shining.” And that’s why it works. It’s not a clone or an attempt to impossibly replicate what Kubrick did. Instead, Flanagan sought to build on it and tell King’s story in his own way.
Mike Flanagan Didn’t Hold Back on ‘Doctor Sleep’s Scares
Stanley Kubrick’s movie is filled to the brim with terrifying visuals, whether it be the hundreds of gallons of blood pouring out of the elevator, or whatever the hell was happening between that guy and the person in the bear costume, and Mike Flanagan keeps the frights coming. Doctor Sleep must tell multiple stories at once, and even though it had two-and-a-half hours to do that, it’s still a rather tough sell with such intricate characters.
Doctor Sleep doesn’t hold back on the horror, and two jolting visuals seal the deal. Dan Torrance is our way into the story, but what he went through at the Overlook Hotel has understandably messed him up. We root for him because of that trauma, yet he’s also a very flawed soul. When he spends one night getting high with another drug addict, he leaves the passed-out woman and her crying baby the next morning, only for a later vision to reveal a disturbing twist you will not get over.
Rebecca Ferguson’s Stephen King Movie Director Teases Reunion After $45 Million Flop
She’s been too booked and busy to make it happen.
The biggest scare of all, though, belongs to a cameo from Jacob Tremblay as the Baseball Boy, a kidnapped kid whose steam is fed on by Rose the Hat and her gang. Tremblay sold his moment so well, screaming in pure terror at the top of his lungs, that Mike Flanagan and Stephen King spoke about how unnerving it was and how the adult cast had to step away to collect themselves. If that scene doesn’t send a chill down your spine, there’s something wrong with you.
Stephen King Approved of the Overlook Hotel Finale
Stephen King famously didn’t like Stanley Kubrick’s film because he changed so much from the novel, including the ending, which saw the Overlook still standing even though Jack Torrance blew it up in the book’s finale. That’s something Mike Flanagan sought to fix. For the Doctor Sleep book, the final showdown takes place on the grounds where the Overlook once stood, but because Flanagan knows that most people’s memory of The Shining comes from the film, he chose to leave the hotel intact for the third act. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, the director said:
“He was reluctant. And then I said, ‘Well, let me tell you how I would approach it.’ I pitched him one scene inside the Overlook. I said, ‘The rest of the story, I’m going to try and stay as faithful as I possibly can… I pitched him one scene, and then he thought about it, and he came back, and said, ‘Okay, then go ahead.'”
That one big change was huge, as Doctor Sleep‘s crew worked to painstakingly recreate the Overlook Hotel. It feels like we’re right back in 1980, with Dan Torrance at the hotel, not to please the audience, but because his character must face his past. It made right what Kubrick wouldn’t do, and in the best review you could ask for, Stephen King told EW, “Everything that I ever disliked about the Kubrick version of The Shining is redeemed for me here.”
Doctor Sleep is now available to stream on Netflix in the U.S.
- Release Date
-
November 8, 2019
- Runtime
-
152 minutes
- Producers
-
Trevor Macy
