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Reed Alexander's Horror Review of 'The Mist' (2007)

Monsters on parade.

By Reed AlexanderPublished 5 years ago 4 min read
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I didn't read the book. Two things. First, I don't give a flying fuck if this wasn't close to the actual book. Sorry, I just don't fucking care. Second, I don't give a good goddamn if the book was better. This movie was fucking awesome! And god DAMN it was brutal. It just keeps kicking you while you're down, and you don't think anything can get any worse, then it pulls out a set of golf clubs and starts whaling on you Mafia style while you're curled up in the fetal position. And the ending, the coup de gras, is a merciless shot to the dick with steel-toed boots.

This movie was out to hurt you. If you didn't leave the movie theater with a sour stomach, you're not human, or just a flat out liar. If you didn't get the feeling that you're being punished when you watched this, I can only imagine you weren't paying attention. The director set out to make a movie that hates you, and he succeeded!

This move has got to be one of the all time greatest creature features ever. They mesh practical FX with CGI pretty seamlessly, and while they do lean a bit too heavy on the CGI, they're not too showy with it. The whole plot surrounds this nigh impenetrable fog that's covering the town, so the atmosphere is perfect to obscure all the creepy shit. It's dark and hazy; another movie that forces you to watch with the light off. The protagonists are cramped and isolated in a storefront, which makes for a shitty defensible position.

There's this ever looming sense that there's something out there. It's anyone's guess as to what, but whatever it is, it kills you, slowly, painfully, and in gruesome fashion. Mind you, there's more than one thing in the fog, but it's the "not knowing" that really makes this agonizing tension. Then people just start dropping like flies.

Even better, the acting is fantastic. Someone that I'll have to touch on in the spoilers. Suffice to say, for survival horror, every character's reaction is perfect. No one knows how to handle themselves in the situation. Half of the people that get killed die from mistakes they make just trying to defend themselves. That's before it gets into the really gritty human element and everyone starts tearing each other apart. There were some downright award-winning performances in this movie.

This is most certainly a mandatory must watch for Horror Heads, but is damn good even for general adult audiences. Anyone who watches this movie through to the end is going to regret doing so, but that's sort of the point. You're not intended to enjoy it, but rather suffer through it and survive it. So fucking watch it.

SPOILERS!!!

I'm a fairly unstable fellow to be honest, and if I had to deal with the bible-thumping psycho in this movie, I'd have stuck my blade in her throat after about the second scene of her causing panic. But that's sort of the point. Marcia Gay Harden does such a marvelous job at being an antagonist that you just hate her! You can't help it. The entire movie you just want someone to kill her, or throw her outside into the mist with the monsters. Every moment of her speaking is like nails on a chalkboard, and that's before she whips up enough people into going full Christian revival. That makes the inevitable scene where someone finally just puts a bullet in her head so fucking fantastic! She really does deserve recognition for her representation of Mrs. Carmody.

But we're here to talk about monsters. Everything is the mist is deadly and it doesn't just kill you, it kills you slowly and painfully. There's the tentacles from the loading dock which rip a bag boy to shreds right before eating him. There's the dragon flies with stingers that cause a slow gasping painful death while it melts your insides. There's the flying beasts which are the equivalent of being pecked to pieces by large birds. And let's not forget the spiders, which paralyze you, stick you up in a cocoon, and lay their eggs in you so you eventually erupt into thousands a little flesh hungry spiders.

However, this movie is known for its ending, and if you don't know it, I won't spoil it. You deserve that pain.

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About the Creator

Reed Alexander

I'm a horror author and foulmouthed critic of all things horror. New reviews posted every Monday.

@ReedsHorror on TikTok, Threads, Instagram, YouTube, and Mastodon.

Check out my books on Godless: https://godless.com/products/reed-alexander

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