Customer Reviews

Stephen King Goes to the Movies

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Because the stories are all excellent, I've given this book five stars. But prospective customers ought to know exaclty what they're buying, and in this case, you're buying an anthology of previously published fiction that share a movie theme: each has been adapted to the silver screen.

If you have all of King's books, you already have the stories in previous collections: "The Shawshank Redemption" appeared in DIFFERENT SEASONS, "1408" from EVERYTHING'S EVENTUAL, "Children of the Corn" from NIGHT SHIFT, "The Mangler" from NIGHT SHIFT, and "Low Men in Yellow Coats" from HEARTS IN ATLANTIS.

In other words, most of the text is reprinted.

Which raises the question: What's new?

Short introductions -- the kind Harlan Ellison popularized decades ago in his collections of short fiction -- serve as set-ups: 2 pages for "1408," 2 pages for "The Mangler," 2 pages for "Shawshank," 1 page for "Children of the Corn," 2 pages for "Low Men," and 1 page for a list of his 10 favorite fiction-to-film adaptations. That works out to 10 pages (actually, less than that: some are 1.5 pages) out of a 626 page book. In other words, there's less than 2% of new material and 98% of previously published material.

One major omission: "The Body" from DIFFERENT SEASONS, but its inclusion would mean that HALF of DIFFERENT SEASONS would be available in this new anthology, so King wisely limited his selection to one novella from D.S. But "The Mist" would have been a great choice--reprinted in SKELETON CREW.

So, is it worth it? Well, if you absolutely must have the new introductions, it's a slam dunk: Get the book and enjoy the brief intros. For me, it's $7.99 that's well spent, since these short intros won't appear anywhere else.

But given that King could have written much more about each story in this book and their respective adaptations to the screen, I think he missed an opportunity to hold court, so to speak. DANSE MACABRE and ON WRITING shows King's strengths as a nonfiction writer, and this would have been a great opportunity for him to talk at length about each adaptation, as opposed to the abbreviated introductions.

Appropriately, the book is dedicated to film director Frank Darabont, whose adaptations of SHAWSHANK, GREEN MILE, and THE MIST rank among the best King fiction-to-film adaptations. Too bad Frank didn't do an introduction, since I would have liked to see through the lens of his imagination as to how successfully he felt these stories had been adapted to the screen.

Bottom line: If you've already got everything by King, this is a nice but not essential addition, given the brevity of the introductions. But if you're a completist, or specifically want a movie-themed collection of King's best fiction, this is worth the asking price.

PS: "Trucks" from NIGHT SHIFT should have been included, because of its uniqueness: it's the only film King himself directed. The story of King behind the wheel as director is as entertaining as the short story itself. The film version was MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE, which is something of a misnomer: the film really never got into first gear, so to speak, but stalled in neutral.

Note: Subterranean Press is issuing a $75 edition in hardback, with art commissioned especially for their edition. It's a run of 2000 copies and, if you want it, you'd have to get it directly from the publisher to guarantee receiving a copy, as they tend to sell principally to subscribers and, if there's anything left over, then to online booksellers. Again, my recommendation is that this edition is more for completists than a new reader, who will want all the King anthologies in their original appearances.

Truth in advertising: I've written a little bit about Stephen King here and there, so I'm reasonably familiar with his work.

I'm struggling to understand why this book exists.

For starters, it contains five short stories or novellas that are readily available anywhere and that a King fan of any stripe will have already read.

What is equally confounding is why these five stories. They are, for the most part, great stories, but they haven't even come close to representing the best adaptations of his work. His (too) brief introductions to each story mostly consist of, "This movie missed the mark", so is this collection to set the record straight, to prove that the source material wasn't to blame? I don't think so. I still don't know why this book exists, but I am reasonably sure that record-keeping is not the answer.

Also mind-boggling: eleven pages? Eleven pages of new material - and one of them just a top 10 list - is why I'm supposed to buy this? As long-winded as King is, and we get 11 pages of new material to justify a collection of stories, almost all of which were written over ten years ago?

Again, but different: why these stories? Why stories about bad films? Not all of them obviously, but who cares about "The Mangler"? It's an awesome story - one of my favorites to read aloud - but even King doesn't remember parts of the forgettable movie. Why not pick movies that he actually liked? Why no insight into his relationship with "Apt Pupil" or "The Mist"?

The short shrift and non-sensical motives behind this book make it feel like a ruse. This man is turning into Harlan Ellison: "Reprint that story just ONE more time, please. I don't think anyone's read it in the last few years. Just one more time, please." I'd have loved to read a book about his thoughts on his films; his fans largely don't even need the stories present to make that worth buying. How about a book where King has to sit down and watch all of the movies based on his stories? now THAT would be an awesome book. Painful for him I am sure, but an awesome book. This isn't even a sneeze in that direction.

At the price, you can buy "Skeleton Crew" or "Night Shift" and get twice the amount of stories without the insult to boot. I want to give it one star but the stories in here are actually good...it's just that no one needs them again without some real insight from the author, and he doesn't provide any.

Like another reviewer, I was going to buy this book until I realized it was just a compilation of short stories I already own. I went through the book a few times in the store thinking there must surely be pages of SK essays I am missing, but no. The only "new" material are very short intros to each story and one page with a list of SK's top-ten movie adaptations. The scariest thing about this book? Buyer beware!!!

I feel totally duped for buying this book and wish I could get my money back. It's basically just a reprint of older King stories, with a scant introduction (2 pages or less) before each one. That's it. I'd bet most King fans have read these stories before and probably already own them in other collections (I do).

The only reason I bought this book was because I was expecting (from the book's title and description on the back cover) that this book was going to feature King's insights and behind-the-scenes comments about the making of these films, how they compare to his books, etc. Sadly, this is not the case.

The list of King's "10 Favorite Adaptations" is literally a list of 10 movie titles in alphabetical order, and that's it. Why are they his favorites? Which one is his ultimate favorite? Who knows?? It doesn't say.

My advice is to pass on this book, unless you're new to King and have never read these stories before. If you have, then there's nothing new here, and what little new there is you could easily read in about 10 minutes at your local bookstore before putting it back on the shelf.

I wish I had read the reviews here before putting it on my wish list. I got this for xmas as a result and finally got around to reading it after finishing 2 other absolutely perfect King books (Duma Key and Just After Sunset).

So I was really looking forward to reading this book even though I haven't seen all the movies. I was severely disappointed when I realized this was just a rehash of previously published short stories that I already have from other books with only very brief intros about each. The intros don't even really say much about the movie experience, at least not in the way that the back cover blurb makes you expect that it will.

What a lame way to get additional bucks out of the same old stories. I would hope Stephen didn't completely come up with this idea himself. Had to be his publisher forcing it on him. Not cool!

I was psyched when I saw this at the book store tonight, and promptly put it in my 'buying' pile. Luckily, the checkout line was long and I took another look. PHEW!

While I originally thought I was buying a memoir of Stephen King's film memories of being on set, I discovered I'd almost been tricked into buying a book with five short stories I'd already read. Sure, King wrote microscopic introductions for each of the stories, and a one page list of his 10-favorite adaptations of his work (with no info beyond the list), but those few pages of liner notes are hardly worth forking over some of your hard-earned money.

Buyers: BEWARE!!!!

Consider the three-star rating to be a happy medium between ratings of five stars for content and one star for false advertising.

The back of the paperback edition of "Movies" says that the "five... celebrated short stories" are expanded by "King's personal commentary, his all-new introductions, and essential, behind-the-scenes insights."

So, let's get this straight: the back cover blurb promises us a new book, with lots of new material. First, commentary; second, an all-new introduction; and third, behind-the-scenes insight. The special 'Salem's Lot, Illustrated Edition, for example, already included all of those things (and more). So why wouldn't you believe the back cover blurb?

In factor, however, this "movies" book does NOT contain three types of new material. It simply contains a single, short, introduction (all new, at least) -- one to two pages per story. Mostly these pages describe what King either liked about the movie adaptation (things the director lifted wholesale from the story) or didn't like (things the director added on his own). There's also an unadorned list of King's ten favorite movie adaptations (note that The Shining [Blu-ray] appears nowhere on this list).

I bought "Movies" because I didn't own three of the five stories within. I'd never read "The Mangler" or "Children of the Corn", both great early examples of King's black-comedy horrorfests. I also didn't own "Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption", having lost my copy of Different Seasons (Signet) years ago. So for me the paperback was worth the low mass-market price.

However, if you already own more than half of the stories in "Movies" in their original anthologies, then it's NOT a required purchase, unless you want to collect the brief introductions.

I bought this without really looking it over in detail (I mean, if it's new King, it's an automatic purchase, right?); much of the scripting on the front and back cover made it sound like it would provide a lengthy discussion of King's thoughts and behind-the-scenes knowledge of five of his story-to-film adaptations. Instead, five full, previously released short stories/novellas fill 95%+ of the book, leaving only about a page-and-a-half of high-level thoughts about each of the film versions from King to finish the piece. Yes, we're talking less than 10 pages of new material here. And, to make things even worse, taking "Low Men in Yellow Coats" out of the greater context of the novel HEARTS IN ATLANTIS is a questionable move, truncating the main character's arc. If, somehow, someway, you haven't acquired these stories prior, then it's a well-priced way to do so, but otherwise, if you must know King's every thought on everything, just read his new (and thin) contributions in this book in less than five minutes at your local library. And, please, don't read "Low Men in Yellow Coats" here--read all of HEARTS IN ATLANTIS instead...

Just so we're clear - this is an anthology book. There's no new fiction from the King here, what you see are 5 "short" stories culled from other volumes that have been made into popular films and been gathered into this one book. What are the stories? "Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption", "1408", "Low Men in Yellow Coats", "The Mangler", and "Children of the Corn".

Purists might argue that these are the wrong choices. After all, nearly all of King's books have been turned into great films. "The Shining", "Carrie", "Misery", "The Body" (Stand by Me), "The Green Mile", "Cujo", "It", to name but a few. So in a way if you want to read some great movies, pick up any King book and chances are it'll be even better than the film. You could also argue a book of short stories that were turned into great films already exists - "Different Seasons" features 3 of 4 stories that were made into tremendous films. But anyhoo, I think the publishers wanted to explicitly point out to anyone not in the know that Stephen King has written a lot of great stories that have been turned into a lot of great films. And here it is.

"The Mangler" is an odd choice, a crappy story about a haunted laundy mangler. Yeah, it's as bad as it sounds and I've never heard of the film. I'd read "1408" and "Shawshank" before and of course seen the amazing film adaptations. The new ones for me were the deliciously trashy "Children of the Corn" (Wicker Man meets Lord of the Flies) and the 300+ page "Low Men in Yellow Coats" filmed as "Hearts in Atlantis".

The last King fiction I'd read was the godawful "Lisey's Story" which put me off King for 5 years. "Low Men" brought me back to the fold. No messing about with idiotic colloquialisms, lack of plot, bad characterisation - here was the King I loved. A fantastic coming of age story of tragedy between a young boy, his unloving mother, and a mysterious lodger in the attic. It's the start of "Treasure Island" crossed with King's own "Dark Tower" books. The character of Ted Brautigan was endlessly fascinating and his relationship with Bobby was brilliantly realised.

I'm not sure why this collection was published but I'm glad it was if only for me to spend some time on holiday in King's fantastically written world of 1960's east coast America. For King fanatics they'll buy it for the 5 pages of new material introducing each story but for those who're fans and have read a lot of his work then chances are you'll have read most of what's in this volume already. "Low Men in Yellow Coats" though, wow. Loved it, just for that.

Just so we're clear - this is an anthology book. There's no new fiction from the King here, what you see are 5 "short" stories culled from other volumes that have been made into popular films and been gathered into this one book. What are the stories? "Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption", "1408", "Low Men in Yellow Coats", "The Mangler", and "Children of the Corn".

Purists might argue that these are the wrong choices. After all, nearly all of King's books have been turned into great films. "The Shining", "Carrie", "Misery", "The Body" (Stand by Me), "The Green Mile", "Cujo", "It", to name but a few. So in a way if you want to read some great movies, pick up any King book and chances are it'll be even better than the film. You could also argue a book of short stories that were turned into great films already exists - "Different Seasons" features 3 of 4 stories that were made into tremendous films. But anyhoo, I think the publishers wanted to explicitly point out to anyone not in the know that Stephen King has written a lot of great stories that have been turned into a lot of great films. And here it is.

"The Mangler" is an odd choice, a crappy story about a haunted laundy mangler. Yeah, it's as bad as it sounds and I've never heard of the film. I'd read "1408" and "Shawshank" before and of course seen the amazing film adaptations. The new ones for me were the deliciously trashy "Children of the Corn" (Wicker Man meets Lord of the Flies) and the 300+ page "Low Men in Yellow Coats" filmed as "Hearts in Atlantis".

The last King fiction I'd read was the godawful "Lisey's Story" which put me off King for 5 years. "Low Men" brought me back to the fold. No messing about with idiotic colloquialisms, lack of plot, bad characterisation - here was the King I loved. A fantastic coming of age story of tragedy between a young boy, his unloving mother, and a mysterious lodger in the attic. It's the start of "Treasure Island" crossed with King's own "Dark Tower" books. The character of Ted Brautigan was endlessly fascinating and his relationship with Bobby was brilliantly realised.

I'm not sure why this collection was published but I'm glad it was if only for me to spend some time on holiday in King's fantastically written world of 1960's east coast America. For King fanatics they'll buy it for the 5 pages of new material introducing each story but for those who're fans and have read a lot of his work then chances are you'll have read most of what's in this volume already. "Low Men in Yellow Coats" though, wow. Loved it, just for that.