Film & TV Stephen King

[Devious]

the guy is one of the most read and bestselling authors in the world, so i know we have to have a few fans of the horror King here. what's your favorite book? favorite movie adaptation? do you think he was a better author when he was strung out on drugs and alcohol (all books from Salem's Lot to the Tommyknockers were written during this period) or after he got sober (everything after this point)? do you like the Bachman Books? let's make this a thread about all things King.

my favorite novel is definitely It. while neither books nor movies can really scare me, i know a scary idea when i read it, and this book is definitely shit-scary. the movie has to be the worst piece of crap made from his work tho. i sincerely hope they remake it, although i doubt a movie can ever do a book like this one justice. the best movie adaptation imo is probably either The Shawshank Redemption, Stand By Me or The Green Mile. so what are some of your opinions on the greatest horror writer of all time?

PS: good news for King Fans, or bad, depending on your views of movies based on his work. both Cell and The Mist (my all time favorite short story of his) are in the first stages of being made into films. Eli Roth will be directing cell , and Frank Darabont will be directing The Mist.

 

[Devious]

oaky, maybe there's not as many King fans as i thought there was you guys suck.

 

[SicC]

My favorite series of book written by him is the gunslinger series. I just finished part 5 and I am tottaly addicted.

I have read about 30 of his novels and have enjoyed all of them.

pz

 

[Helena]

^ i've been meaning to read the dark tower series but i never gotten round to it!
the book i enjoyed reading the most was 'the black house' with peter straub, oh how i loved that book, in fact i may read that again soon!

is anyone a dean koontz fan by the way?

 

[Prize Gotti]

yeah i love stephen king films, i dont do books, that was what school was for.

 

[Devious]

yeah i love stephen king films, i dont do books, that was what school was for.

well then you're missing out, big time. 99% of his books that have been adapted into movies, the book is always much better. in some cases you can barely call the movies adaptations, because they have been changed so much (Kubrick's version of The Shining, for one). and sometimes it's only little things, but they still make a big difference. for example in Misery, in the movie she uses a sledgehammer on his legs to "hobble" him. in the book, she chops off his foot with an ax and then uses a blowtorch to cauterize the wound. much more gruesome. (although i'm not sure which would be worse, both are pretty nasty.) also, in the movie she just shoots the sheriff when he finds Sheldon in the basement. in the movie she shoots him, chops him up, then runs over him with a riding lawn mower to dispose of the remains. but i guess not everyone enjoys reading for pleasure, so to each their own.

also, i'm almost ashamed to say this, being the huge King fan that i am, but i have never read any of The Dark Tower series *hangs head in shame* that can make it rather confusing reading some of his other books, since he likes to connect them all to the Tower series, most of them anyway. Insomnia stands out in my mind as one in particular that has a great deal to do with that series, and i read it without having the slightest idea that characters like The Crimson King were directly linked to the series. i did recently pick up The Gunslinger tho, and when i find the time i'll get to it. btw, rumor is that J.J. Abrams (Lost) has bought the rights to The Dark Tower series and is planning to make a series of movies.

 

[Devious]

^ i've been meaning to read the dark tower series but i never gotten round to it!
the book i enjoyed reading the most was 'the black house' with peter straub, oh how i loved that book, in fact i may read that again soon!

is anyone a dean koontz fan by the way?

have you read The Talisman? because a lot of people surprisingly don't seem to realize that Black House is a sequel to The Talisman.

 

[Devious]

just as a little bit of trivia, did you know that Misery was originally planned to be a Bachman book? but he was found out before the book was finished, so he put it out under his own name. also some trivia for fans of The Dark Half (another one of my favorites), the book by the character George Stark, Machine's Way, was a novel that King was working on, with intentions of releasing it under Richard Bachman's pseudonym, George Stark. (that's pretty bad when even your pen name has a pen name lol). apparently he's releasing another Bachman book this year called Blaze (an unpublished novel predating Carrie) and one of his own called Duma Key.

 

[FroDawgg]

187, i'm going with you. my fave is definately IT. i read that book when the movie came on TV. i was 9 or 10, reading a 1000+ page book. the end of the movie is corny, but it's still a great movie and book. i like a lot of his other work but this is number one to me.

 

[Devious]

187, i'm going with you. my fave is definately IT. i read that book when the movie came on TV. i was 9 or 10, reading a 1000+ page book. the end of the movie is corny, but it's still a great movie and book. i like a lot of his other work but this is number one to me.

i don't know man, i thought the movie was just badly done. too many things changed from the book, not enough details on certain aspects, and the casting was just wrong. although Tim Curry was a great Pennywise, the rest of the cast just seemed wrong to me. a bunch of sitcom stars in a horror movie? i mean John Ritter was a great actor, but there was a reason why he stuck to comedy for the most part. the book is an all time classic tho, even tho it is damn near the size of a brick lol. the best 1100 pages i've read from him.

 

[FroDawgg]

^^^i kinda agree with you. they did change and omit stuff from the book, but as a tv miniseries, i've seen worse. the thing is that if they would have been true to the book, it would have been long enough for a season's worth of episodes, and they couldn't show it on tv b/c it wouldn't be suitable. even if they tried to make it for the big screen and be true to the book, it would have been too long.

so for those reasons, i can't be mad at the producers for taking liberties with it, but maybe they could have done it with different elements.

 

[Ms L]

I wonder what if anything, must be wrong with me, because ok, I like his movies and his books, but I just don't find them scary...am I the only one?