Constant Listeners, you are cordially invited to another round of The Kingies – a night where the Losers celebrate the best (and not so best) of King’s output from 2000 to 2009. From Best Novel to Best Protagonist, Tastiest Poundcake to Scariest Moments, it’s a whimsical conversation that hits upon nearly every title in this slice of King’s ouevre.

Those titles include On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, Dreamcatcher, Black House, Everything’s Eventual, From a Buick 8, The Dark Tower V: Wolves of the Calla, The Dark Tower VI: Song of Susannah, The Dark Tower VII: The Dark Tower, The Colorado Kid, Cell, Lisey’s Story, Blaze, Duma Key, Just After Sunset, and Under the Dome.

So, put on your denim best and attend the only Stephen King awards show that matters below. For further adventures, join the Club over long days and pleasant nights via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, RadioPublic, Acast, Google Podcasts, and RSS. You can also unlock hundreds of hours of content in The Barrens (Patreon).

The post Celebrating the Best of ’00s Stephen King [The Losers’ Club Podcast] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Stephen King has always been a self-referential writer. In addition to his poignant memoir On Writing and a multitude of forwards and afterwards in his Uncle Steve voice, the Master of Horror tends to inject his fiction with characters that bear a striking resemblance to his own persona. Equating writing with therapy, he often seems to be working through issues that underlie his novels and one can often pick out themes and seasons of life peeking through the windows of his work.

Before hitting the bestseller list, King was a young husband and father struggling to make ends meet and the weight of supporting a family frequently appears in his early writing. The newest King adaptation to hit the big screen, Rob Savage’s The Boogeyman, reimagines a story from the author’s first collection Night Shift in which a surly father mourns the deaths of his three young children. The bulk of these paternal characters appear in early phases of King’s career, but the prolific writer has continued to create complex and conflicted fathers for the past five decades.

As Father’s Day approaches, let’s celebrate the good, the bad, and the dastardly dads that weave their way through Stephen King’s body of work. 

Worst: Lester Billings – The Boogeyman

The Lester Billings we meet in Rob Savage’s adaptation of The Boogeyman is a far cry from the despicable father haunting the pages of Night Shift. Both versions of the character visit a psychiatrist hoping to share the tragic story of their children’s deaths and both versions insist that the child killer is a shadowy monster lurking in darkened closets. While Savage’s version is understandably despondent, King’s original Lester is much more unpleasant. An abusive bigot, he casually mentions assaulting his wife and hints that he would rather his son die than turn out to be what he calls “a sissy.” His story is horrifying, but it’s difficult to feel too much sympathy for the grieving father when he describes sending his young son back to his crib alone to divert the Boogeyman’s attention away from himself. Even worse, an alternative reading of King’s story implies that the Boogeyman is merely a manifestation of Lester’s own rage. He is the true monster and has created the Boogeyman to hide from the reality that he has killed his own children.  

Best: Andy McGee – Firestarter

When most Constant Readers think about King’s 1980 novel, their minds naturally turn to Charlie McGee. However, the story is actually a two-hander following the titular pyrokinetic child and her father as they run from a clandestine government agency known as the Shop. Andy McGee met his late wife Vicky during a college experiment in which they were both injected with a serum designed to enhance psychic abilities. Their daughter Charlie was subsequently born with the power to start fires with her mind along with a bevy of other abilities that continue to grow stronger as she ages. Despite Andy’s tendency to use his own psy talents, all he wants for his daughter is a normal life. He’s taught her to suppress her enormous gifts in fear that the Shop will hold her captive and subject her to cruel experiments. Andy is not a perfect father. His lessons have caused Charlie to live in fear of her own body, but this parental control stems from an all-consuming desire to shield his daughter from harm. He sacrifices his own life to save her from a sinister father figure working on behalf of the Shop. Most of the fathers in King’s early work fall victim to their own inadequacies, but Andy stands out as a dedicated dad determined to protect his child. 

Worst: Billy Halleck – Thinner

IMAGE – Robert John Burke as Billy Halleck in Thinner

Billy Halleck is arguably a better father than he is a husband. A highly connected lawyer, Halleck pulls strings to avoid jail time when he kills a Romany woman with his car while receiving a hand job from his wife. The deceased woman’s husband curses the obese Halleck with a single word: thinner, and dooms him to rapidly lose weight until he wastes away to practically nothing. Though never exactly pleasant, Halleck begins to lose his grip on reality as the pounds melt away. He resents his wife, Heidi, and believes that she should be the one to pay the price for the old woman’s death. Halleck seems to genuinely care for his daughter, Linda, though his insistence that his wife has caused all his problems suggests a mean streak that might eventually land on his daughter’s shoulders. Halleck eventually finds a way to escape the curse by passing it to someone else with a pie poisoned with blood. He leaves the treat for his wife to eat and falls asleep believing that all of his problems have been solved. Unfortunately, Linda also consumes a slice and Billy wakes up to learn that he’s now doomed his own daughter to a horrendous fate. Written under King’s dark pseudonym, Thinner is a mean story about a careless and selfish man who destroys his family because he cannot accept responsibility for his own actions. 

Best: Clay Riddell – Cell

The main protagonist of King’s tech apocalypse nightmare is a bit of an anomaly. Instead of an author, he’s a graphic novelist hoping for a lucrative contract that will allow him to reconcile with his estranged wife, Sharon, and young son, Johnny. Clay has just emerged from a meeting in Boston when a phenomenon called the Pulse uses cell phones to transmit a deadly signal turning anyone who hears it into feral murderers. Clay joins a rag tag group of survivors and becomes a father figure of sorts to 12-year-old Jordan and 15-year-old Alice who have both become orphaned in the world-wide massacre. However, Clay never gives up on Johnny and ventures through the post-apocalyptic hellscape determined to find (or find out the fate of) his own son. The novel ends with a bittersweet reunion and the vague promise that Clay might be able to save Johnny from the horrific mind virus. Cell may not be King’s most beloved novel, but by refusing to give up on the chance of saving his son, Clay becomes one of the author’s most inspirational fathers. 

Worst: Joe St. George – Dolores Claiborne

On the opposite end of the paternal spectrum is Joe St. George. The disgusting husband of Dolores Claiborne, Joe’s single good quality seems to be a smooth forehead the island woman fell in love with in high school. Now married with three children, Joe spends his days picking up odd jobs around the tiny community of Little Tall Island and his evenings drinking and gambling away the money Dolores has been saving for her children’s college funds. When Dolores learns that Joe has also been molesting his oldest daughter Selena, she decides to take matters into her own hands and create an “accident” that will rid her home of this predatory monster. Under cover of a full eclipse, Dolores lures Joe out into the blackberry brambles behind their ramshackle house and leads him straight to the rotted cover of an old well. Joe falls through the wood and eventually dies at the bottom of the dried up pit screaming for his wife to either pull him out or join him in the deadly darkness. A caricature of abusive evil, Joe is one of King’s worst fathers and deserves to rot away in a hole deep under the ground. 

Best: Mike Anderson – Storm of the Century

Another resident of Little Tall Island, Mike Anderson proves that the tiny New England community does have fathers who love their children. When a brutal Nor’easter cuts the town off from the larger world, a mysterious stranger named Andre Linoge begins to pick off the island residents in a string of grisly murders and suicides. Despite being jailed by Anderson, serving as a part-time constable, Linoge exerts mental control over the town’s residents and repeats the simple phrase “give me what I want and I’ll go away.” Unfortunately, what this centuries-old sorcerer desires is a child to raise as his own evil successor. Faced with certain death, the adults of Little Tall Island decide to give the monster one of their children and devise a lottery system to choose the unfortunate sacrifice. The lone dissenter, Mike is devastated when his own son Ralphie is chosen to become Linoge’s progeny. Mike does his best to save his son, but tragically finds himself outmatched by a dark wizard and a town full of frightened people desperate to save themselves. 

Worst: “Big Jim” Rennie – Under the Dome

Arguably King’s worst villain, “Big Jim” Rennie is a slick politician and Second Selectman of the small Maine town of Chester’s Mill. This used car salesman and secret drug lord pulls the town’s strings from behind the scenes while maintaining the façade of a god-fearing father. When the whole of Chester’s Mill becomes encased in an indestructible dome, Big Jim seizes the opportunity to murder his enemies and increase his control over the terrified town. He’s so busy orchestrating riots and vilifying his political rivals that he fails to notice his son committing murders of his own. Due to an undiagnosed brain tumor, Junior Rennie careens through town assaulting and killing anyone who angers him or threatens his authority as the town’s most powerful son. Big Jim appoints Junior and his friends to the office of Special Deputy and essentially gives them free reign to terrorize the town under the guise of martial law. Two of King’s most evil characters, Big Jim and his son Junior are terrifying simply because they seem so plausible in a divided political landscape that feeds on fear mongering and deception.

Debatable: David Drayton – The Mist

Thomas Jane may just want his kids back, but his most famous Stephen King character, David Drayton, has been struggling to care for his young son Billy in the wake of a mysterious catastrophe. When a vicious storm ushers in a dense fog that essentially swallows the town of Bridgton, Maine, several of the town’s residents find themselves trapped together in the local grocery store. As otherworldly monsters emerge from the mist and begin to snatch survivors, David must find a way to protect Billy while convincing his stubborn neighbors that the monsters he’s seen lurking outside the store are real. Even worse, a local zealot named Mrs. Carmody decides that this plague is a punishment from a vengeful God. She amasses a group of terrified followers and demands to take Billy as a sacrifice. David eventually flees the store with his son and a small group of likeminded residents. King’s original David merely keeps driving through an endless sea of mist, dodging monsters and continuing to care for his son while Frank Darabont’s adaptation takes a much darker turn. Hearing the approach of a gigantic creature, David and his unofficial ka-tet decide that a quick death is more appealing than a slow and agonizing demise at the hands (claws) of these Lovecraftian beasts. He shoots Billy and everyone else in the car before running out of bullets and stepping outside to face what he believes will be certain death. Only then does he realize that the sound they heard was the arrival of salvation; army tanks approaching to sweep them away to safety. King’s ending is haunting, but Darabont’s grim conclusion dramatically changes the tone of this bleak horror film and catapults David to the upper echelons of the author’s worst fathers. 

Worst: Wilfred James – 1922 

In Zak Hilditch’s adaptation of King’s novella 1922, Thomas Jane brings to life another of King’s flawed fathers. Nebraska farmer Wilfred James claims to want to protect his son Henry’s inheritance, but his desire to murder his wife Arlette stems from petty jealousy that the parcel of land she owns is larger than his own. When the headstrong woman begins making plans to sell off her portion of the property and move to Omaha, Wilfred convinces his teenage son Henry to help him carry out a gruesome murder. The reluctant son joins his father in a plan to slash Arlette’s throat and send her tumbling down a well that subsequently becomes infested with rats. Perhaps predictably, Henry struggles with the weight of this crime and his promising life quickly falls apart. He impregnates his girlfriend and the young lovers set out on a Bonnie and Clyde style crime spree that eventually leads to their own tragic deaths. Wilfred ends up depressed and alone, forced to sell the land he once killed for and move to the city he hates. Haunted by the rats who seem to embody Arlette’s vengeful spirit, Wilfred succumbs to his own guilt while trying to tell the story of a life shattered by his own selfishness.  

Worst: Bob Anderson – A Good Marriage

No relation to Little Tall’s Mike, Bob Anderson proves to be one of King’s most devious fathers. The central villain of the novella A Good Marriage, Bob seems to have the perfect life: a loving wife named Darcy, two happy adult children, and a small yet successful business selling rare coins to dedicated collectors. While Bob is away on a business trip, Darcy stumbles upon her husband’s dark secret. Searching for batteries in the garage, she finds evidence of her his taste for sadomasochistic torture and confirmation that he is a notorious serial killer known as Beadie. Darcy tries to hide her shock, but Bob confronts her with the truth and convinces his wife to keep his horrific secret to protect their children. She agrees, but secretly begins to plan a way out of her disintegrating marriage. Though Bob is ostensibly a family man and loving parent, he’s spent the past few decades murdering the daughters of other fathers. He claims to be thinking only of his children, but anyone can see that his insistence that Darcy keep his secret stems from a selfish desire to avoid prison or death. King based this character on the horrifying true story of Dennis Rader, a Kansas serial killer who operated under the noses of his picture perfect family for decades. Rader’s small community was devastated by the discovery of his crimes, leaving little doubt of the dark fate awaiting Darcy and her children should Bb’s secret ever come out. 

Best: Edgar Freemantle – Duma Key

One of King’s most unusual protagonists, Edgar Freemantle moves to a quiet Florida island known as Duma Key in order to recover from a near-fatal accident. After a collision with a massive crane, Edgar discovers that he now has the ability to create reality with his drawings and see far away scenes by envisioning them in his mind and translating them to canvas. Unfortunately his curious power seems to come from a terrifying female force known as Perse lurking just off the coast. Having divorced his wife in the aftermath of the accident, Edgar remains close to his younger daughter Ilse whom he invites to stay with him on Duma Key. With this innocent visit, Edgar inadvertently introduces Isle to the island’s sinister presence and Edgar scrambles to keep her from falling under Perse’s deadly spell. The novel concludes with a father’s desperate quest for revenge. Guided by memories of his beloved Ilse, he ventures to the island’s dark edges to battle the centuries-old sea-witch once and for all. King’s bittersweet ending proves that though time heals all wounds, some losses are forever. 

Worst: Frank Dunning – 11/22/63

Arguably one of King’s best novels and most romantic stories, 11/22/63 also contains one of the most horrific scenes in his entire body of work. Frank Dunning is a popular butcher who constantly flirts with the ladies of Derry, Maine. Unfortunately, he’s also an angry and controlling drunk and frequently abuses his wife and children. On Halloween night of 1958, Frank tries to force a reunion with his estranged wife and winds up attacking his family with a sledgehammer, gruesomely killing all but young Harry who emerges from the chaos with a mental disability and debilitating limp. Decades later, Harry tells this tragic story to a young teacher named Jake Epping who finds a way to travel back through time and save the family from this horrific fate, giving the audience a ring-side seat to this harrowing massacre. Frank’s fate is a minor part of King’s epic novel, but this Halloween night and the raging father who turns out to be worse than any monster is one few Constant Readers will ever forget. 

Best: Alan Pangborn – Needful Things

When Sheriff George Bannerman falls victim to a rabid St. Bernard, Castle Rock’s next Chief of Police will undoubtedly have big shoes to fill. Fortunately, the job falls to one of King’s most beloved characters, Alan Pangborn. This husband and father of two first emerges in the pages of The Dark Half when he attempts to help another father, Thad Beaumont, defend his own family against the murderous manifestation of his sinister pseudonym. Pangborn returns in the black comedy Needful Things to square off against devilish salesman Leland Gaunt for the souls of the small New England town. Between the timelines of these two Castle Rock stories, Alan’s wife Annie dies in a car accident along with the couple’s younger son Todd. The grieving father not only struggles with depression, but guilt at failing to recognize the symptoms of a brain tumor that may have caused Annie to crash the car. Alan may protect the town from annihilation, but his true paternal strength lies in a more quiet kind of courage. Devastated by the loss of his wife and son, Alan bravely confronts his own grief and finds a way to heal his broken heart in order to love and support the son he still has left.  

Worst: Jack Torrance – The Shining

King’s most famous father will always be associated with Jack Nicholson’s incredible performance as Jack Torrance in Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of The Shining, though King’s own version of the character enjoys a bit more humanity. As the winter caretaker of the Overlook Hotel, Jack drags his family to an isolated resort hidden deep in the Colorado mountains after losing his teaching job due to a violent temper and struggles with sobriety. Jack intends to spend the quiet months finishing a play, but begins to feel resentment for his wife, Wendy, and young son, Danny. When the sinister ghosts haunting the hotel begin to prey on Jack’s weakened psyche, they convince him to kill Wendy and the psychically gifted Danny as the bloody price of admission to the Overlook’s system of power. Having struggled with addiction himself, King has since written that Jack may have been an unconscious manifestation of his own inner demons. He offers Jack a final moment of redemption not found in Kubrick’s adaptation and this near-perfect novel becomes a poignant reminder that hope never dies. Even the worst parents have the power to find their way out of darkness and remember to selflessly love their children. 

Most Tragic: Louis Creed – Pet Sematary

Louis Creed’s life seems practically perfect when he moves to the sleepy town of Ludlow, Maine. Having taken a job as a doctor at the local university, the husband and father of two moves his family into a country home that just happens to lie next to a two-lane road frequented by large trucks. When his neighbor Jud introduces him to a charming, but eerie Pet Sematary in the woods behind his house, a sinister force awakens in the forest’s deeper darkness. This innocent hike begins a deadly chain reaction that claims the life of the family’s pet cat and toddler son Gage. Louis tries to harness this dark power to resurrect the happy family now lying shattered at his feet, but winds up plunging his wife and daughter into an inescapable nightmare. King was inspired to write this terrifying novel after watching his own young son run into the road and famously put the finished manuscript in a drawer convinced it was too dark for publication. Pet Sematary is indeed devastating, and may be King’s most terrifying tale, but it’s also one of his best. Watching Louis try to reject the inevitability of loss allows us all to confront the terror of loving children in a world that doesn’t promise to protect them. His descent into hell reminds us to hold our loved ones a little closer and treasure their presence in our lives while we still can. 

The post The King of Father’s Day: Stephen King’s Best and Worst Fathers appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

The Losers gather at Boston International Airport to close out their coverage on Stephen King‘s Cell. Now that they’ve explored the 2006 novel, they’re dialing into the 2016 adaptation. Originally announced as an Eli Roth project two months after the book’s release, the film spent 10 torturous years in development hell before finally being unleashed.

What came to fruition is a feature by filmmaker Tod Williams (The Door in the Floor, Paranormal Activity 2) that stars John Cusack, Samuel L. Jackson, Isabelle Fuhrman, Owen Teague, Stacey Keach, and Joshua Mikel. What’s more, King himself penned the screenplay alongside 2009’s Last House on the Left scribe Adam Alleca. Was it worth the wait?

Join Losers Michael Roffman, Rachel Reeves, Ana Marie Cox, and Jenn Adams as they answer that very question. Together, they chart the entire decade-long production history, discuss the 1408 reunion between Cusack and Jackson, try to make sense of King and Alleca’s chopped-up script, collect all the King Easter Eggs, and much, much more.

Stream the movie review below. Then return next week when the Losers re-run their book episode for King’s emotional 2006 novel Lisey’s Story, which originally dropped in 2021 for the Apple TV+ series. For further adventures, join the Losers’ Club over long days and pleasant nights via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, RadioPublic, Acast, Google Podcasts, and RSS.

You can also unlock hundreds upon hundreds of hours of exclusive content in The Barrens (Patreon) — from deep dives into uncollected King works to Dark Tower detours to feature-length King commentaries to exclusive interviews to spinoff podcasts centered around Stranger Things, Michael Crichton, and spooky real-life stuff.

Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | Patreon | Store

The post Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Adaptation Never Really Escaped Development Hell [The Losers’ Club Podcast] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

The Losers are taking that to heart as they run out of Boston Common. All around them, The Pulse has turned the world upside down: mothers are gnawing at their daughters, trucks are crashing into stores, explosions are deafening. Luckily, they find a peaceful retreat at Gaiten Academy, where they catch their breath to discuss Stephen King‘s Cell.

Join Losers Randall Colburn, Michael Roffman, Ana Marie Cox, and Jenn Adams as they revisit King’s 2006 novel. Together, they meditate on the reverberations of 9/11, the parallels to H.G. Wells and Richard Matheson, the hilarious digital marketing campaign around its release, and why this often feels like King’s version of a Greatest Hits album.

Stream the book episode below and be sure to keep your phone on silent. Then return next week when the Losers speak to a very special guest who knows a thing or two about love. For further adventures, join the Losers’ Club over long days and pleasant nights via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, RadioPublic, Acast, Google Podcasts, and RSS.

You can also unlock hundreds upon hundreds of hours of exclusive content in The Barrens (Patreon) — from deep dives into uncollected King works to Dark Tower detours to feature-length King commentaries to exclusive interviews to spinoff podcasts centered around Stranger Things, Michael Crichton, and spooky real-life stuff.

Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | Patreon | Store

The post Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Dials Up the Gore and Calls Back to Familiar Hits [The Losers’ Club Podcast] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Stephen King is no stranger to the apocalypse. From the fallen worlds of his The Dark Tower series to his viral opus The Stand (which remains one of my all-time favorite literary works), the writer has an undeniable knack for depicting savage characters with nothing left to lose. Back in 2006, the author tried his hand at a different kind of apocalyptic yarn with Cell, a chilling homage to the zombie genre wrapped up in a bit of technological satire.

Unsurprisingly, the book became yet another hit for the King of horror, so it’s only natural that its rights were soon scooped up by eager film studios. However, Cell’s journey to the big screen was a tumultuous one, with the project shifting from one creative team to the next over a period of several years. At one point, even Hostel’s Eli Roth was set to direct the flick, though he ultimately departed from the picture due to creative differences with the Weinsteins.

After a number of false starts, Cell finally began production in 2014 with Paranormal Activity 2’s Tod Williams directing a screenplay written by Stephen King himself. John Cusack and Samuel L. Jackson were brought on board as our leading men, which pleased fans of the surprisingly successful 1408 adaptation. The duo was also joined by the always-charming Isabelle Fuhrman (Orphan), further adding to the hype as this long-awaited project finally got off the ground.

Like the novel, the film follows artist Clay Riddell (Cusack) as he attempts to survive the aftermath of a mysterious pulse that transforms cellphone users into zombie-like murderers. Joining forces with train conductor Tom McCourt (Jackson) and a teenage neighbor named Alice Maxwell (Fuhrman), Clay embarks on a perilous quest to reunite with his estranged family in New England as the group learns to face the dangers of this brave new world.

Promising a star-studded cast boosted by a script penned by the original author, Cell was shaping up to be a high-profile Stephen King adaptation akin to the aforementioned 1408 or even Frank Darabont’s The Mist.

SO WHAT WENT WRONG?

While the movie was completed in early 2014, Cell would only see the light of day two years later, being unceremoniously dumped onto streaming platforms after an extremely limited theatrical release (resulting in an abysmal $1 million box office return). This unusual delay implies that the studio knew something was wrong with the film even before it earned its disappointing 11% score on Rotten Tomatoes.

Once they finally got to see it, most critics agreed that the movie was a rather bland entry in the zombie genre, suffering from heavy-handed allegories and cookie-cutter characters. There were also numerous complaints about the film’s low production value, with reviewers almost unanimously lamenting the picture’s made-for-TV aesthetics, bizarre editing choices and laughable special effects.

In fact, I’d argue that most of the film’s general lack of tension and style can be chalked up to the wildly inappropriate budget. While it’s not necessarily a blockbuster action story, Cell clearly needed to be a larger production in order to properly adapt the apocalyptic scale of King’s novel. Couple that with the inherent difficulties of translating the author’s idiosyncrasies and lengthy inner monologues to a visual medium and you get a literal yet confused adaptation that doesn’t really do the book justice.

There’s also the issue of the film simply taking too long to get made, with the cellphone zombie idea seeming a lot fresher back in 2006 than when the movie eventually came out. By 2016, much of the story’s social commentary seemed silly and outdated, especially when you consider that most people were already using cellphones as texting devices rather than actual phones.

At the end of the day, Cell was a missed opportunity, containing all the right ingredients for a great Stephen King adaptation but fumbling the execution.

THE SILVER LINING

As I mentioned in a previous Silver Lining piece on Riding the Bullet, I’ve always been a fan of made-for-TV King adaptations. These low budget movies and miniseries may have been overly literal translations of the author’s work, but I think that their schlocky ambitions often outshined their limitations. I mention this because I see some of that same late-night TV charm in Tod William’s Cell, which contains quite a few entertaining moments despite its obvious flaws.

While it would have been fun to see a proper big-budget adaptation of the book’s opening moments, I honestly believe that the film faithfully captures the initial chaos and confusion of a sudden apocalyptic event. Most zombie media tends to overlook the genesis of the undead uprising, usually skipping ahead to the dystopic thrills of a post-zombie society, so I appreciate how Cell lets us witness these events in almost real time.

The film’s ending might still be a little too on-the-nose, but it’s a marked improvement over the novel’s excessively vague finale while still managing to keep the story’s nihilistic elements front and center. In fact, most of the original plot made it onscreen intact, courtesy of King’s effective screenplay. The cast is also surprisingly likable despite the admittedly thin characterization, and I especially like Cusack and Fuhrman’s budding friendship, which provides some of the film’s most tender moments.

It’s definitely no Shawshank Redemption, but I think Cell is an enjoyable B-movie if you can stomach some shoddy effects work and sub-par production value. The technophobic thrills that carry the story might not please everyone, but I’d recommend this peculiar zombie flick to die-hard fans of both Stephen King and the late great George Romero. Just try not to play around with your phone while you watch it.

Watching a bad movie doesn’t necessarily have to be a bad experience. Even the worst films can boast a good idea or two, and that’s why we’re trying to look on the bright side with The Silver Lining, where we shine a light on the best parts of traditionally maligned horror flicks.

The post Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ – Finding the Good in a Missed Opportunity [The Silver Lining] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Next up is a collaboration with supergroup The Damned Things, a whacked-out music video for “Cell” off their forthcoming album High Crimes (April 26 through Nuclear Blast). The band’s members include Keith Buckley (Every Time I Die), Scott Ian (Anthrax), Dan Andriano (Alkaline Trio), Joe Trohman (Fall Out Boy) and Andy Hurley (Fall Out Boy). Spoiler: they all get brutalized.

The post Things Go Horribly Wrong in the Music Video for The Damned Things’ “Cell”! appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Theatrical Releases:

Carrie (1976)

Based on: the novel from 1974

It’s only fitting that the first King novel to ever be published was the first to receive a feature film adaptation. And it set the bar high right out of the gate. Sissy Spacek was nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award for her turn as the shy Carrie White, daughter to religious zealot Margaret White (Piper Laurie, also nominated for an Academy Award) and frequent target of high school bullies. That is, until her telekinetic powers are awakened and a mean prank pushes her over the edge. Directed by Brian De Palma, Carrie still remains among the best King adaptations.

The Shining (1980)

Based on: the novel from 1977

Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of King’s novel is often considered a cinematic masterpiece, and one of the scariest of all time. Just not by King himself, who’s been vocal throughout the decades of his feelings on Kubrick’s drastic departure from the source material. Whereas Jack Torrance’s descent into madness was much more external thanks to the ghosts of the Overlook Hotel, Kubrick made Jack’s journey more rooted in psychological terror. His vision and surreal imagery haunted in a very different way.

Creepshow (1982)

Based on: two segments are based on the short stories “Weeds” from 1976 and “The Crate” from 1979, the rest King wrote for the film.

Directed by George A. Romero, this anthology is one big homage to horror comics of the ‘50s, and plays out like one. Bookended by little Billy (played by King’s son Joe) getting scolded for reading a horror comic, The Creep appears at his window for assistance. From there, five segments unfold of horror and humor. All very colorful in a comic book aesthetic, and all very King. King even appears in the segment “The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill” based on his short “Weeds” for his film debut. The icing on the cake is special makeup effects handled by master Tom Savini.

Cujo (1983)

Based on: the novel from 1981

A friendly St. Bernard becomes a vicious beast thanks to a bite from a rabid bat. Enter housewife Donna (Dee Wallace) and her young son Tad (Danny Pintauro), who’ve arrived on property to get the family car repaired, unaware that the rabid dog has killed its owner. It sets off an intense fight for survival, with the car the only safe haven from the unrelenting animal and no help in sight. This also means that the elements are a big issue, too. This adaptation is fairly faithful, but it drops all supernatural elements from the novel and offers a much more uplifting ending.  Book spoiler: Donna finally defeats Cujo mere moments from help arriving, but young Tad had already died from dehydration and heat exposure.

The Dead Zone (1983)

Based on: the novel from 1979

Directed by David Cronenberg, this adaptation stars Christopher Walken as John Smith, a young school teacher who slips into a coma for five years due to a car accident. When he comes to, he finds his lady love has moved on and a new psychic ability that gives him insight into anyone he touches. A genre-bender that streamlines King’s novel, The Dead Zone isn’t one of the best adaptations but one that remains timeless. The novel also inspired a TV series that ran for six seasons beginning in 2002.

Christine (1983)

Based on: the novel from 1983

King’s popularity was so immense by this point that production for this adaptation began before the novel was even published. So, naturally, there are some narrative differences between the novel and film. This wasn’t a passion project for director John Carpenter, but one he needed to make from a career standpoint following the box office failure of The Thing. It was our gain, as his vision of King’s novel brought a very stylized take on the killer Plymouth Fury story.

Children of the Corn (1984)

Based on: the short story from 1977

Young couple Burt and Vicky (Peter Horton and Linda Hamilton) find themselves trapped in a remote town full of homicidal, religious children who have previously purged the town of adults. Unlike the source novel, which sees Burt and Vicky at the end of the relationship and thus constantly bickering, the film has the leads happy and still in love. Until they get to Gatlin, anyway. The adaptation also adds in two new characters, the innocent Job and Sarah, who assist the adults in their survival. King was rumored to be unhappy with these changes, but at least the adaptation gave us memorable villains in Isaac (John Franklin) and Malachai (Courtney Gains).

Firestarter (1984)

Based on: the novel from 1980

The plot sees a couple gaining telekinetic abilities after volunteering for medical experiments, and then go on to have a child, Charlie (Drew Barrymore), who is born with pyrokinetic abilities. The facility responsible wants Charlie back. Firestarter was directed by Mark L. Lester (Commando, Class of 1984), but it very nearly would have been directed by John Carpenter. Yet again, the financial flop of The Thing altered the trajectory of his career, as he was slated to direct Firestarter but was replaced post The Thing release. Lester hired Stanley Mann to adapt King’s novel to screen, eschewing the two Carpenter commissioned scripts- one of which was written by Bill Lancaster (screenwriter of The Thing) that King had given his seal of approval.

Cat’s Eye (1985)

Based on: two segments based on the short stories “Quitters, Inc.” from 1978 and “The Ledge” from 1976, “General” was written specifically for the film

This anthology connects three segments of horror and suspense together by a traveling cat on a quest to save a little girl. Written by King, and directed by King favorite Lewis Teague (Cujo), Cat’s Eye is the first film to really play with the universe in the way King does in his novels. The ninth theatrically released film (tenth if you count made-for-TV movie ‘Salems Lot), there’s a lot of Easter eggs and overt nods to other notable characters and places that indicates just how relevant to pop culture King had become.

Silver Bullet (1985)

Based on: the novella Cycle of the Werewolf from 1983

Cycle of the Werewolf was originally intended to be a calendar, with illustrations by comic book artist Bernie Wrightson. But King wasn’t satisfied with the limited space for his monthly vignettes to accompany the art and turned it into a short novel (Wrightson’s illustrations included). So, the novella plays out like an extended calendar; each month a story of the werewolf’s latest victim. King wrote the screenplay for the adaptation, as well, dropping the monthly format in favor of one cohesive narrative that followed paraplegic hero Marty (Corey Haim), his uncle Red (Gary Busey), and his sister (Megan Follows) as they solve the mystery behind the werewolf attacks.

Maximum Overdrive (1986)

Based on: the short story “Trucks” from 1973

A comet causes inanimate objects to become sentient and homicidal, resulting in a group of people banding together at a truck stop to evade the attacks and survive. Not only was the screenplay written by King, but Maximum Overdrive also marks the writer’s first and only directorial credit. It also didn’t fare well financially or critically, earning both King and lead actor Emilio Estevez Golden Raspberry nomination. As evidenced by his prolific writing, King is also an overachiever, and you can spot him in the film as a man at the ATM.

Stand by Me (1986)

Based on: the novella The Body from 1982

Some of the most critically adored adaptations of King’s works aren’t horror at all, but drama. Such was the case for Stand by Me, a coming of age story in which four friends embark on a journey to find the body of a missing boy. Directed by Rob Reiner early in his directorial career, he opted to hone in on one of the boys, Gordie, and make them a central character to give the film version more focus. The move resulted in Stand by Me winning many awards, including a Golden Globe for Best Director and an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.

Creepshow 2 (1987)

Based on: one segment based on the short story “The Raft” from 1982, the other two were written specifically for the film

Like its predecessor, Creepshow 2 was meant to include five segments. Budgetary cuts meant that two were trimmed, though one was later used in Tales from the Darkside: The Movie – “Cat from Hell.” The best segment, “The Raft,” was based on King’s short, while the rest he wrote treatments for. From there, George A. Romero wrote the screenplay. The director’s reigns were handed off to Creepshow and Day of the Dead cinematographer Michael Gornick for this sequel.

The Running Man (1987)

Based on: the novel from 1982 under pen name Richard Bachman

This Arnold Schwarzenegger sci-fi action vehicle follows a wrongly convicted man, Ben Richards (Schwarzenegger), forced to play in a deadly gauntlet as a form of public execution via live reality TV game. Much lighter and different from the source novel, this adaptation has a much happier ending. If it’s been a while since you’ve seen this one, or not at all, then there’s no better time than this year to watch, since most of the narrative is set in 2019.

Pet Sematary (1989)

Based on: the novel from 1983

One of King’s most terrifying novels was originally intended to be directed by George A. Romero, who’d previously purchased rights in 1984. But due to being tied up in another project, he pulled out of the production. Later, due to a looming writer’s strike, Paramount needed screenplays already ready to go to avoid major gaps in their release schedule. Enter King’s screenplay. This, combined with director Mary Lambert’s strong vision which included her insistence on casting decisions of Miko Hughes as Gage Creed and Andrew Hubastek as Zelda, this faithful adaptation is an all-timer.

Tales from the Darkside: The Movie (1990)

Based on: one segment based on the short story “Cat from Hell” from 1977

Remember how Creepshow 2 had two more segments that were cut due to budgetary constraints? This is where one of those cut stories ended up. The middle segment, “Cat From Hell,” was based on King’s story treatment and adapted by Romero, and followed a wealthy old man who hires a hit man to kill a cat. The hitman doesn’t believe the old man’s stories of how this cat is responsible for a string of murders but is willing to accept the high fee anyway. This segment has a lot of dark humor up until its grisly, gory end.

Graveyard Shift (1990)

Based on: the short story from 1970

This adaptation makes some drastic departures from the short story it’s based on. A creature feature that didn’t fare well with critics, Graveyard Shift follows new hire Hall (David Andrews) tasked by his mean boss Warwick (Stephen Macht) to assist with the insane rat infestation beneath their mill. They find something much most monstrous as the cause. Though the film was panned, it’s a fun creature feature with an always welcome appearance by Brad Dourif as the intensely eccentric exterminator. The film also opts for a happier ending, whereas (spoiler), the story sees both Hall and Warwick getting devoured by the mutated rats, the crew in the upstairs mill none the wiser.

Misery (1990)

Based on: the novel from 1987

Getting into a car crash is only the beginning of Paul Sheldon’s nightmare when he realizes his savior is an obsessed fan who refuses to let him leave at any cost. Director Rob Reiner once again proves masterful in adapting King’s works for screen, this time tapping talented novelist and screenwriter William Goldman (Magic, The Princess Bride) to adapt. Another award-winning feature, but this time the focus was on actress Kathy Bates, unknown prior to her star turn in Misery.

The Lawnmower Man (1992)

Based on: the short story from 1975 – in name only

This adaptation is a bit of a doozy. It wasn’t initially conceived as an adaptation at all; originally titled Cyber God, the story followed a simple greenskeeper rendered intelligent due to virtual reality experiments. But New Line Cinema had rights to King’s short story, and decided to combine the story with Cyber God, to be titled Stephen King’s The Lawnmower Man. King successfully sued to have his name removed; this adaptation had very little in common with his story at all. This movie isn’t even acknowledged on his official web page, but I’m including it for its brief connection and as an incentive to seek out the short story, which is much more gruesome and, well, better.

Sleepwalkers (1992)

Based on: Original screenplay based on an unpublished short story

The first of many King’s works to be directed by horror master Mick Garris, Sleepwalkers is an original screenplay written by King. A wacky twist to vampire mythos, the film centers around two incestuous shapeshifting vampires (Brian Krause and Alice Krige) who feed off virgins. Their latest victim is Tanya Robertson (Madchen Amick), a sweet girl who finds an unexpected ally in the Sheriff’s cat, Clovis. Look for many notable horror cameos; John Landis, Joe Dante, Clive Barker, Tobe Hooper, and King all make appearances in this underrated creature feature.

The Dark Half (1993)

Based on: the novel from 1989

Directed and adapted for screen by George A. Romero, The Dark Half follows Thad Beaumont (Timothy Hutton) an author attempting to bury his more successful pen name George Stark. But George doesn’t want to be buried and becomes a physical presence that terrorizes Thad’s friends and family. The novel was written after King’s own alter ego, Richard Bachman, was outed, and even dedicated the novel to “the late Richard Bachman.” If there’s one subject that King loves most, it’s tortured writers. The Dark Half may be slow in pace, but it’s far better than it was given credit for and Hutton is clearly having a ball playing dual roles.

Needful Things (1993)

Based on: the novel from 1991

The mysterious Mr. Gaunt (Max von Sydow) arrives in Castle Rock to open a shop that grants its patrons their deepest desires. But with it comes a very steep price. The 960-page novel was a lot to condense into a feature-length film, which is why there was an extended, 3-hour cut (including over an hour of footage that was trimmed from the theatrical cut) that aired on TBS three years later, in miniseries format. No home release has included this extended cut of the film. This is probably for the best, as the pacing meant the two-hour version is plenty.

The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

Based on: the novella Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption from 1982

As if we needed another reason to love A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, it was the first screenwriting credit that Frank Darabont received, giving him the confidence (and money) to return to King, with whom he’d worked on adapting short story “The Woman in the Room” for a short film, to purchase rights to his novella Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption. Darabont didn’t immediately adapt it, writing the screenplay five years later. He expanded the story and characters, adding in a shady warden as a primary antagonist. The screenplay was so good that Rob Reiner wanted to direct, offering to finance any other project in exchange. Darabont held strong, and the result is one of the greatest movies and beginning of Darabont’s work with King’s stories.

The Mangler (1995)

Based on: the short story from 1978

One of the wackiest of King’s adaptations, this one sees an industrial laundry press develop a taste for human flesh. Yes, you read that correctly. Directed by Tobe Hooper, The Mangler stars Robert Englund as the press owner and Ted Levine as the police officer called in to investigate the machine’s first victim. At least the adaptation doesn’t dare get as surreal as the story- which sees the mangle unhinging itself from its anchors to roam the streets in search of new victims. It spawned two sequels, none of which are connected to King’s story or other works.

Dolores Claiborne (1995)

Based on: the novel from 1993

A big city reporter heads back to her small home town in support of her mother, who’s been accused of murdering the elderly woman she works for as a maid. Starring Jennifer Jason Leigh and Kathy Bates, in what she’s described as her best role, Dolores Claiborne is an engaging adaptation that’s been tough to nail down in terms of genre. Mostly referred to as a psychological thriller, it’s also been classified as drama, gothic romance, and straightforward horror. No matter what you define it as, it’s all around great. There are more supernatural elements in the novel, and a major connection to another King novel – Gerald’s Game.

Thinner (1996)

Based on: the novel from 1984 under pen name Richard Bachman

Directed by Tom Holland and adapted by Michael McDowell (Beetlejuice), Thinner didn’t win over critics or the box office at time of release. It had an uphill battle to climb; lead protagonist isn’t exactly an endearing character that’s easy to root for. Billy Halleck is an upper-class lawyer with a talent for defending criminals. It doesn’t take long before his misdeeds piss off the wrong gypsy, who curses him to lose weight at an unhealthily rapid weight. A mean spirited and macabre story adapted faithfully, it’s enhanced by great special effects.

The Night Flier (1997)

Based on: the short story from 1988

Ok, so this was dumped onto DVD by New Line Cinema and not released theatrically, but it wasn’t made-for-TV either. This also makes it one of the lesser seen King adaptations, which is a shame. Miguel Ferrer stars as sleazy tabloid reporter Richard Dees, eager to get the scoop on a serial killer that travels to airports to slaughter victims. Dees suspects the killer thinks of himself as a vampire, but the truth is more horrifying. The adaptation is pretty faithful, but the addition of a budding reporter character alters Dees ultimate fate.

Apt Pupil (1998)

Based on: the novella from 1982

A thriller that involves a teen boy blackmailing his neighbor after discovering that he’s a Nazi/fugitive war criminal. As all good boys do, of course. It begins an unhealthy relationship between the boy and the Nazi, and their lives spiral out of control from there. Directed by Bryan Singer, and starring Brad Renfro and Ian McKellen, the film and novella have widely different endings, though thematically both leave teen boy Todd in a dark place. A film that unnerved critics and didn’t fare well financially, it was further marred by scandal when a lawsuit was filed against Singer by a 14-year-old extra.

The Green Mile (1999)

Based on: the novel from 1996

Frank Darabont’s second King adaptation, of which he both directed and wrote the screenplay, was a major award winner. Set during the Great Depression, it’s a supernatural drama that sees the lives of the prison guards of a Death Row known as the “Green Mile” irrevocably changed upon the arrival of prisoner John Coffey (Michael Clarke Duncan), a gentle giant with a mysterious gift. This adaptation demands that you have a box of tissues handy while watching.

Hearts in Atlantis (2001)

Based on: the novella Low Men in Yellow Coats from 1999

This adaptation takes its name from the collection that included Low Men in Yellow Coats. It follows single mother Liz (Hope Davis) and her son Bobby (Anton Yelchin), who take in an elder stranger, Ted (Anthony Hopkins). As Bobby bonds with Ted, he discovers he has telekinetic and psychic powers, and the friendship changes his life. No, this isn’t horror, but the source novella was written as a tie-in to King’s popular Dark Tower series. Ted is on the run from “low men” who work for The Crimson King, a major entity of evil in the series.

Dreamcatcher (2003)

Based on: the novel from 2001

Often touted among the worst of King’s adaptations, Dreamcatcher is a puzzling head scratcher for sure. Directed by Oscar-nominated screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan (The Empire Strikes Back, Raiders of the Lost Ark), written by Oscar-winning screenwriter William Goldman (Magic, Misery), and featuring a cast of A-list talent, there’s an unspoken expectation that the film would offer much better dialogue than lines like, “Jesus-Christ-bananas, some fuckarow this is turning into.” As for plot, the extraterrestrial invasion by way of infectious parasite that catches four friends in middle, it’s a wackier one to begin with. But the grand scope of the bizarre invasion means we never get time to get to know the characters well enough to buy into the madness.

Secret Window (2004)

Based on: the novella Secret Window, Secret Garden from 1990

Sharing some major similarities to The Dark Half, successful writer Mort (Johnny Depp) is stalked by a stranger accusing him of plagiarism amidst a painful divorce with his wife. His wife is seeing another man, played by The Dark Half’s Timothy Hutton. Of course, the stranger stalking Mort has a lot more in common with him than identical writing, or this wouldn’t be a King story. Adapted and directed by David Koepp (Stir of Echoes), the film version favors Mort, making his ex-wife an antagonist and drastically altering the fates of both characters.

Riding the Bullet (2004)

Based on: the novella from 2000

When George gets a phone call that his mother is dying, he decides to hitchhike over a hundred miles to see her. He’s picked up by an ominous stranger with a deadly secret. Directed and written by Mick Garris, this adaptation of the novella is fairly faithful, only speeding up the timeline of the character’s fates for added urgency. It stars Jonathan Jackson as George, and David Arquette as the ominous stranger, George Staub. Riding the Bullet received a very unsuccessful limited theatrical release before dropping onto DVD, making it one of the lesser-known adaptations.

1408 (2007)

Based on: the short story from 1999

John Cusack stars as Mike Enslin, a cynical author who specializes in debunking the paranormal. Despite warnings from hotel manager Gerald Olin (Samual L. Jackson), Enslin checks into the haunted room 1408 at the Dolphin Hotel. That skepticism changes to unbridled fear when the room preys on his grief over his lost daughter, and more. Director Mikael Håfström opts for psychological and surrealism terror over a straightforward haunted fare, and manages to make The Carpenters’ song “We’ve Only Just Begun” a menacing theme for the mean-spirited entities lurking in the room. Håfström shot four different endings for this film, attempting to recapture the ambiguity of King’s short, though none of them match the story’s ending.

The Mist (2007)

Based on: the novella from 1980

Most of King’s works tend to end on a relatively uplifting note of hope. Leave it to screenwriter/director Frank Darabont to swap out The Mist’s hopeful ending for one of soul-shattering bleakness, and boy does it work. With a talented cast lead by Thomas Jane, The Mist follows a group of citizens stranded in a grocery store when a strange storm hides a horde of deadly creatures within its mist. More than just a well-made creature feature, it’s an examination of humanity when faced with catastrophe, and possibly even the end of days. Marcia Gay Harden is chilling as the fervently religious Mrs. Carmody.

Dolan’s Cadillac (2009)

Based on: the short story from 1993

King’s crime-thriller twist to Edgar Allan Poe’s The Cask of Amontillado, Tom Robinson (Wes Bentley) embarks on a quest for vengeance against crime boss Jimmy Dolan (Christian Slater) following the murder of his wife after witnessing Dolan in the act of committing a crime. Whereas King’s story is haunted tale of revenge spanning years, the film speeds it up to rev up the action. This one went direct-to-video.

Carrie (2013)

Based on: the novel from 1974

The third adaptation of King’s first published novel, this time starring Chloe Grace Moretz as Carrie White, and Julianne Moore as her mother Margaret. Directed by Kimberly Peirce (Boys Don’t Cry), this version of Carrie comes with a talented cast that delivers great performances (Moore is very effective as the unhinged Margaret). The only problem is that it doesn’t really bring anything new or different to the fold, and was critically panned in large part because of that.

A Good Marriage (2014)

Based on: the novella from 2010

Adapted for screen by King from his own novella, A Good Marriage stars Joan Allen and Anthony LaPaglia as longtime married couple Darcy and Bob Anderson. After 25 years of an idyllic marriage, Darcy uncovers a shocking secret of Bob’s, one that drive’s her to equally shocking lengths to protect her family from that secret’s exposure. Directed by Peter Askin, and also starring Stephen Lang, this psychological thriller is surprisingly light on thrills.

Mercy (2014)

Based on: the short story “Gramma” from 1985

A Blumhouse Production film loosely based on King’s short story that appeared in Skeleton Crew, Mercy stars Frances O’Connor as a single mother with two boys who help her care for their ailing grandmother. Suffering from Alzheimer’s, grandma isn’t all there. She also has a lot of sinister secrets, and only her favored grandson George (The Walking Dead’s Chandler Riggs) truly gets her. Adapted for screen by Matt Greenberg (1408, Reign of Fire), this makes drastic departures from King’s original story but does retain a lot of the Lovecraftian mythology. It released on VOD and home release simultaneously, making this another lesser known adaptation.

Cell (2016)

Based on: the 2006 novel

John Cusack and Samuel L. Jackson look to recapture the magic of 2007’s 1408, this time with a screenplay by King himself. Needless to say, this one didn’t fare so well. A mysterious signal emitted through cell phones renders people insane and homicidal. Cusack leads as Clay Riddell, a man joined by a group of survivors while in route to reunite with his estranged family. King rewrote the ending based on criticisms of his novel’s ending. Directed by Tod Williams (Paranormal Activity 2), but Cell was very nearly directed by Eli Roth until he walked away due to creative differences.

The Dark Tower (2017)

Based on: The Dark Tower series

One of the most highly anticipated adaptations, and one of the biggest disappointments, The Dark Tower film was a mess before it even made it to theaters. Considered a sort of continuation of the popular novel series, which contained eight novels and multiple tie-ins. Being passed around through various studios and filmmakers, including J.J. Abrams and Ron Howard, throughout the years, it finally moved forward with director Nikolaj Arcel and screenwriters Akiva Goldsman and Jeff Pinkner, who reworked the existing screenplay entirely. The result is a messy film bearing little resemblance to one of King’s most beloved series.

It (2017)

Based on: the 1986 novel

The second adaptation of King’s massive novel, but first theatrically released, It: Chapter One is only the first half of the story- Chapter Two is scheduled to conclude the story this year. Revolving solely around the childhood experiences of the Loser’s Club with the evil simply dubbed It, director Andy Muschietti made a very different version of King’s novel than the 1990 made-for-TV mini-series and updated the setting to the ‘80s. The result was a critical success and a box office juggernaut. Not only did it become one of horror’s all-time most profitable films, but one of the biggest box office earners across the board for 2017. The success the frenzy for adapting King’s works into overdrive, one that hadn’t entirely gone away in the first place.

Gerald’s Game (2017)

Based on: the 1992 novel

The original novel is set mostly inside the mind of lead protagonist Jessie Burlingame, a woman handcuffed to the bed and stranded once her husband dies of a heart attack. Because of this, it was widely considered “unfilmable.” It just needed the right visionary to convey the horrors both real and imagined in Jessie’s story. Enter Mike Flanagan (Oculus, Hush). With his clever direction and updates to the story, Carla Gugino’s fantastic performance, and truly spooky moments -that degloving scene, ugh- Gerald’s Game was yet another stellar adaptation released on Netflix just a month after It.

1922 (2017)

Based on: the 2010 novella

Less than a month after dropping Gerald’s Game, Netflix also released 1922, another King adaptation; this one based on a lesser known novella. Written and directed by Zak Hilditch, 1922 is a slow burn story of the haunting consequences of a man’s decision, with his son’s assistance, to kill his wife for her money. Thomas Jane stars as Wilfred James, the stubborn farmer unwilling to give in to his wife’s (Molly Parker) desire to move to the city. That stubbornness and pride proves to be his entire family’s undoing. Mark Patton, of Faith No More and Mr. Bungle fame, composed the film’s score.

TV Movies:

Salem’s Lot (1979)

Based on: the novel from 1975

Thanks to Paul Monash’s script, which turned Kurt Barlow into a menacing cousin of Count Orlok from Nosferatu, and Tobe Hooper’s excellent direction, which gave us iconic scenes of terror, this adaptation transcends its TV mini-series status. Hooper may have drawn inspiration from Alfred Hitchcock in creating this story about a New England town inundated by vampires, but in turn, he created one of the most influential vampire films to date.

It (1990)

Based on: the novel from 1986

It took just over a decade for King’s works to return to the small screen, and what a return it was. Despite the miniseries length, much was trimmed from the source novel in this adaptation, which isn’t much of a surprise considering some of the more salacious parts of the novel would never have made it past TV censors. Writer Lawrence D. Cohen (Carrie) and director Tommy Lee Wallace (Halloween III: Season of the Witch) retained the core essence of the story and kept Pennywise front and center. It was this move that made the miniseries so memorable; Tim Curry’s performance as Pennywise instilled nightmares in viewers for generations to come and instantly birthed a horror icon.

Sometimes They Come Back (1991)

Based on: the short story from 1974

This short story adaptation very nearly ended up as a segment in Cat’s Eye, but producer Dino De Laurentiis felt it was strong enough to warrant a full-length made-for-TV film instead. Directed by Tom McLoughlin (One Dark Night, Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives), this adaptation stars Tim Matheson as Jim Norman, a school teacher who witnessed his older brother getting murdered by a gang of greasers during childhood. The greasers died soon after in a train accident. When he takes a new teaching gig in his hometown, he’s perturbed to discover students that resemble the greasers, and others begin dying around him. This made for TV version does give his brother’s return a much less demonic background than the story.

Golden Years (1991)

Based on: none; completely original miniseries

Considered by the author to be a novel for television, Golden Years isn’t an adaptation at all but an original seven-part miniseries written by King. It centers on an elderly janitor who ages backwards following an explosion at a secret army lab. When they send someone to cover up their secrets, i.e. kill the janitor, he goes on the run. King wrote the first five episodes, and outlined the last two. It was intended to launch a regular series, thus ended on a cliffhanger, but the network that aired the miniseries never picked it up. King’s request to complete the story in a future miniseries went unfulfilled.

The Tommyknockers (1993)

Based on: the novel from 1987

Author Bobbi Anderson (Marg Helgenberger) and her recovering alcoholic boyfriend Gard (Jimmy Smits) stumble upon a strange object protruding from the ground in the woods behind their house. The more they dig up the object, the stranger people start behaving in town, giving way to accidents and even homicides. Bobbi falls hardest under its sway, and it’s up to Gard to save them all. This adaptation has been rumored to have new updates in the works since 2013, and it’s one that could use it. While the large cast is talented, the special effects don’t hold up well at all. This adaptation also has a much happier ending than the novel, which likely doesn’t help the hokey look of the miniseries.

The Stand (1994)

Based on: the novel from 1978

King’s magnum opus was directed by Mick Garris and adapted for the small screen by the prolific author himself. It was a perfect match, as this sprawling epic with a great cast captures the lengthy novel’s larger-than-life battle between good versus evil. After a plague wipes out most of humanity, the survivors split into two factions; one lead by benevolent elderly Mother Abagail and the other lead by the evil Randall Flagg. Aside from great storytelling that spans many states, look for more fun horror cameos from the likes of Joe Bob Briggs, King, John Landis, Tom Holland, and more.

The Langoliers (1995)

Based on: the novella from 1990

Nothing shows age like the CG of the early ‘90s, and The Langoliers is a perfect example. A miniseries written and directed by Tom Holland, the plot sees a group of people surviving the sudden disappearance of most on board their flight only to find the airport they’ve landed at just as deserted. It’s a Twilight Zone-style sci-fi mind-bender with CG creatures that eat everything in sight. It’s the vfx for these creatures that shows this miniseries’ age above all, but the extended, two-part miniseries drags out the story too long, as well.

The Shining (1997)

Based on: the novel from 1977)

Mick Garris and Stephen King once again team up to adapt the author’s works for the small screen, and this time it’s to give a more faithful retelling of The Shining. Those who adore Kubrick’s unique and cinematic take on the novel will likely have their feathers ruffled upon viewing this lower budget made-for-TV take that follows the novel much more closely, including the more supernatural elements that drove Jack Torrance to madness. This adaptation gives a much happier epilogue than penned in the novel.

Trucks (1997)

Based on: the short story “Trucks” from 1973

Of all of King’s novels, short stories, novellas, and more, who would’ve thought that “Trucks” would get not one, but two adaptations? King’s original attempt, Maximum Overdrive, didn’t exactly set the bar high, so perhaps that left the door open for someone aiming higher. Unfortunately, this take on the story fared much worse. If the title is any indication, it’s only the trucks that come to life and terrorize the humans stranded at a truck stop. No crazed soda machines or lawnmowers, just trucks. It’s silly, with really goofy deaths, but at least it tries to up the gore content?

Quicksilver Highway (1997)

Based on: the short story “Chattery Teeth” from 1993 for one segment

Mick Garris wrote and directed this two-segment anthology that sees Christopher Lloyd play Aaron Quicksilver, a traveler with a penchant for telling horror stories to strangers. The first segment is based on King’s short story “Chattery Teeth,” which sees a salesman develop a bizarre kinship with an oversized pair of wind-up chattering teeth during a string of bad luck incidents. The second segment in this anthology was based on a short story written by Clive Barker.

Storm of the Century (1999)

Based on: None, it’s an original screenplay

Another miniseries that King considers to be a novel for television. The story, that sees a stranger come to town and terrorize its residents during a dangerous blizzard, had been in King’s head for a while but he wasn’t sure whether it should be formatted as a novel or screenplay. Obviously, he went with screenplay, and that screenplay was published and released just prior to the miniseries premiere. It was directed by Craig R. Baxley, selected personally by King for the job, and well received by critics upon airing.

Rose Red (2002)

Based on: None, it’s an original screenplay

King initially pitched the idea behind this story to Steven Spielberg in the mid-nineties, intending it as a loose remake of Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House. But then The Haunting was released in 1999, so he instead expanded it into a miniseries and combined other haunted house elements. For the team of investigators spending the night in the haunted mansion of Rose Red, they discover it has a mind of its own and tends to build upon itself. The author reteamed with director Baxley for this miniseries.

Carrie (2002)

Based on: the novel from 1974

The second of three adaptations of King’s breakout novel, this one was actually intended to be a backdoor pilot for a TV series. Written by Bryan Fuller (Hannibal TV series) and directed by David Carson, actress Angela Bettis (May) assumed the mantle of the titular character in this iteration. Fuller envisioned this as a sort of remake to De Palma’s well-regarded adaptation, trying to modernize it for the current social climate, but it was panned upon release as unnecessary. Being that it was intended to launch an ongoing series, the ending was left open and Carrie survived her harrowing prom night.

The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer (2003)

Based on: the novel by Ridley Pearson from 2001

Based on The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer: My Life at Rose Red, this King adaptation is unique in that it’s based on a book not written by him. But that book is based on his screenplay, therefore it’s still a King adaptation. Once again directed by Baxley, this prequel to Rose Red follows the construction of the mansion and the tragic events that plagued the Rimbauer family, leading to its eventual haunting. This one dropped the miniseries format in favor of a leaner feature-length runtime.

Salem’s Lot (2004)

Based on: the novel from 1975

The second adaptation of King’s novel, a miniseries for TNT, wisely opts to not attempt to follow in the same footsteps as Hooper’s made-for-TV version. Updating the story to a modern setting, this take on the story makes its own changes to the novel and stands apart from any other version. Rutger Hauer plays Kurt Barlow, making the big bad closer to the character in the novel, and Rob Lowe plays the protagonist Ben Mears.

Desperation (2006)

Based on: the novel from 1996

Rob Perlman plays Collie Entragian, the deranged desert town sheriff that arrests numerous people passing through for nefarious means. That group must band together to survive before the sheriff kills them all. Frequent collaborator Mick Garris once again reteams with King, who wrote the teleplay for this adaptation. Also starring was Tom Skerritt, Steven Weber, Annabeth Gish, Charles Durning, Matt Frewer, and Henry Thomas. Though conceived as a two-part miniseries, it aired in its entirety on one night.

Nightmares & Dreamscapes (2006)

Based on: eight short stories

This eight-episode miniseries is partially based on short stories from the Nightmares & Dreamscapes collection, which includes “Umney’s Last Case”, “You Know They Got a Hell of a Band”, “The End of the Whole Mess”, “The Fifth Quarter” and “Crouch End”. The remaining stories were adaptations of “The Road Virus Heads North”, “Autopsy Room Four”, and “Battleground”. Jim Henson’s Creature Shop provided the special effects. The writers, directors, and cast featured a lot of repeat King collaborators like director Mikael Salomon (Salem’s Lot), writer Lawrence D. Cohen (Carrie, It, The Tommyknockers), actors Steven Weber, Henry Thomas, and more.

Children of the Corn (2009)

Based on: the short story from 1977

Set in the ‘70s, this adaptation adheres a little more closely to the short story, though King wanted no part in this adaptation. Written, produced, and directed by Donald P. Borchers, an original producer of the 1984 film, this iteration sees couple Burt (David Anders) and Vicky (Kandyse McClure) as they were in the short story- near the end of their relationship and in a constant state of unhappy bickering. Seeing it in this context makes it easier to understand why it was changed for the original film; they’re much easier to root for when being attacked by the creepy children of Gatlin. Also updated was that the children were actually played by minors, as opposed to adults playing teens.

Bag of Bones (2011)

Based on: the novel from 1998

The reigning champ of King collaborators, Mick Garris, helmed this adaptation featuring one of King’s favorite subjects; a tortured writer. Pierce Brosnan stars as Mike Noonan, a best-selling novelist suffering from writers block after the unexpected death of his wife. His subsequent nightmares about her death and the summer home they shared prompts him to take a trip there, where he becomes inundated by a haunting presence that unravels a mystery of its own. Regular King adaptation actors Annabeth Gish and Matt Frewer also appear.

Big Driver (2014)

Based on: the 2010 novella

Based on the novella that appeared in Full Dark, No Stars, Big Driver stars Mario Bello as Tess Thorne, a crime writer who’s brutally assaulted during a short cut home from a fan event. Left for dead, she instead decides to enact her own vengeance rather than going to the police. Directed by frequent King collaborated Mikael Salomon (Salem’s Lot, Nightmares & Dreamscapes), Big Driver also stars Joan Jett, Olympia Dukakis, and Ann Dowd. This feature-length adaptation aired on Lifetime.

11.22.63 (2016)

Based on: the novel from 2011

This eight-part miniseries was executive produced by J.J. Abrams, and created for TV by producer Bridget Carpenter (Westworld, Dead Like Me). James Franco starred as Jake Epping, a school teacher given the opportunity to travel back in time. He’s tasked with the mission to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy, but finds himself attached to the life he builds there instead, threatening both his safety and the mission. Airing as a Hulu original miniseries, 11.22.63 was well received by critics and audiences alike.

The adaptations of King’s works aren’t slowing down any time soon, with many more already on the way. Neither is the author, who continues to churn out novels, short story collections, and more at an insane rate. Which King film and novel is your favorite?

The post The Definitive Guide to Stephen King’s Film and TV Adaptations appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

On that note…

In a lengthy interview that Yahoo just published, King shares his feelings on this year’s IT, Gerald’s Game and “Mr. Mercedes,” while also revealing his thoughts on the King-inspired “Stranger Things.” Yahoo even asked King to name some past adaptations of his work that maybe deserve a second chance.

“I don’t know, I don’t know. There are ones that I frankly don’t understand why they reviewed so badly,” King responded. “Guess I’ve got to go back and look at Dreamcatcher, which has just been kind of lashed. I’d like to take a look at that again. And I frankly never understood why people didn’t like Cell, because to me that was a terrific, eccentric movie with some really eccentric, strange performances in it. John Cusack at his best, and Samuel L. Jackson is terrific. So I would say Cell for sure.”

“Dreamcatcher, I don’t know, I better look at it again,” King continued. “I thought it was okay at the time.”

The post Stephen King On Which King Adaptations Deserve Another Watch appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

A poster is the best marketing tool for a film outside of its trailer. I used to get to the movie theater 45 minutes early so I would have time to walk the halls and look at all of the posters for the coming attractions. There’s just something so fun about looking at posters and horror films arguably have the best ones. They can’t all be winners though, as the posters on this list make clear. With that being said, here are (in no particular order) 10 of the worst posters for horror films released this year!

5. The Other Side of the Door/The Disappointments Room

Do you think keyholes are scary? These posters certainly hope you do.

4. Visions/The Veil/Curve

These three posters are joined together because they are for three Blumhouse films that were all unceremoniously dumped on Netflix without any fanfare back in January. Blumhouse put as much effort into designing these posters as they did into promoting the films’ releases.

3. Martyrs

Nothing like showing a shot from the climax of your film! Yes, this is a remake and everyone who is going to see it probably knows the direction the film is going to take, but it’s still in poor taste to show the climax of your film in its poster.

2. Cabin Fever

Look, I get that Cabin Fever (my pick for worst horror film of the year) went straight to VOD services and no one tried in any shape way or form to make it a good movie, but you would think the marketing team would try to sell the film a little bit better than this poster does. Especially when the original film’s poster (the trees and the house making a skull) was so clever. You can barely even read the tagline on this one!

1. Cell

Come on! The cover of Stephen King’s novel would have made for a better poster! Whatever this thing is, it’s just awful.

What were your least favorite horror movie posters of 2016? Let us know in the comments below!

The post Trace Picks the Worst Horror Movie Posters of the Year! appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

2016 was one of the best years for horror films in a long time. Unfortunately, even the best years have to have a clunker or two, and that is why “worst of” articles exist. It’s not enjoyable to trash films, but it’s a necessary evil that must be done. I didn’t get to see quite as many horror films as I would have liked (only about 70 out of 120), but to see what was up for consideration you can see the list of 2016 horror films I watched on my Letterboxd page. Let’s get started, shall we?

Dishonorable Mentions

There weren’t many truly atrocious horror films released in 2016, but there were plenty of mediocre ones. First there’s the disappointing (sorry) The Disappointments Room (my review). Then there’s the Inception/The Exorcist hybrid that is Incarnate (my review). Thomas Dekker’s ambitious but lackluster directorial debut Jack Goes Home (my review) meant well but was more a pretentious mess than a substantial character study. You can’t forget about the ghost story Visions (my review)*, which was unceremoniously dumped on Netflix back in January, no matter how much you would like to. Wes Craven’s final producing gig gave us the mean-spirited and sloppily put together The Girl in the Photographs. Finally, there’s Greg McLean’s first major American horror film The Darkness, which is so dull that you’d be forgiven for not realizing it was a horror film.

*I just realized I used the exact same phrase in the title of my reviews for Incarnate and Visions. Whoops. My New Year’s resolution for 2017 will be to get more creative with those.

The films listed above may be mediocre, but they cannot compare to the five worst horror films of the year. So without further ado, I give you these turds. The films listed on the next page earned a pretty strong reaction from me, and had I reviewed them they would have earned a 1.5/5 or lower on our skull scale.

The post Trace’s 5 Worst Horror Movies of 2016 appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Saban Films and Lionsgate is behind the release that’s directed by Tod Williams (Paranormal Activity 2, The Door in the Floor), and adapted by King and Adam Alleca (The Last House on the Left).

In the film, “At the Boston airport, Clay (Cusack) witnesses a scene of chaotic mayhem when an electronic signal turns hundreds of cell phone users into rabid killers. Desperate to find his estranged wife and son, Clay teams with a train driver (Jackson) to battle the horde of murderous “phoners” as the city descends into apocalyptic madness.”

Cell stars Golden Globe nominee John Cusack (1408, Love & Mercy, Being John Malkovich, 2012), Academy Award nominee Samuel L. Jackson(Avengers: Age of Ultron, Django Unchained, Pulp Fiction) and Isabelle Fuhrman (Orphan, The Hunger Games).

The post Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Infects Home Video appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

When a powerful signal is broadcast across mobile networks worldwide, cell phone users’ minds are instantly and dangerously re-programmed. Heading north through New England in search of his wife and son, Clay Riddell (Cusack) is joined by a group of survivors hoping to fend off the bloodthirsty and hyper-connected “phoners.”

Directed by Tod “Kip” Williams (Paranormal Activity 2) and Cusack (The Raven), Samuel L. Jackson (1408, Pulp Fiction), Stacy Keach (Sin City: A Dame To Kill For), and Fuhrman (Orphan), Cell was written by King with revisions by Adam Alleca.

The film hit “Ultra VOD” on June 10th and will be hitting theaters and VOD tomorrow, July 8th.

The post There are Things Lurking in the Dark in ‘Cell’ (Clip) appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Cell stars the always-reliable Samuel L. Jackson and recent DTV champion John Cusack. The latter has been in a ridiculous amount of pay-the-bills movies lately – Frozen Ground, Grand Piano, The Prince – while also delivering an Oscar-worthy performance in Love & Mercy. Seriously. Cusack is devastating in that one.

Here, Cusack stars as Clay Riddell, a graphic novelist trying to become the father he never was, connecting with his estranged wife. It’s a beautiful moment that kicks off Cell. As he flies into Boston’s Logan Airport, a cell signal goes out that turns everyone into a raging, murdering asshole. Luckily, Clay’s phone dies right before that electromagnetic pulse apocalypse. Timing is everything, pal.

He ventures out with gay MBTA subway driver Tom McCourt (Jackson) – one resourceful bastard – and Alice Maxwell (Isabelle Fuhrman). Also in the mix is Stacey Keach, a genuine god of genre films and The Simpsons (look him up). So across the board, the cast delivers. Cusack and Jackson are terrific. The problem is, the story itself is wicked flimsy.

Cell follows Clay, Tom, and Alice as they wander the outskirts of Boston – fighting against the signal people (essentially zombies with a hive-mind) and average Boston douchebags. It starts off really promising, with an awkwardly shot action sequence in Logan. Williams does not know how to film action. It’s an ugly sequence that utilizes shaky cam in the place of honest action.

Given the absurdity of the premise, you’d think Cell would be an entertaining ride. It’s not. It’s gratuitously grim and gloomy, with no real message to drive this misery home. Throughout the film, there are references to the unfortunately named “King of the Internet” – known as “The Raggedy Man in King’s book. He’s almost like a Freddie Krueger character who terrorizes people in their dreams. At one point, Clay and Tom meet the most Boston guy ever in the woods, who hasn’t slept a week because of the “Internet King.”

So where do all these references to “Internet King” and Clay’s sullen art lead? Nowhere. Cell closes out on a finale that will justifiably frustrate most. The story packs absolutely no punch and the solid stable of actors look bored for most of he film.

Why is it so hard to adapt a King novel? His monsters live in the mind, at the heart of America. Putting literal monsters on screen always dulls the impact.

Cell is available to rent now On Demand.

The post [Review] Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Is Another Forgettable Adaptation appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

“When a powerful signal is broadcast across mobile networks worldwide, cell phone users’ minds are instantly and dangerously re-programmed. Heading north through New England in search of his wife and son, Clay Riddell (Cusack) is joined by a group of survivors hoping to fend off the bloodthirsty and hyper-connected “phoners.””

Directed by Tod “Kip” Williams (Paranormal Activity 2) and starring John Cusack (The Raven), Samuel L. Jackson (1408, Pulp Fiction), Stacy Keach (Sin City: A Dame To Kill For), and Isabelle Fuhrman (Orphan), Cell was written by King with revisions by Adam Alleca.

The film will hit “Ultra VOD” on June 10th and will then hit theaters and VOD on July 8th.

The post Watch a Chaotic Several Minutes From Stephen King’s ‘Cell’! appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

“When a powerful signal is broadcast across mobile networks worldwide, cell phone users’ minds are instantly and dangerously re-programmed. Heading north through New England in search of his wife and son, Clay Riddell (Cusack) is joined by a group of survivors hoping to fend off the bloodthirsty and hyper-connected “phoners.””

Directed by Tod “Kip” Williams (Paranormal Activity 2) and starring John Cusack (The Raven), Samuel L. Jackson (1408, Pulp Fiction), Stacy Keach (Sin City: A Dame To Kill For), and Isabelle Fuhrman (Orphan), Cell was written by King with revisions by Adam Alleca.

The film will hit “Ultra VOD” on June 10th and will then hit theaters and VOD on July 8th.

The post New Clip From Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Shows the Chaos of an Infestation appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Saban Films and Lionsgate is behind the release that’s directed by Tod Williams (Paranormal Activity 2, The Door in the Floor), and adapted by King and Adam Alleca (The Last House on the Left).

In the film, “At the Boston airport, Clay (Cusack) witnesses a scene of chaotic mayhem when an electronic signal turns hundreds of cell phone users into rabid killers. Desperate to find his estranged wife and son, Clay teams with a train driver (Jackson) to battle the horde of murderous “phoners” as the city descends into apocalyptic madness.”

Cell stars Golden Globe nominee John Cusack (1408, Love & Mercy, Being John Malkovich, 2012), Academy Award nominee Samuel L. Jackson(Avengers: Age of Ultron, Django Unchained, Pulp Fiction) and Isabelle Fuhrman (Orphan, The Hunger Games).

The trailer looks like a post-apocalyptic zombie movie that reminds me of Magnolia Pictures’ 2007 The Signal, which was directed by David Bruckner, Jacob Gentry, and Dan Bush. The set up is pretty simple as cell phones, which nearly everyone in the world owns, sent out a signal that turns people into monsters. The footage is littered with hordes, yet the final shot sets up something more. Is there an evolution to the infected?

Saban recently came in and saved Rob Zombie’s 31, too.

Thanks to Fabien M. for the tip.

The post The ‘CELL’ Trailer Rings in a Zombie-esque Apocalypse! appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Directed by Tod Williams (Paranormal Activity 2, The Door in the Floor), Cell is based on the apocalyptic novel of the same name by Stephen King, who adapted the screenplay along with Adam Alleca (The Last House on the Left).

Cell, which has yet to be given a release date, stars Golden Globe nominee John Cusack (1408, Love & Mercy, Being John Malkovich, 2012), Academy Award nominee Samuel L. Jackson (Avengers: Age of Ultron, Django Unchained, Pulp Fiction) and Isabelle Fuhrman (Orphan, The Hunger Games).

“When a mysterious cell phone signal is broadcast across the network and turns the population into mindless animals, struggling graphic artist Clay Riddell (Cusack) bands together with a small group of fellow survivors to trek across a decimated New England to seek answers and reunite with his son.”

“I enjoyed working on Cell and love the way it turned out,” said Stephen King. “Kip Williams has made a scary and thoroughly entertaining movie. But you may want to put your cell phone in the freezer after seeing it.”

Cell was fully financed by Benaroya Pictures and produced by Benaroya Pictures and The Genre Company.

The post Breaking: Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Has a Distributor! appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Fuhrman plays a teenage neighbor of Cusack’s Clay Riddell character who joins him and Jackson’s Tom McCourt character on their journey to safety after a mysterious pulse spreads like a virus through the human population.

Keach (“Nebraska”) will play the headmaster of a prep school where the survivors stop along their way.

“When a powerful signal is broadcast across mobile networks worldwide, cell phone users’ minds are instantly and dangerously re-programmed. Heading north through New England in search of his wife and son, Clay Riddell (Cusack) is joined by a group of survivors hoping to fend off the bloodthirsty and hyper-connected “phoners.””

Paranormal Activity 2‘s Tod “Kip” Williams directs.

The screenplay for Cell was written by Stephen King, with revisions by Adam Alleca.

Thanks to Fabien M. for the tip!

The post Stephen King’s ‘Cell’: New Shots of Samuel L. Jackson, John Cusack, and Isabelle Fuhrman! appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Fuhrman plays a teenage neighbor of Cusack’s Clay Riddell character who joins him and Jackson’s Tom McCourt character on their journey to safety after a mysterious pulse spreads like a virus through the human population.

Keach (“Nebraska”) will play the headmaster of a prep school where the survivors stop along their way, Variety previously reported.

“When a powerful signal is broadcast across mobile networks worldwide, cell phone users’ minds are instantly and dangerously re-programmed. Heading north through New England in search of his wife and son, Clay Riddell (Cusack) is joined by a group of survivors hoping to fend off the bloodthirsty and hyper-connected “phoners.””

Paranormal Activity 2‘s Tod “Kip” Williams directs.

The screenplay for Cell was written by Stephen King, with revisions by Adam Alleca.

Thanks to Fabien M. for the tip!

New image for CELL (based on a Stephen King novel) with @SamuelLJackson, John Cusack,@isabellefuhrman. pic.twitter.com/ehIpHEu940

— Fanatic (@Fanatic04986107) January 21, 2016

New image for CELL (based on a Stephen King novel) with @SamuelLJackson, John Cusack,@isabellefuhrman, pic.twitter.com/vovKCgk80x

— Fanatic (@Fanatic04986107) January 11, 2016

The post Stephen King’s ‘Cell’: Samuel L. Jackson, John Cusack, and Isabelle Fuhrman (Images) appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

With all of the big stories and news, we thought it would be fun to look back and see what the most popular posts were from the past year. Read on to see what you might have missed and relive some of the biggest posts from 2015! NOTE: These are the most viewed posts by readers from 2015, and are in order of how many times they were read.

The post The Biggest Horror Stories of 2015 appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Fuhrman plays a teenage neighbor of Cusack’s Clay Riddell character who joins him and Jackson’s Tom McCourt character on their journey to safety after a mysterious pulse spreads like a virus through the human population.

Keach (“Nebraska”) will play the headmaster of a prep school where the survivors stop along their way, Variety previously reported.

“When a powerful signal is broadcast across mobile networks worldwide, cell phone users’ minds are instantly and dangerously re-programmed. Heading north through New England in search of his wife and son, Clay Riddell (Cusack) is joined by a group of survivors hoping to fend off the bloodthirsty and hyper-connected “phoners.””

Paranormal Activity 2‘s Tod “Kip” Williams directs.

The screenplay for Cell was written by Stephen King, with revisions by Adam Alleca.

The post First Look at Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Rings In appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Fuhrman plays a teenage neighbor of Cusack’s Clay Riddell character who joins him and Jackson’s Tom McCourt character on their journey to safety after a mysterious pulse spreads like a virus through the human population.

Keach (“Nebraska”) will play the headmaster of a prep school where the survivors stop along their way, Variety previously reported.

Now filming in Atlanta, Paranormal Activity 2‘s Tod “Kip” Williams is directing.

The screenplay for Cell was written by Stephen King, with revisions by Adam Alleca.

The post First Look At Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Rings In appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Fuhrman plays a teenage neighbor of Cusack’s Clay Riddell character who joins him and Jackson’s Tom McCourt character on their journey to safety after a mysterious pulse spreads like a virus through the human population.

Keach (“Nebraska”) will play the headmaster of a prep school where the survivors stop along their way.

Now filming in Atlanta, Paranormal Activity 2‘s Tod “Kip” Williams is directing.

The screenplay for Cell was written by Stephen King, with revisions by Adam Alleca.

The post Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Calling New Cast For Apocalypse appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

The film is an adaptation of the Stephen King thriller novel “about an apocalyptic event that amounts to a pitch heard by anyone on a cell phone at a certain moment in time, which turns them into zombified beings with a herd mentality.”

Fuhrman will play the lead role of Alice.

Paranormal Activity 2 helmer Tod Williams is directing a script by King and Adam Alleca, the latter of whom scripted Last House On The Left.

The post Creepy ‘Orphan’ Rings In ‘Cell’ Lead appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Tod “Kip” Williams will direct, with production set to begin in January.

In Cell, Jackson will play Tom McCourt, an engineer and former soldier who escapes from Boston along with Cusack’s character, Clay Riddell, after a mysterious pulse, transmitted by Cell phones, spreads like a virus through the human population.

Samuel L. Jackson most recently co-starred in last year’s Django Unchained and next appears in the upcoming films Oldboy and Robocop as well as Captain America 2: Winter Soldier and The Avengers sequel.

Producing the project are Richard Saperstein (Se7en, Hancock), Michael Benaroya (Lawless, Margin Call), Brian Witten (Chernobyl Diaries, Friday the 13th, Final Destination) and Shara Kay (Silent Night). While President of Dimension Films, Saperstein oversaw the Stephen King adaptations, The Mist, directed by Frank Darabont, and 1408, which also starred Cusack and Jackson, and grossed over $130 million worldwide.

The screenplay for Cell was written by Stephen King and Adam Alleca (Last House on the Left). Edward Mokhtarian, Armen Aghaeian, Xavier Gens, and Laurence Freed will executive produce. Mark Leyner and Ben Insler will co-produce.

The post Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Gains Samuel L. Jackson appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

“When a powerful signal is broadcast across mobile networks worldwide, cell phone users’ minds are instantly and dangerously re-programmed. Heading north through New England in search of his wife and son, Clay Riddell is joined by a group of survivors hoping to fend off the bloodthirsty and hyper-connected “phoners.””

John Cusack is starring, with Paranormal Activity 2‘s Tod “Kip” Williams directing. The film is still in pre-production.

The post [AFM ’13] Three Pieces of Art For Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Adaptation! appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

As previously reported, Tod ‘Kip’ Williams will commence shooting in September on the Stephen King adaptation about a catastrophic signal blast across US phone networks.

In it, a pulse sent out through cell phones around the world turns every phone user into a crazed, murderous zombie.

Richard Saperstein and Michael Benaroya produce with The Genre Company’s Brian Witten and Shara Kay. Marina Grasic and Jan Korbelin of Cargo Entertainment serve as executive producers.

The post John Cusack Zombie Flick ‘Cell’ Rings Into Production This September appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

And they’re bringing along John Cusack (1408, High Fidelity). The film is based on King’s bestselling novel about a father’s odyssey to find his wife and son in the wake of a catastrophic pulse transmitted via mobile phones. Also? Zombies. King co-wrote the screenplay Adam Alleca (The Last House On The Left). Directors are now being approached.

More on this as it develops.

The post Stephen King’s ‘Cell’ Not Dead After All! John Cusack To Star!! appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.