By Quin
I just stumbled upon an article that made a claim that there are over 20 Stephen King stories in some stage of film or television development right now. I have to admit that the article felt like it placed a lot of faith in rumors – and it was also on one of those websites where you have to endlessly click to a new page to read a long list, which we all know is designed to add more web hits for advertisers. Despite all of that, I still read the whole thing. Apparently Maximum Overdrive is going to be remade? Things are getting really crazy, folks, when Maximum Overdrive is up for a remake.
As silly and uninformative as this article seemed to me, it still got me thinking about Stephen King. I’ve been a longtime fan, but I’ve realized that even though I am familiar with a big chunk of his work, I’ve still barely scratched the surface. I’ve read most of the classic works (some multiple times – like Pet Sematary) and I’ve seen almost all of the adaptations – even Kingdom Hospital (which is actually Lars Von Trier by way of King) as well as the plethora of other made-for-TV assortment of crap. While I’m still catching up on his 20th century work, he’s been awfully prolific this century – and I’m hardly aware of any of it. Therefore, I haven’t quite gotten to his 2010 collection of short stories Full Dark, No Stars (one of the best titles ever, by the way). In this collection, you will find A Good Marriage, which is now a major motion picture – not a short film, but a 102 minute feature length film. However, Stephen King’s A Good Marriage is loaded with problems and I struggle to find much to like about it at all.
Bob and Darcy have been married for 25 years. Life is good. Bob is a professional coin collector and looking for them keeps him on the road regularly. He and his wife run a coin dealing business out of their home. One day, when Bob is away, Darcy finds something shocking in the garage – a tin box filled with driver’s licenses of women who have gone missing. (This happens early, so I’m giving nothing away.) All the while there are reports of a serial killer in the area known as Beadie, and Darcy notices that she is being watched by someone lurking in the rain. This convoluted set-up, as well as the less-than-startling revelation that slaps you upside the head, all builds up to a wanna-be thriller that makes Sleeping With the Enemy look like a masterpiece of modern horror. Just so we’re all clear, it’s not. But the tone and theme of the two movies is so similar. The 1991 Julia Roberts film is infinitely more entertaining and satisfying while still remaining a less-than mediocre film. A Good Marriage is just dull and predictable.
The lead actors in A Good Marriage have both done a pretty even mix of good and bad work in the past. Joan Allen has been nominated for three Academy Awards and she was incredible as the title character in the biopic Georgia O’Keefe. Anthony LaPaglia is probably best known to horror fans for his role in John Landis’ Innocent Blood. I’m sure they both did their best with King’s surprisingly pun-heavy script, but for a married couple who have been together as long as they have, their conversations don’t seem very intimate at all. Even before the big reveal of who Bob really is, they both are just kind of spewing words at the walls rather than truly engaging with one another. As soon as Bob rolls back into town and Darcy has to deal with him directly, things get slightly more kinetic. The big problem is that we can see it all coming in slow motion. This just leaves the viewer frustrated and annoyed.
The best acting in the film comes from Stephen Lang as the sickly and mysterious stranger. I don’t even want to say much about him, because his performance is quite possibly the only thing worth praising in this mess. He absolutely overdoes it, but it’s still a joy to behold. He doesn’t hold back and he will make you cringe. I’ve liked him in just about everything I’ve ever seen him in. His role here as Holt Ramsey is no exception.
As for Stephen King, the master of horror and the macabre; what are we going to do with him? Mr. King is no stranger to adapting his own stories for the screen. Perhaps he feels as if they are in better hands if those hands are his own. But, over and over he has proven that not even he can translate his writing for the screen. It’s always missing crucial elements that only work on the page. He’s had a reasonable amount of success with this before, but even when they follow the source material closely, they still just don’t fully work. We’ll see if he has better luck with Cell, scheduled to come out later this year, but I certainly won’t be holding my breath. At least he stopped directing after Maximum Overdrive.
Stephen King’s A Good Marriage is available now in the UK on DVD and VOD/digital platforms via Grimm Entertainment.